Product Review: GTime Tracking for Freelancers

There are quite a few tools out there to help freelancers manage project hours and billing, and today we look at one of the effective, low-cost solutions. I tried out GTime Tracking this past week, which is a simple, yet elegant software that runs on Adobe AIR and stores your timed-task information with Google Spreadsheets.

How It Works
Install is a quick and painlessly delivered through the Adobe AIR system. Just a couple clicks and less than a minute later, we’re ready to go. When you startup the software, GTime asks you to enter your Google account login credentials. From there onward you can create new timesheets or access existing ones. For a website redesign project I’m working on, I found it best to correlate one ‘timesheet’ to that unique project and client. This timesheet is stored on Google’s servers as a spreadsheet, and its individual records are accessible either through the GTime software or direct on the web in your Google account.

There are two options for creating and categorizing a timed task, which I did today for creating a new website logo for the project. The first option and easiest for my style is to use GTime’s simple start / pause / stop timer. The ‘start task’ button helps you track timed tasks as you work on them, and immediately lets you enter that time record into your timesheet when you click ‘stop’. The entry I made showed the date, hours spent (1.45), and let me add a category (Graphic Design) and a task note (logo redesign for client X). The second option is to view all task records for a timesheet, and manually create and/or update the record of your choice. This works well for recording time spent away from your computer, like at a client meeting.

One of the nice features that I enjoy is the reporting module. For each project, you can get a weekly or monthly view of how much time you’ve spent within each category of work. For my web redesign project, I know that coding isn’t my strongest area of work, and it’s hours are disproportionately large vs. my graphic design category. With this report, I can use accurate time data to make an informed decision on whether or not to outsource development for future projects.

Recommendation
Overall, this utility does the trick for me – it saves me time from my current spreadsheet-input process, and is much cheaper than the competition at $20 USD for a single lifetime license.

I definitely recommend this tool for the individual freelancer who needs a better way to manage their time. Whether you’re billing clients by hour, or merely want to see an overview of where your time is spent in a given week, the 14-day trial of GTime is definitely worth a shot. You can download the free trial at http://gtimetracking.com and give it a whirl.

Product Features

• Software works on PC, Mac and Linux platforms
• Very fast install with no server software
• Secure and reliable, with smooth usability
• Start / pause / stop tray timer for recording tasks
• Immediate and automatic synchronization between Google and GTime
• Lowest-cost option vs. the competition
• Leverage all the features offered by Google Docs
  • Export your timesheets from Google to Excel, Open Office, PDF, CSV, HTML, Text
  • Ability to share timesheets publicly, or privately with other Google users
  • Automatic timesheet backup and versioning

If you’d like to learn more about the author of GTime Tracking, check out freelancer Nicholas Bilyk’s blog.