Everhour connects time tracking to budgets and billing, while your rate still needs clean inputs.
Track billable vs. non-billable time and see your real utilization rate and revenue potential in seconds.
Working hours in the period
Admin, meetings, internal work
Industry average is 75–80%
The calculator gives you the number — Everhour takes it from there.
One click and you're timing. Start a timer, add an entry, edit the details. This is exactly how it feels in Everhour.
Set a budget, assign rates, and get alerted before you're over.
Measurement
Track your budget through time or costs
Every report you need — configured your way, always up to date.
Tracked hours flow straight into a polished invoice — no copy-paste, no manual math.
A billing rate answers one practical question: what hourly price covers the cost of doing the work and leaves the margin you need. For service work, the useful rate is not based on every hour in the week. It is based on billable hours, because internal meetings, admin, training, and sales work do not directly create invoiceable revenue.
The result is normally a USD hourly rate for U.S. billing. After you calculate the service rate, keep taxes separate unless the invoice rules require otherwise. The United States has no federal VAT/GST or national sales-tax rate for billed professional time. Sales tax treatment is state and local, so taxable services need a jurisdiction-specific tax input.
Start with the annual cost you need to recover, then divide it by realistic annual billable hours. A clean structure is labor cost plus overhead plus target profit, divided by expected billable hours. Overhead can include software, rent, insurance, admin support, and non-billable management time if those costs are part of delivering the service.
For example, a consultant has $78,000 in annual labor cost and $18,000 in overhead. The consultant wants $24,000 in profit and expects 1,200 billable hours for the year. Total required revenue is $120,000, so the billing rate is $100 per hour. At that rate, 37 approved billable hours create a $3,700 pre-tax invoice line before discounts, write-downs, or expenses.
The billing rate is the price per hour. The invoice amount is approved billable hours multiplied by that rate, after any billing increment, write-down, or non-billable exclusion. Mixing those steps creates avoidable errors, especially when a project includes fixed-fee work, custom task rates, or a discount applied after time has already been approved.
Use the rate calculation to set the price, then use the invoice calculation to price the actual work. If a client contract requires 6-minute rounding, round time according to that contract before multiplying by the rate. If the work is subject to state or local tax, apply the correct jurisdiction-specific tax rule after the service amount is known.
A one-off calculator is enough when you need a quick rate for a proposal, a solo project, or a simple review of whether an hourly price covers cost and profit. It works well when the inputs are stable: one service line, one hourly rate, one expected billable capacity, and no special client billing rule.
A managed workflow becomes necessary when rates connect to budgets, recurring retainers, approval steps, and invoice timing. Everhour Project Budgeting supports hour-based and money-based budgets, recurring budget periods, email alerts, budget protection, expense controls, multiple billing methods, and client-level budgets, so the rate is tied to the work as time is logged.
This content is for general information only, may not be fully up to date, and is provided without any warranty or liability.
High Performer
G2
Summer 2026
Best Ease Of Use
Capterra
Summer 2026
Rated in the top time trackers across G2, Capterra, and TrustRadius — with consistent praise for ease of use, integrations, and support.
The basic formula is total required revenue divided by expected billable hours. Total required revenue includes labor cost, overhead, and target profit. Expected billable hours should exclude admin time, sales time, training, and other work that will not be billed to a client.
Yes. Overhead belongs in the billing rate when it is part of the cost of running the service business. If software, insurance, rent, admin support, and management time are not included, the hourly rate can cover direct labor while still leaving the business underpriced.
No. A billing rate is the stated price per hour. An effective billing rate is actual revenue divided by total worked hours or another chosen hour base. Write-downs, non-billable work, fixed fees, and discounts can make the effective billing rate lower than the stated rate.
Set the pre-tax billing rate first. The United States has no federal VAT/GST or single national sales-tax rate for billed professional time. If the service is taxable, add a state and local tax input based on the applicable jurisdiction and service category.
The common mistake is dividing required revenue by total working hours instead of billable hours. A person working 2,080 hours in a year does not bill 2,080 hours. If only 1,200 hours are billable, the rate must recover annual cost and profit over those 1,200 hours.
Everhour Project Budgeting lets teams set time or money budgets, recurring budget periods, and budget alerts as tracked work accumulates. That keeps a chosen billing rate connected to project limits instead of leaving rate math isolated in a spreadsheet.
Everhour Billing & Invoicing converts tracked billable time and expenses into invoices using project, member, or task rates while excluding non-billable work. Invoiced time is marked as invoiced so the same approved hours do not appear again on a later invoice.
Set the rate, then keep budgets aligned as hours are approved. Everhour Project Budgeting connects time and money limits to tracked work, recurring periods, alerts, and budget protection.
14-day free trial · No credit card · Cancel anytime
