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If you are a Freelance developer, working in a small business or need to know how much you have to charge for a service it can be quite hard to do this in a simple and easy to use fashion. This is where Billings comes into play. As the name suggests its a professional application which you can use to send estimates, track how long you have worked on a project and send invoices. It also has a very detailed reporting feature which you can use to see exactly what is happening with your clients.

Billings is designed to monitor and track who much work you do and how much you can charge for it. It a simple way to make sure you don’t under cut your profits and you charge your clients at the correct rate. Its not designed as accounting software to tell you how much you are making, however that is not the focus of the application.

This app is split into 4 main areas. The first section contains the majority of the tools which you end up working with, this is known as the projects section. In the sidebar you have your client lists, as well as a general section which you use to generate overall reports and view all of the time slips. Within the main section of the app you have a projects section which you use to setup a project for a client. A client can have more than one project associated to them. The third section which you will use a lot is the time slips section, this is used to record the time and costs associated with a project. The final section is the “Accounts” section. This is where you send invoices and estimates to a client and track there results. It has plenty of tools to see who has paid and what stage a project is at.

This application, which seems simple on the outside, has plenty of features. I am going to walk you through how you set up a project can calculate the cost. When you first start out you need to add a client, the clients information can either come from address book (if you have worked with them before you have used Billings) or from information you have entered yourself. Once as a client has been added you need to generate there project folder. As mentioned clients can have more than one project. When you enter a project you can enter some limited details such as start and end date, you can also link a folder to specific files.

Once the project folder has been set up you can now begin to add estimate and working slips. Estimate slips can be used to send to a client before you begin work, this is a good way to track how much a project a cost and who you have sent an estimate to. The accounts section tracks when you have sent invoices so you can keep on top of things.

After you have sent your estimate you can now begin to work. Within the “Working Slips” section you can add expenses which are either timed, flat, quantity, mileage or a general expense. All of these expenses are added to the project so you can keep track of exactly what you are doing. One very nifty feature is the ability to track a cost for the client for the amount of time worked. For example if you charge £20 an hour and you have worked for 5 hours 37 minutes this will show up on the cost sheet. This means you don’t over or under charge your client.

Once you have tracked every little cost you can now generate an invoice. Invoices, estimates and reports are all added to a template. You can pick a default template or make your own. This does make invoices look a lot smarter and allows you to look more professional. Invoices are calculated on all of the costs and work in taxes and any other expenses.

The final section is the accounts section. All invoices and estimates end up in this section. A client has a specific accounts section which tracks how much they have paid, how much is outstanding and any retainer applied to the account. This is a simple way of seeing how much someone owes for the work you have done. Any overdue payments are shown in red in the sidebar so you can see who’s payments are late.

There are more features to this application, such as generate reports for the amount earned over a certain period, however I want to wrap this review up. To conclude this application is very easy to use. After you have read the support manuals using the app is very simple. The estimates, working and reports section are very simple and provide you with a lot of information. The app also has a lot of small features to make your life a lot easier. If you own a business of any sorts, or are self employed it may be worth having a look at this app and see if it is right for you. It only costs $40, which I think is a bargin.

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