Overview
A time entry records a stretch of work: who did it, when it started and finished, what was done, and whether it's billable. Beeswax saves one every time someone pauses a task or sends it to review and saves the time panel, and every time someone logs time by hand.
The Time Entries page puts all of them in one place, so you can see where the week went, fix anything that's wrong, and make sure the right time gets billed.
Key characteristics:
- Always on a task — Every entry belongs to a task. Time logged by hand from this page creates a task of its own, already closed and ready to invoice.
- Billable or not — Each entry is billable (the default) or not. Only billable time is invoiced.
- Rates come from the task — The Product or Service that sets the rate belongs to the task, not to each entry.
- Timeline view — Each day's entries sit on a 24-hour track, one colour per person.
For starting, pausing and reviewing tasks, and invoicing the finished work, see Tasks.
Finding Your Time
- Every project: open the Work menu and choose Time Entries.
- One project: open the project and choose its Time tab.
- Your own week: the dashboard's My Time widget has a Full Report button that opens the Time Entries page.
The page opens on the current week (Monday to Sunday), or on the date range you last chose, showing billable time.
Filters
| Filter | Description |
|---|---|
| Date Range | Pick any range, or a preset: This Month, Last Month, This Quarter, Last Quarter, Current FY or Last FY. Beeswax remembers the last range you applied. |
| Assigned To | One or more team members. Owners, Super Admins, Managers and Accountants only. |
| Project | One project. On the Time Entries page only; a project's Time tab is already filtered to that project. |
| Billable? | On (the default) shows billable time only. Off shows only the time that isn't billable. |
Choose Go to apply the filters.
Reading the Timeline
- Each day has its own group, newest first.
- Every entry is a bar on a 24-hour track, placed at the time the work happened. The shaded band is your account's work hours, labelled with its time zone.
- Each person has their own colour, with their initials beside the bar.
- A red dollar sign means the entry isn't billable (switch Billable? off to see these).
- A green arrow means the entry started the day before; its bar is drawn from midnight.
- Hover over a bar for the details: how long it took, the start and finish, the comment, and the task, project and Product or Service it belongs to.
Logging Time
For work that was never set up as a task, choose Log Time.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Start / finish | Drag the slider's handles, or type the hours and minutes. Beeswax works out the duration. A new entry starts as the hour ending now. |
| Task | A name for the work. Beeswax creates a task with this name. |
| Description | What you did ("Write something..."). |
| User | Who did the work. Defaults to you. Owners, Super Admins, Managers and Accountants can choose anyone; everyone else logs their own time. |
| Date | Defaults to today. |
| Project | The project the work belongs to. Fixed for Basic users. |
| Product / Service | An hourly or daily one; it sets the rate you'll invoice at. |
| Billable | Ticked by default. Untick it for internal time. |
When you save, Beeswax creates the task, already closed, so it's ready to invoice with everything else on the project's Closed Tasks page.
To log time against an existing task, use that task's Pause or Review button: see Tasks.
Editing & Deleting
- Change the times — Click the bar, then drag either end (or type the times). Choose the tick to save, or the cross to cancel.
- Change anything else — Choose the pencil at the end of the row. The full entry opens: the comment, the user, the date, the Product or Service and whether it's billable.
- Delete — Choose the bin, then the tick that appears to confirm. A deleted entry can't be brought back. If Beeswax created a task for the entry, the task stays.
The Product or Service belongs to the task, so changing it on one entry changes the rate for all of that task's time.
Billing & Rates
- Only billable time is invoiced. Each task becomes one line on the invoice, and its quantity is the task's billable hours; entries marked not billable stay off the invoice.
- The rate is the task's Product or Service.
- Time is invoiced task by task from the project's Closed Tasks page (Invoice Selected). There's no separate import of individual time entries. See Tasks.
Task Timer
Starting a task records when work began; there's no running clock to watch. When you choose Pause or Review, the time panel opens with the time since you started, and saving it creates a time entry. Starting a second task logs the time on the first and pauses it, so your entries never overlap. A task left running is paused automatically at 11:30 pm.
Permissions by Role
| Action | Owner | Super Admin | Manager | Accountant | Basic | Contractor | Client |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Log time entries | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Own only | No | No |
| Edit time entries | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Own only | No | No |
| Delete time entries | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Own only | No | No |
| View all entries | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Own only | No | No |
| Filter by user | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
| See billing rates | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
Basic Plus follows Basic for the actions in this table; its extra access is to account-wide tasks and read-only projects. See Roles.
Key Notes
- Basic users see and edit only their own entries, without the rates. The Work menu is hidden for them; they reach their time from a project's Time tab.
- Owners, Super Admins, Managers and Accountants see everyone's time and can log or fix it for anyone.
- Clients and Contractors can't open time entries.