Time Tracking for Your Business

Time Tracking for Project Managers

Project managers track time for two reasons: to report it and to improve it. Most tools that claim to help add more overhead than the work itself. Sandtime.io lets you log hours against each project phase from any device, keep your whole team in one account, and pull reports when you need them - without making time tracking the job.

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Project Managers: why they choose Sandtime.io

Track time by project phase

Assign every hour to the right project and phase as it happens. Reports show the hours each phase has used, so you can check them against the budget before you are over - not when you are writing the retrospective.

Keep your whole team in one account

Everyone from PMs to developers to contractors logs time in the same place. No separate tools, no merging spreadsheets at the end of the sprint.

See where hours actually go

Compare planned hours against logged hours by project, phase, or team member. Know whether estimates are realistic before the next kickoff.

Bill clients or report to stakeholders

Pull invoice-ready reports by project, or export time data for internal reporting, capacity planning, and stakeholder updates.

How a project manager sets up Sandtime.io

A project manager sets up Sandtime.io with a project for each client project or internal initiative and asks the team to name entries after the phase or sprint they belong to. At every phase gate, a report grouped by project and activity compares logged hours with the estimate, which makes the next estimate less of a guess.

  1. Structure projects around budgetsCreate one project per deliverable that has its own budget, and use entry names for phases or sprints, such as discovery, build or sprint 14. Mark client work billable and keep internal meetings on a non-billable project.
  2. Make each lead a Project AdministratorInvite the team, contractors included, by email. Leads become Project Administrators for the projects they run, contributors join as Users and see only their assigned projects, and one Administrator owns rates and timesheet approvals.
  3. Let people log from where they workDevelopers can log from the desktop app, the Chrome extension, Slack or an AI assistant through the MCP server, and the REST API accepts entries from scripts. Core hours and weekly goals on the dashboard show each person how their week is tracking.
  4. Report burn at each phase gateGroup a report by project and activity to compare hours with the estimate, or by member to spot someone who is overloaded. Past periods lock once they close, so the numbers in a stakeholder update do not shift afterwards.

Step by step in the help center: invite the team with the right role, approve a week from the email, and turn on auto-locking.

Start with one project freeFree for unlimited users. No credit card required.

See what the recurring meeting costs the team

A standing meeting rarely gets reviewed once it is in the calendar. Multiply the attendees, their hourly rate, and the length to see what one session costs and what it adds up to each week.

Price a recurring meetingSee the free plan

Common use cases

  • Log hours against the right project and phase as work happens
  • Track time across multiple projects running simultaneously
  • Compare actual hours against estimates after each phase
  • Pull a client billing report without reconstructing the week
  • Keep contractor and team member time in one shared account
  • Export project time data for retrospectives and capacity planning

Key features

One-click timers

Start timing the moment you switch contexts. One click logs to the right project without interrupting the work.

Retroactive time entry

Add entries after a meeting, a review, or a focused work session. Nothing is lost because you forgot to start a timer.

Multiple projects at once

Run timers across multiple active projects simultaneously. Each project tracks independently so hours never cross over.

Export and report

Pull time reports by project, team member, or date range. Export to CSV for billing, reporting, or retrospectives.

Where Sandtime.io stops

Better to know before you invite the team. These are the gaps people in this line of work ask about most.

  • No project budgetsThere is no budget field or budget alert. A report grouped by project shows hours, cost, and revenue so far, and you compare them with the estimate yourself.
  • No leave managementHolidays, sick days, and leave requests are not managed in Sandtime.io. Keep them in your HR tool, or start from the free leave policy template.
  • Reminders are a weekly emailThe fill-timesheet reminder is one email, sent on Friday at 6 PM while auto-locking is on. It is off by default, so each member switches it on in their notification settings.

Free templates for this workflow

Use a practical file now, then move to Sandtime.io when collecting, approving, locking, and reporting records becomes ongoing work.

Daily, weekly, and monthly timesheets

Start with an editable daily, weekly, or monthly timesheet when a simple file still fits the process.

Timesheet approval and correction policy

Set clear submission, review, approval, correction, locking, and escalation rules before the workflow becomes inconsistent.

PTO and leave policy

Set clear rules for paid time off, sick leave, unpaid leave, requests, and approval in an editable Word policy.

Project staffing and capacity planner

Plan available hours, billable and non-billable work, leave, remaining capacity, utilization, and workload review in Excel.

Weekly status report

Share what is done, in progress, planned next, and blocked in a simple, repeatable weekly report.

Client onboarding and project setup checklist

Confirm the client, scope, billing, communication, access, staffing, time-recording, risk, and readiness decisions before work begins.

Keep exploring

Continue with the most relevant Sandtime.io pages for this topic.

Create a project for reported time

Create projects that people can report against, mark them billable or non-billable, and keep reporting tidy.

Open page

Access Control

The system of permissions controlling who can view, edit, or manage resources. Defines what each role can do.

Open page

Create a new organization

Create a separate workspace from your account menu, then name and configure the new organization. It keeps its own projects, members, and data.

Open page

Administrator

A user with full organization control: settings, members, every project, and all cost and revenue rates.

Open page

Create and switch organizations

Create separate workspaces, switch between organizations, and find focused help when data appears missing.

Open page

Assignment

The relationship between a team member and a project. Assignments control who can log time and at what rates.

Open page

Choose the best next step

Use this workflow page as the starting point, then move to the route that answers the next buying question - proof, product fit, pricing, or immediate setup.

Start with a timesheet template

Download a free daily, weekly, or monthly timesheet for Excel or PDF when a simple file is the right starting point.

Measure lost billable hours

Estimate how much forgotten client work may already be missing from invoices before you change anything else.

Explore time tracking software

See the main commercial overview built for teams that bill, budget, and report against time.

See pricing and plan details

Review the free plan, unlimited-user model, and trust-first approach before you invite the team.

Go straight to free time tracking

Start with the free product if the problem is already clear and you want to capture work immediately.

Compare Sandtime.io with other tools

See how Sandtime.io compares with Clockify, Harvest, Toggl, Jibble, and more, with each vendor's prices checked on its own site.

Related guides

Not quite the right fit? These pages cover the situations teams most often compare before choosing.

Time Tracking for Freelancers

See the path for solo client work, underbilling prevention, and cleaner invoice preparation.

Time Tracking for Software Agencies

See the path for project teams that need tighter retainer control and early margin visibility.

How to Spot and Recover Billable Leakage

Find the gap between work done and work billed, estimate what it costs, and close it without surveillance.

Billable vs Non-Billable Hours

Learn which hours you can bill, why the split drives utilization and your real rate, and how to track it without surveillance.