Billable Time to Invoice
Turn the billable time your team logs on tickets into an invoice. Ascent does not have a separate billing wizard — you convert time directly from the ticket it was logged on, or in bulk from the client it belongs to.
Overview
This workflow lets you:
- Log billable and non-billable time against tickets
- See how much uninvoiced billable time a ticket or client has accumulated
- Generate a draft invoice from that time, with line items grouped your way
- Have the originating time entries marked Billed automatically so you never bill the same work twice
How billable time becomes an invoice
Log time on a ticket → mark it Billable → Create Invoice from the ticket or client → review the draft → publish/send
When you create an invoice from time, Ascent finds every time entry that is billable and not yet billed, builds invoice line items from those entries, marks each entry as Billed, and links it to its invoice line item. The invoice is always created as a Draft so you can review and edit it before sending.
Step 1 — Log time on a ticket
Time is logged per ticket. There is no rate field on the time entry form; the billing rate is resolved later (see Rates).
-
Open a ticket (PSA → Tickets, then select one).
-
Open the Time tab. In the Time Entries card, click Add Time.
-
In the Add Time Entry dialog, enter:
Field Description Minutes Time spent, entered in minutes (required) Description What you worked on (optional, used as line-item text) Date The date the work was done (defaults to today) Billable Toggle on for client-chargeable work (on by default) -
Click Add Time.
Each saved entry shows the duration and a Billable badge when applicable. Once it has been invoiced, a Billed badge appears and the entry can no longer be deleted.
Only entries marked Billable are eligible for invoicing. Non-billable time is tracked but never appears on an invoice.
Step 2 — See uninvoiced time
On a ticket
The Time tab's Time Entries card shows a running summary:
- Total — all logged time
- Billable — billable time
- Unbilled — billable time not yet invoiced (highlighted in amber)
When there is unbilled time, a Create Invoice button appears in the card header.
On a client
Open a client (CRM → Clients, then select one). The sidebar shows an Unbilled Time card listing:
- Total Time — uninvoiced billable minutes/hours
- Est. Amount — estimated value at the resolved rate
- A badge with the number of tickets that have unbilled time
- A short list of those tickets (the first five, with a "+N more tickets" note)
- A Create Invoice from Time button
If a client has no uninvoiced billable time, the card reads No unbilled time entries and the button is hidden.
The Unbilled Time card collects billable time across all of a client's tickets regardless of ticket status, so work logged on a since-closed ticket is not forgotten.
Step 3 — Create the invoice
From a ticket
- On the ticket's Time tab, click Create Invoice in the Time Entries card.
- In the Create Invoice from Billable Time dialog, the amount of unbilled time is shown. Choose a Line Item Grouping (see Grouping options).
- Click Create Invoice. The draft invoice opens for review.
From a client
- In the client's Unbilled Time card, click Create Invoice from Time.
- Ascent generates a draft invoice covering all of that client's uninvoiced billable time, with one line item per ticket.
- On success you are taken to the new draft invoice.
In both cases the invoice is created as a Draft. Nothing is sent to the client until you publish/send it from the invoice page — see Invoices.
There is no bulk selection screen under Time Tracking for picking individual entries and invoicing them. Time becomes an invoice from the ticket it was logged on, or from the client's Unbilled Time card.
Grouping options
When creating an invoice from a ticket you can choose how line items are built. (The client-side Create Invoice from Time button always groups by ticket.)
| Grouping | Result |
|---|---|
| By Ticket | One line item per ticket, e.g. Ticket #123: <subject> (2.50 hours) |
| Individual Entries | A separate line item per time entry, labeled with the date, technician, and description |
| Summary | A single line item for all of the time, e.g. Professional Services - 150 minutes (2.50 hours) |
Rates
Ascent resolves the billing rate per time entry when building the invoice:
- The per-entry rate, if one is set on the time entry.
- Otherwise, the client's default rate.
- Otherwise,
0.
Each line item's quantity is the time in hours and its unit price is the resolved hourly rate. For grouped line items, Ascent shows the effective hourly rate for the group. The due date is set from the client's net terms (falling back to your organization's default net terms, or 30 days).
After invoicing
- Every time entry pulled onto the invoice is marked Billed and linked to its line item, so it will not be picked up again.
- The ticket's Unbilled total and the client's Unbilled Time card update to reflect the now-billed work.
- The new invoice is a draft — edit line items, add manual line items, apply a discount, or change the due date before sending. See Invoices.
Manual invoices vs. time-based invoices
Creating an invoice from the New Invoice form (Billing → Invoices, then click Create Invoice) is a fully manual process: you pick a client, add line items by hand or from your product catalog, and set quantities and prices yourself. That form does not pull in billable time. Use the time-to-invoice flow above whenever you want logged ticket time to populate the line items automatically.
For automated, scheduled billing of recurring time, recurring invoices can be configured to include uninvoiced billable time when they generate — see Recurring Billing.
Tips
- Toggle Billable off for internal or warranty work so it never reaches an invoice.
- Write clear time-entry descriptions; with Individual Entries grouping each line
item reads
<date> - <technician>: <description>, so your wording appears on the invoice. - Review the draft before publishing — the time-based invoice has no tax or discount applied until you add it.
- Check a client's Unbilled Time card periodically to catch revenue waiting to be invoiced.