Living in the world of freelancing can be a paperwork and time tracking nightmare and without the proper management can result in unpaid hours worked. Luckily, there is Billings 3; “Professional time billing for anyone” (As stated by Marketcircle). After two days, 6 hours of experimenting, one estimate, and one timed project; I’ve come to the conclusion that Billings 3 is some pretty impressive software. Though it still has it’s pitfalls, it is an extremely useful application I would recommend to any freelancer.

My experience with Billings 3 initially started about two months ago when I downloaded a trial copy to take a look at. When I stumbled upon Marketcircle’s little gem of an application I was searching for an invoicing system that:

1. Didn’t require me to pay a monthly membership.
2. Wasn’t a web application.
3. Had a custom invoice design option.
4. Was easy to use.
5. Looked like it was a Mac App.

Billings fit the bill.

It’s Pretty, Like a Mac App

That doesn't look like a Mac App at all...

Like anyone that’s trying to do in-house billing for their business I looked into Quickbooks first. The problem is that I already knew that there was going to be a pretty steep learning curve for Quickbooks AND I knew that it didn’t look at all like it is supposed to be on Mac.

Sure, application presentation should be the least of a business owner’s worries but I’m a designer, I like things to look pretty. Plus, I’ve found that the presentation of an application almost always has a direct connection to it’s ease-of-use. (Did someone say Mac vs. Windows?)

So, I moved on to other options.

Monthly Payments? No Thanks!

I’m a believer that once I purchase software I shouldn’t have to pay for it again next month. That’s why I didn’t want to pay for invoicing for my business. Another reason is that a lot of the monthly membership kinds of invoicing solutions are online only. Even as a web developer, I’m not into that kind of “software” for my personal stuff. I guess I’m kind of a control freak.

Billings 3 not only isn’t a monthly membership piece of software, it’s extremely easy on a freelancer’s wallet. Priced at a very pleasant $39.99 for a single user and $25.95 for a single user upgrade (for users upgrading from Billings 2.x), it’s affordable for anyone needing timed billing. They also have the option to go monthly for $5.95 per device per month, but I see that as more of a trial extension rather than a viable option for use. (Sorry, Markercircle)

My Business, My Invoices

The designer in me absolutely hates templates. I want everything that represents my business to be completely unique. Invoices, like any printed product representing your business, have a direct correlation with the way clients view you professionally. So it was extremely important for me to be able to customize the way my billing documents look.

Billings 3 Edit Template Interface

Billings 3 has everything you need to be able to change the look and feel of your invoices. Although this is one of the more confusing sections of the app I was still able to get my estimates, invoices, and statements looking exactly the way I wanted.

Some of the functions in the editor that could definitely use another look are:

• Ability to add a page in between two other pages rather than just at the end of the list – I was able to get around this by simply copy/pasting elements from the page above to the correct page. I did find an odd occurrence where I was unable to paste anything into a page unless I already had an element on it. So, I simply dropped a blank image holder onto the page, pasted the elements I wanted onto the page while the helper element was selected, then deleted the helper element. Problem solved.
• Ability to reorder pages at will – Solved this problem in a similar fashion to the above problem.

You can edit all of the graphical aspects of your invoice right in the editor but I am must more efficient in Adobe Illustrator. Luckily, Billings 3 has support for vector files. So, I did what came naturally to me and created all of my graphical elements in Illustrator then put the newly created file on my invoice as a background image. To be honest, was a little frustrating to try to design the whole layout in Billings 3, so the vector support was a nice feature to discover. For all of you Photoshop designers out there; Billings 3 will obviously take any raster image format as well. I’m not sure of the official file list but I’m sure it supports all of the usuals.

While editing your template you have the ability to add in a myriad of different elements that will auto-populate based on the project that you are creating the estimate, invoice, or statement for. This is a nice feature because up until now I was entering in all of the individual line items to each invoice and estimate.

Keep track of your project billable hours with Billings 3's timer window

Freelance Flux Capacitor

While Billings 3 doesn’t quite take 1.21 Jigawatts to successfully bill your clients; It does have a nice time tracking feature for those hourly contracts. Billings 3 has two nice ways to keep track of your project’s billable time; the Timers window and the menu bar Timer. Both are just a simple stopwatch but the nice thing is that it will input the timed values into your project for billing.

In addition to simply billing per minute you can also set a minimum time increment (ex. 15 minutes) and billings will round to the next value, much like a cell phone company where 1 minute equals 15 billable minutes just like 14 minutes equals 15 billable minutes. Nice feature as all of my contract work is billed under a minimum of 15 minute increments. You can, of course, set this to any value that your contract requires as well as changing it on a per project basis.

Final Words

While there are some aspects of this software that took me a little bit to learn I genuinely feel this is one of the simplest apps that I’ve had to learn recently for my business. Taking a single work day to dive into a new application that not only enhances my workflow but helps me bill my clients quicker and more efficiently seems like a small price to pay. Plus, with it’s small price makes this application worth every penny spent. I highly recommend it!

Recommendation: BUY IT!

Visit Marketcircle at: www.marketcircle.com