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3 min 18 sec
0:00
Hours not yet invoiced
0:25
Work in progress
0:42
Why the ledger can't see it
1:13
Unbilled hours go stale
1:34
Bill little and often
1:55
Closed tasks in Beeswax
2:29
Recap and quiz
Accounting 101
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Keeping it straight
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Episode 20
Unbilled Work
(Money you've earned, but haven't asked for.)
Maya has twenty hours of work for Harbour and Co that isn't on an invoice yet. Why the ledger can't see it, and why unbilled time goes stale if you leave it.
unbilled work
work in progress
wip
billable time
Transcript
0:00
It's the end of March, and Maya's been flat out. Twenty extra hours for Harbour and Co., on top of their retainer. A booking page, a batch of social posts, and one very long call about a logo that ended up exactly where it started.
0:15
She hasn't invoiced any of it yet. Today: unbilled work. Money you've earned, but haven't asked for.
0:26
Accountants call it work in progress. W I P. It's time you've spent, at your rate, that isn't on an invoice yet.
0:34
Twenty hours, at a hundred and twenty an hour. Twenty-four hundred. Earned. Real. And completely invisible to your books.
0:42
Because the ledger only moves when a document does. No invoice, no income, and no debtor either. March's profit and loss has no idea those hours exist.
0:53
Usually, that sorts itself out. The invoice goes out in April, April looks brilliant, March looks a bit feeble, and nobody's really to blame.
1:01
But at year end, or when a month's numbers really matter, you can accrue it, just like last episode. Debit accrued income, credit services. Then reverse it when the invoice goes out.
1:13
The bigger danger isn't timing. It's forgetting. Unbilled hours go stale. The client forgets asking. You forget doing it. And the longer it waits, the harder that invoice is to send.
1:25
Every hour you never bill is an hour you worked for free. For a small studio, it's often the biggest leak in the whole business. Bigger than the biscuits.
1:34
So watch the number. How much unbilled work is sitting there right now? How old is it? And bill it little and often, not in one terrifying lump.
1:44
Some time is never meant to be billed, of course. Admin, proposals, that logo call. That's fine. Mark it as non-billable, so it doesn't pretend to be money.
1:55
In Beeswax, time is logged against tasks, and it's billable unless you say otherwise. When a task is closed, it lands in Closed Tasks, ready for invoicing, and the project shows what hasn't been invoiced yet.
2:08
Tick the tasks, choose Invoice Selected, and add them to a new invoice or an existing one. Each task becomes a line, with its billable hours, at the rate for that service.
2:20
Already covered by a fixed price? Choose Mark as Invoiced instead. The tasks stop waiting, and nothing extra lands on the invoice.
2:29
So. Unbilled work is earned, but not yet invoiced. The ledger can't see it until the invoice goes out. Accrue it when the timing matters. And bill it before it goes stale.
2:41
Quick one. Twelve billable hours at ninety an hour, and three hours of admin marked non-billable. How much should the invoice be?
2:50
Have a think.
2:54
Ten eighty. Twelve hours at ninety. The admin was real work, but it isn't billable.
3:00
Maya sent Harbour's invoice on the first of April. They paid within a week. The logo, as far as anyone knows, is still exactly where it started.
3:09
Next time: depreciation. Why the laptop from episode one quietly costs Maya something every single year.