Turn consultant hours into clear client profitability
TimeMagick is time tracking and profitability software for consulting firms.
1-month free trial · See TimeMagick pricing
Billed hours are not the same as a profitable client
Consulting firms sell expertise by the hour, the day or the engagement. The billed total shows only part of the picture: the extra interview round nobody charged for, the senior partner's time on a small account, the preparation that was never billable, the invoice that has not been sent yet.
Consulting profitability is not simply how many hours were billed. It is what the relationship produced after the time spent serving that client.
TimeMagick connects the consultant's tracked hour to the billing decision, the invoice and the client's profitability, so the firm can see that difference for every client:
Step 1
Discovery
Engagement set up as a project with an hour budget and tasks.
Step 2
Analysis
Consultants track time against the client's tasks.
Step 3
Delivery
Budget use and workload followed while the work runs.
Step 4
Client Review
The client follows progress in their workspace.
Step 5
Approved Billable Hours
The approver sets how much of each entry is billable.
Step 6
Invoice
Project Billing shows what remains; the invoice is created.
Stage and task names are examples; you create your own tasks.
Track consultant time against real client work
A consultant's week is split across clients, engagements and internal work. TimeMagick records every entry against a client, a project and a task, so each hour can later be approved, billed and counted in that client's margin:
A weekly timesheet
Delta Works: 22 h
No engagement or task behind the total.
Client, project and task
- Delta Works → Operations review → Analysis → 10 h
- Delta Works → Operations review → Interviews → 4.5 h
- Acme Retail → Pricing strategy → Workshop → 2 h
Illustrative entries; each also carries its member.
Internal preparation can be tracked against the client it served, so hours that were never charged still show up in that client's cost.
How time tracking worksDecide what is actually chargeable
Worked time and chargeable time differ in most consulting firms. Some analysis runs longer than the client should pay for, and some internal preparation is not charged at all. In TimeMagick, tracked entries wait in approval, and the approver sets a billable percentage for each one:
- 10 hours worked
- approved at 70%
- 7 billable hours
- Project Billing
- invoice
The project budget is shown beside the billable total, and bulk actions handle many entries at once. The decision is always the approver's; TimeMagick records it and carries it into billing.
Know what is billable and what has already been billed
Unbilled work is revenue the firm has earned and not yet asked for. Project Billing shows billable hours against hours already billed for every client and project, so the gap is visible without reconciling timesheets against invoices.
The same information appears in the Uninvoiced Hours table in the profitability module, listed by client.
How billing worksCatch over-servicing while the engagement is running
A fixed-fee engagement priced at 90 hours that takes 96 is over-servicing, and it is usually discovered at the end. In TimeMagick, each engagement can have an hour budget, shown against time spent on the project card, in the project overview, on the Gantt, in tracked-time approval and on the admin dashboard.
Budget alerts and forecasting work from the same numbers, so a partner can raise scope with the client before the extra hours become a write-off. Projects Over Budget is also a headline KPI.
How project budgets workMeasure utilisation without a separate spreadsheet
Utilisation is often calculated monthly in a spreadsheet, from exported timesheets, after the month is over. In TimeMagick, Utilisation % is a headline KPI, with the change from the previous period, calculated from the hours already tracked.
- Utilisation % and Effective Rate as headline KPIs
- Resource planning that shows which consultants are on which engagements
- Per-project Gantt and a portfolio Gantt across clients
- Member timesheets and reports with formatted Excel export
TimeMagick shows the figures; targets and how you act on them stay your firm's decision.
Find clients that consume time without creating margin
The biggest client by revenue is not necessarily the most profitable one. A client can need more senior time than the rate reflects, keep asking for unbilled extras, or slowly send less work.
TimeMagick's KPI module shows Avg Client Profit, Avg Client Margin, Effective Rate, Utilisation %, Repeat Client %, Retention % and Revenue Concentration %, with tables for the Most and Least Profitable Clients, Falling Activity, Uninvoiced Hours and Low-Profit Projects, and a Client Health ledger.
Illustration (demo data, fictional projects and clients).
Revenue Concentration shows how much revenue depends on your largest clients; Falling Activity flags clients whose hours are dropping. Both are early signals, read from data the firm already has.
How profitability tracking worksGive clients visibility without opening your internal operations
Clients want to know what the engagement has covered and how many hours went in. Client Members are external accounts linked to one or more of your clients, with a Dashboard, Projects, Timesheets, Report, Message Channels and Sensai.
They see the projects, hours and due tasks of the client they are linked to and can talk to your team in project channels and groups. Their workspace does not include your internal modules, such as approvals, billing, invoices or profitability.
