In your business do you Generic Drugs Fine Wine keep track of billable hours for your clients? Do you find it absolutely annoying to constantly keep track of thirty different timesheets in Excel?

I just have to share with you this new tool a fellow VA shared with me . Its called MyHours and it simply is the greatest software to track your billable hours. I signed up for a free MyHours account (which they state will be going to a paid system at some point Im kind of keeping my fingers crossed that theyll forget about that little note theyve made on Elephant Man website) and I started using it immediately.

Once you sign up, the first place you need to go to is the Projects tab so you can set up your clients and the various projects you may do for each client. The next place you should go is the Tasks tab and set up a few of the regular tasks that you do. For myself, I used this area to put in things like Transcription, Web Maintenance and Administrative Support.

Once you have those two areas filled out, you can begin using MyHours (I told you it was easy!) in one of two ways regular daily view entry or entry through the MHlite interface. The difference is that the regular daily view entry uses up the whole screen and you have to manually put in your start and stop times. With MHlite, it works much like a punch clock. You hit Start Work to begin and Finish Work to end and it calculates the time youve home owners insurance on that project / task.

One thing I want to note is that whether you are using the daily view or the lite version, there is one row in the data entry that says Notes. I would highly recommend using these and getting into the habit of putting data in there from the time you start. I add a more detailed note so that my client knows exactly what it was I worked on. It also allows me to look back and see precisely where my time was spent.

The reporting function of MyHours is also excellent. You can pull reports that are sorted by client, by project or by task. It automatically adds up the hours spent in each area which makes invoicing your clients a breeze!

I also think it is neat to use the software to track how much time I am spending on the various areas of my own business. Writing e-zine submissions or blog entries for example. You can see how much of your time is spent ON your business instead of IN your business.

Regardless of your own primary use of this software program, we give it two giant thumbs up. The ease of set up and use is extraordinary and I love that you can access it from anywhere. Enjoy!

-- About the Author --

Erin Blaskie is the owner of Business Services, ETC ( www.bsetc.cabsetc.ca). BSETC is a virtual assistance company that gives freedom to small business owners, coaches and speakers by managing the BS, etc.

-- For More Information --

Erin has a blog located on the main page of her website in which she provides advice on small businesses and running a virtual assistance company. She has recently started a free bi-weekly telecall for virtual assistants where they can come together with other VAs and get support. You can find out more on the website at www.bsetc.cabsetc.ca

If you want to know more about our services, please contact Erin at erin.blaskie@bsetc.ca.

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