Freelancer Client & Project Tracker With Hourly Rate Calculator
$2,400 is a good fee until you divide it by fifty-two hours. Then it is $46 an hour — and you will not find that out until you have already quoted the next job on the same basis.
Eight working tabs, already linked together, plus a Start Here page. Instant download. No app, no login, no monthly fee.
What is in it
- Settings — payment terms, tax share, and when you want to be warned.
- Your Rate — weeks off, the share of your time you can really bill, business costs and the tax you never keep. Put in the take-home you need and it gives you the floor.
- Clients — 150 rows, with everything to the right of the name calculated.
- Projects — 200 rows, quoted fee against hours actually logged.
- Time — 1,200 rows, one per session. Invoices — 300 rows, with due dates, days overdue and a tax pot.
- Monthly and Overview — invoiced, received, hours and earned per hour by month, then your real rate against the one you need and what to chase today.
Who it is for
Freelancers and one-person studios who quote by the project but pay their bills by the month — designers, developers, writers, translators, photographers, consultants.
The worked example
In the example, a $42,000 take-home works out at a floor of $57.07 an hour — not the $45 the freelancer thought they were charging. Every project then shows the quoted fee divided by the hours it really took, with a warning the moment it drops under that floor. Free pitches are counted too, which is the honest place for them.
Type a client name once and their projects, hours, invoiced, paid, outstanding, average days to pay and share of your year all fill in. A client on 14-day terms averaging 47 days turns red. And one client above the share you set is flagged: above roughly forty per cent you are not freelancing, you are employed by one company without any of the protections.
How it works
Compatible with Microsoft Excel 2016 or newer on Windows or Mac, with Google Sheets, and with LibreOffice Calc. No macros. Due dates come from each client’s own terms, so the chase list builds itself.
The download has two workbooks: one with the worked example already in it and one completely blank, plus a Start Here guide as a PDF. Buy it on Etsy — $9
Sold through my Etsy shop, ThePlainLedger, so the download, the payment and the buyer protection are all handled by Etsy.
Need it built around your business?
This file assumes you bill by the hour or by the project in one currency. If you work on retainers, split fees with a collaborator, or invoice in more than one currency, I can build the same eight tabs around that instead.
All other templates are listed on the Excel & Google Sheets Templates page.