Core concepts

Hoursmith is built around one idea: almost everything you do flows along a single line.

Clients → Projects → Tasks → Time → Invoices → Payment.

These pages explain what each concept is and how it fits that line. When you want to actually do something — add a client, start a timer, send an invoice — each page links you straight to the how-to. If you'd rather see the whole chain in motion first, read The core workflow.

The billing line

Each link in the chain feeds the next:

• A client is who you bill, and holds the billing defaults everything else inherits.
• A project is a piece of work for that client, billed Hourly, as a Fixed fee contract, or kept Non-billable.
• Tasks break a project into work items. They're optional for billing but keep work organized.
• Time entries are the unit of tracked work. Hourly entries can be priced and invoiced; Fixed fee entries record delivery effort.
• An invoice gathers billable Hourly time, Fixed fee contract value, expenses, and custom lines into a bill you send.
• A payment settles the invoice — online or offline — and the money lands in your own account.

Three rules worth knowing up front

A few rules fall out of that chain and shape how the whole product behaves:

• Hourly rates cascade. A client's default rate flows into new Hourly projects and prices their time. Fixed fee and Non-billable projects do not inherit it.
• Invoice sources stay explicit. Billable, un-invoiced Hourly entries become time lines; Fixed fee projects contribute available contract value. Once an entry lands on an invoice, it's locked.
• Invoices are immutable snapshots. Bill-to details and line prices freeze at generation — editing a client later never rewrites a past invoice.

Where to go next