Best Project Time Tracking for Architecture and Engineering Firms

How can architects and engineers track project time without interrupting their work?

Architecture and engineering firms need detailed time records, but recording those details should not interfere with design, analysis, documentation, or client work. Timesheets.com gives architects, engineers, designers, drafters, technicians, project managers, and administrative employees several straightforward ways to record project time. Employees can run a timer while working, enter completed time manually, fill out a weekly timesheet, or submit time from a mobile device. Each entry can be assigned to the appropriate client, project, and type of work, with notes explaining what was completed. Employees get a practical time-entry process, while managers receive the detail they need for project oversight, reporting, job costing, and billing.

Can we track hours by client, project, phase, and type of work?

Yes. Timesheets.com allows firms to organize time by customer, project, and account code. Projects can represent individual contracts, jobs, or engagements, while account codes can represent phases, services, or other categories of work. A firm could track time spent on schematic design, design development, construction documents, administration, and more. Administrators can also control which projects are available to each employee, helping team members select the correct assignment without searching through a long list of unrelated jobs.

How can we see where a project’s labor hours and costs are going?

Timesheets.com turns project time into information that managers can review throughout the life of a project. Reports can show hours worked, labor costs, billable amounts, non-billable effort, expenses, and the activities consuming the most time. Project managers can filter and group records by customer, project, employee, service, or account code to see how much time has been recorded, which phases have required the most labor, and where actual work may be exceeding expectations. This gives firms a clearer picture of project performance before unexpected labor demands become buried in an end-of-project spreadsheet.

Can different employees, projects, and services use different billing rates?

Yes. A principal, project architect, licensed engineer, designer, drafter, and technician may each have a different billing rate for the same project. An employee may also have different rates depending on the client, contract, or service being performed. Timesheets.com supports project billing rates, employee-specific rate overrides, separate cost and billing rates, and adjustments for individual time entries. Managers control these rates and can restrict access to confidential financial information, allowing employees to record their work without calculating charges or viewing information they do not need.

How do we separate project time from payroll and attendance records?

An employee may work eight hours in a day while dividing those hours among several projects, phases, meetings, and internal activities. Timesheets.com keeps the employee’s total working time separate from the details of how that time was used.

Hourly Timesheets can track:

• Clock-in and clock-out times
• Regular and overtime hours
• Attendance
• Paid and unpaid breaks
• PTO
• Payroll information

Project Timesheets can track:

• Clients and projects
• Project phases and services
• Billable and non-billable time
• Work notes
• Billing rates
• Labor costs
• Internal and administrative activities

Payroll time answers, “How long did this employee work?” Project time answers, “Which projects and activities used those hours?” Firms can use project time tracking by itself or combine it with hourly time tracking when they also need attendance, overtime, PTO, and payroll records.

How do project managers review time before it is used for billing?

Project managers need an opportunity to identify incomplete, inaccurate, or misclassified entries before project time is reported or sent to accounting. Timesheets.com provides one place to review project assignments, recorded hours, work notes, billable status, rates, and other time-entry details. Managers can confirm that time was assigned to the correct project and phase, distinguish billable work from non-billable activity, identify entries that need attention, and approve records before reporting or billing. Record histories help explain corrections, while archived records can remain available for reporting without being changed after they have been processed.

Can historical project time help us estimate future work more accurately?

Accurate historical time records give architecture and engineering firms a stronger basis for preparing proposals, project budgets, and staffing plans. Managers can review how many hours similar projects required by phase, service, discipline, or employee instead of relying only on memory. A firm can examine the actual time spent on design, documentation, engineering, permitting, coordination, revisions, site visits, and construction administration. Over time, these records can reveal phases that are frequently underestimated, services that require additional staffing, and work that regularly falls outside the original scope.

Why do architecture and engineering firms choose Timesheets.com?

Architecture and engineering firms need more than a basic employee time clock. They need project time connected to clients, jobs, phases, services, employees, billing rates, and labor costs. Timesheets.com makes that information straightforward for project teams to record and useful for managers to review. Employees get flexible time-entry options, while project managers get organized records for approvals, reporting, billing support, job costing, and future estimating. Simple for project teams. Detailed for managers. Useful for understanding where every project hour goes.