How the client portal worksInvoice from approved work
Once hours are approved, the invoice follows from them. TimeMagick invoices combine duration-based lines for consulting hours with quantity-based lines, such as a fixed workshop day, plus taxes and notes. Each has a due date and a status and downloads as PDF, from any of your legal entities and billing accounts, in the client's currency.
For regular advisory work, scheduled recurring invoices let you choose when an invoice becomes due; when it does, it appears in TimeMagick and goes through approval. TimeMagick is not accounting software or a retainer-management system.
How invoicing worksExample workflow · fictional
Example: an operations review engagement
A client engages the firm for a 180-hour operations review. In TimeMagick, the firm would:
- Create the engagement as a project with its client and 180-hour budget, with tasks for Discovery, Interviews, Analysis, Recommendations and Workshops.
- Staff it in resource planning alongside each consultant's other engagements.
- Have consultants track client work and internal preparation against those tasks.
- Notice that interviews ran over their budget and agree the remaining scope with the client.
- Approve 10 hours of analysis at 70%, giving 7 billable hours, and internal preparation at 0%.
- Check Project Billing and invoice the approved hours plus the workshop day.
- Review the client's margin, effective rate and health against other clients.
This is an illustrative example, not a customer case study.
Where TimeMagick fits in a consulting firm
TimeMagick runs the operational side of client work: hours, billability, budgets, workload, client access, invoicing and profitability. It is not accounting software, a CRM or a proposal tool, and profitability figures are management information, not financial statements.
Pricing is per user, and every plan includes every feature. See TimeMagick pricing. To control who sees billing and profitability, see Roles & Permissions.
TimeMagick for consulting firms: key facts
- TimeMagick is time tracking and profitability software that consulting firms use to track consultant hours by client, project and task.
- Approvers set a billable percentage for each tracked entry, for example 10 hours at 70% gives 7 billable hours.
- Project Billing shows billable against billed hours for every client and project.
- Utilisation % and Effective Rate are headline KPIs in TimeMagick's KPI module.
- The KPI module lists the most and least profitable clients, Falling Activity, Uninvoiced Hours and Revenue Concentration.
- Client Health shows each client's revenue, profit, margin, cooperation length, last activity and status.
- Each engagement can have an hour budget with budget alerts and forecasting.
- Client Members get a workspace with Dashboard, Projects, Timesheets, Report, Message Channels and Sensai.
- TimeMagick creates invoices from approved hours and supports scheduled recurring invoices with approval.
- TimeMagick is not accounting, CRM or retainer-management software.
Frequently Asked Questions
Consultant hours, billability, utilisation, client profitability, client access and invoicing.
Is TimeMagick suitable for consulting firms?
Yes. Consultants track time against client projects and tasks, approvers decide how much of each entry is billable, Project Billing shows what has been billed, and the KPI module shows utilisation, effective rate and profitability by client, all from the same hours.
Can TimeMagick track consultant utilization and effective rate?
Yes. Utilisation % and Effective Rate are two of TimeMagick's 14 headline KPIs, shown with period-over-period changes. They come from the hours, client rates and billing data already in TimeMagick, so no separate utilisation spreadsheet is needed.
Can consultants track billable and non-billable time?
Yes. Consultants track all their time against client projects and tasks, including internal preparation. In tracked-time approval, the approver sets a billable percentage per entry: 10 hours approved at 70% become 7 billable hours, and an internal task can be approved at 0%.
Can TimeMagick show what has been billed and what has not?
Yes. Project Billing shows billable hours against hours already billed for every client and project, and Uninvoiced Hours by client is one of the profitability insight tables.
Can TimeMagick track consulting project budgets?
Yes. Each engagement can be a project with an hour budget, shown against time spent on the project card, in the overview, on the Gantt, in tracked-time approval and on the admin dashboard, with budget alerts and forecasting.
Can TimeMagick show which consulting clients are least profitable?
Yes. The KPI module lists the most and least profitable clients by profit and margin, with Avg Client Profit, Avg Client Margin, Falling Activity, Revenue Concentration and a Client Health ledger with each client's revenue, profit, margin, cooperation length, last activity and status.
Can consulting clients access TimeMagick?
Yes. Client Members are external accounts linked to one or more of your clients. Their workspace has a Dashboard, Projects, Timesheets, Report, Message Channels and Sensai. Their workspace does not include your internal modules, such as approvals, billing, invoices or profitability.
Can TimeMagick invoice consulting work on a regular schedule?
Yes. Besides invoices built from approved hours, TimeMagick has scheduled recurring invoices: you choose when a recurring invoice becomes due, and it then goes through an approval workflow. TimeMagick is not a dedicated retainer-management system.
See what each client relationship really produces
Start a 1-month free trial and track your first engagement from consultant hour to client margin.