[cutntrim]

I've been slogging through entering 2006 log sheets into QB Contractor over the past couple weeks. We fill out individual daily paper log sheets tracking hours with columns for:

Customer Job
In
Out
Total (time)
Service Item/Description/Notes

From that I have customers broken down into Commercial/Residential, Summer/Winter and services broken down into subheadings under Winter Maintenance, Summer Maintenance, or Landscaping depending on what service is performed. (ex. "Summer Maintenance: Fertilizing").

In addition to our regular paying customers I've also got "Load/Unload", "Equipment Maintenance", "Dump Trip", and "Non-Productive"under the "Customer JOb" drop-down list.

I'll probably tweak them a bit since all of those are technically "non-productive" activities (or non-billable if you will) but that's how I've got it set up so far.

Real-time reports have been just a pipe dream so far, as I'm the one entering the data and this is the third year it hasn't gotten done until just before the next spring season rolls around.

My mom retired from the bank and I've asked if she'd like to take the data entry over from me so it can be done weekly. It'll allow current reports, save me time that I can spend in the field instead, and put some extra $ in her pocket.

Incidentally, as far as quick numbers to illustrate the importance of controlling non-billable time, when I call up a QB report on it we're frequently between 27-30% time spent NOT onsite producing billable work. Tells me I've got a lot of work to do to improve that. I'd like to see it at 20%.