As a professional freelancer, sometimes you’ll be paid hourly for your services. This means that you may be required to alter your invoices to reflect hours worked rather than by the project or product. Perhaps you’re now wondering, “How should I invoice my clients for hourly services?”
The truth is, hourly invoices are tedious and challenging to prepare because they involve detailed accounts of the tasks you accomplish within each hour. For example, if you’re preparing an hourly law firm invoice, you have to log in billable time, disbursement expenses, and accomplishments throughout the legal process. You need to consider that as an attorney, you may be required to add notes and adjust hourly costs periodically depending on the intricacies of the case. These actions will further complicate the process of preparing an hourly service invoice.
This is why you need to incorporate a reliable invoicing platform like Invoice Ninja into your billing undertakings to simplify the process. One of the benefits of using an invoicing platform to create your invoices is that you’ll be provided with a well-designed invoice for professional services template.
What Can an Invoice Template Do?
This professional invoice template acts as your guide, helping you fill in important details and keep your invoice looking professional and well-organized. An invoice template saves you time because you just replace its default details with your invoice specifics and send it to your client. You can use the time that you could have spent creating the invoice from scratch to achieve other objectives like marketing, sales, and acquiring more clients.
With a professional invoice template, you can add an element of consistency to your invoices because the layout and the overall design remain the same. Regardless of who fills out your invoices, your clients will still receive the same experience. This helps to build confidence and trust in your brand.
An invoice template from a professional invoicing platform, like Invoice Ninja, will add an element of professionalism to your invoices because it’s designed by professionals who understand the most important aspects of an invoice. It also improves the accuracy of your invoices, allowing your clients to clear your payments on time because they do not have to keep sending your invoices back for correction.
How to Create an Invoice for Hourly Services
To create an invoice for your hourly services, you have to compute the hourly pay rate for each task and all job descriptions that you complete within the hour. This invoice consolidates tasks done per hour and specifies the obligation of payment.
Many freelance specialists and contractors bill their clients on an hourly basis because they’re paid hourly rates. So, as a freelancer, you have to keep a record of the hours you’ve worked for each client and invoice them at the end of each project cycle. Your hourly invoice should indicate what you’re billing for, the amount of time you’ve spent on each task, as well as the hourly rate for each task.
Your invoice for hourly services should contain other important details, like your name and contact details, as well as those of your client. It should also contain:
- An invoice number
- Date of issuance
- Due date
- Amount in figures
- The subtotal
- The grand total
- Tax obligations and other fees
At the bottom of your invoice, include a footer, which includes essential details like payment instructions (mode of payment and possible fines for late payments) and the expected payment timelines. If you’re using an invoice template, choose the one that provides all these fields so that you don’t leave essential details out.
Once you’ve filled in all the invoice details, send it to your client via email or through the invoicing platform. You can ask your client what their preferred communication channel is to avoid delays.
Streamline With Invoice Ninja
Using invoicing software like Invoice Ninja can simplify and speed up the process of creating and sending an invoice for hourly services. This software allows you to customize your invoices to suit your invoicing needs and brand identity. Get started with us today!
