Everhour supports team capacity and time policies, while a spreadsheet needs clear utilization inputs before the math works.
Measure billable utilization against total capacity and see exactly how many hours you're leaving on the table each period.
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A utilization rate spreadsheet answers one practical question: what share of a person's available capacity became billable work? The core formula is billable hours divided by available hours. The spreadsheet matters because "available hours" is a policy choice. Some firms use gross capacity, such as 40 hours per week. Others use net working hours after PTO, holidays, unpaid leave, or other approved absences.
For U.S. teams, federal law does not define full-time employment, so full-time capacity belongs in employer policy. Many firms use 40 weekly hours as a gross baseline because federal overtime rules require covered nonexempt employees to receive overtime pay for hours worked over 40 in a fixed 168-hour workweek. That produces 2,080 annual gross hours before company leave rules reduce capacity.
Start with columns for person, role, period, gross capacity, PTO or holiday hours, other approved absence, net available hours, billable hours, non-billable client hours, internal hours, utilization rate, and notes. The utilization formula should point only to billable hours and the named denominator. Internal training, sales calls, administration, and management time should stay visible without inflating the numerator.
A spreadsheet fails when one column mixes actual work, paid time not worked, and target capacity. Paid vacation and paid holiday access are common in private industry, but the FLSA does not require payment for time not worked, including vacations, sick leave, or federal or other holidays. Private-sector paid holidays remain an employer policy matter unless another law or contract applies.
Use `billable hours / available hours * 100` for the utilization percentage. For one project manager in a short reporting period, assume 45 net available hours after approved time off, 36 billable hours, 6 internal planning hours, and 3 admin hours. The utilization rate is 36 divided by 45, or 80.00%. At a $145 standard billing rate, those 36 billable hours carry $5,220 of standard billable value.
The same row can show effective value across the named denominator: $5,220 divided by 45 net available hours equals $116.00 per available hour. That second figure does not replace utilization. It adds commercial context for staffing and pricing decisions. Keep realization separate because realization compares billed or collected value against standard billable value, while utilization compares billable hours against capacity.
A one-off spreadsheet is enough for a monthly check, a small team review, or a single project retrospective. It works when everyone agrees on the period, the denominator, and the billable classification before entering data. It breaks when people update hours late, managers overwrite formulas, leave is tracked in another file, or different teams use different available-hour definitions.
A managed workflow becomes necessary when capacity policy, approvals, and role access need control. Everhour Team Management supports weekly capacity per team member, approval workflows, lock rules, admin time correction, roles, project assignments, team groups, and team-wide time policy defaults. Those controls turn a spreadsheet-style utilization calculation into a repeatable management process with fewer manual corrections.
This content is for general information only, may not be fully up to date, and is provided without any warranty or liability.
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Use `billable hours / available hours * 100`. The numerator should include hours that count as billable under the firm's policy. The denominator must be labeled as gross capacity, net available hours, or total logged hours. A rate of 36 billable hours over 45 net available hours equals 80.00%.
The denominator drives the result more than the formula does. A person with 36 billable hours has 90.00% utilization against 40 gross hours and 80.00% utilization against 45 available hours. The spreadsheet should name the denominator on every row so managers compare like with like.
PTO and holidays should appear when the firm calculates utilization against net available hours. The FLSA does not require payment for time not worked, including vacations, sick leave, or federal or other holidays, so the spreadsheet should follow employer policy, contract terms, and any applicable law rather than assume a federal leave entitlement.
Yes. Person-level rows should calculate individual billable hours divided by individual available hours. Team-level utilization should sum billable hours and divide by summed available hours for the same period. Averaging individual percentages gives distorted results when people have different capacities, leave, or part-time schedules.
A common mistake is subtracting non-billable work from the denominator instead of leaving it in available hours. Training, sales support, internal meetings, and administration consume available capacity, so they should reduce utilization through the numerator, not disappear from the denominator. Removing them makes the team look more billable than it was.
Everhour Team Management lets admins set weekly capacity per team member, use approval workflows, lock completed periods, correct team member time, and group people for department-level reporting. Those controls give utilization exports a cleaner capacity and approval base before the numbers move into a spreadsheet.
Everhour reports can group and filter logged time by member, project, client, and metadata, with billable time available as a report column. Managers can export reports in CSV, Excel/XLSX, or PDF format for spreadsheet review, client sharing, or archive needs.
Set weekly capacity, approve submitted time, lock closed periods, and organize teams by role or group. Everhour turns utilization tracking into a controlled management workflow.
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