Rate Cards & Budgets

Rate cards and budgets are the financial backbone of HeyKazi. Rate cards define what you charge clients per hour and what your team costs internally. Budgets set spending limits on projects so you can track consumption and act before costs run over. Together, they drive invoicing, profitability reporting, and financial oversight across your organisation.

Vertical terminology: Depending on your industry, rate cards may be called Fee Schedules (accounting firms) or Tariff Cards (legal firms). HeyKazi supports terminology overrides so the platform speaks your language.

Key Concepts

Billing Rates vs Cost Rates

HeyKazi tracks two types of rates for each team member:

Rate Type	Description
Billing Rate	What you charge the client per hour. This drives invoice line item values.
Cost Rate	Your internal cost per team member — typically their salary or contractor rate divided by working hours. This drives profitability calculations.

The difference between billing and cost rates is your margin. Setting both accurately gives you a clear picture of how profitable each project, customer, and team member is.

Rate Hierarchy

Rates follow a three-level hierarchy where the most specific rate always wins:

Level	Scope	Set where
Org Default	Applies to all work unless overridden	Settings → Rates
Customer Override	Applies to all projects for a specific customer	Customer detail → Rates tab
Project Override	Applies only to a specific project	Project detail → Rates tab

For example, if a team member has an org default of R800/hr and a customer override of R750/hr, the customer rate is used for that customer’s projects. A project override would take precedence over both.

Rates are resolved per member, per engagement. Set an override at the appropriate level and it applies automatically to all time entries logged there.

Effective Dates

Each rate has an effective-from date and an optional effective-to date. If the effective-to date is blank, the rate is treated as Ongoing. This lets you manage rate changes over time — for example, applying an annual rate increase starting on a specific date without losing the historical rate.

Rate Snapshots

When a time entry is logged or an invoice is generated, the current rate is captured as a snapshot. Changing a rate later does not affect existing entries or invoices, ensuring historical accuracy in your financial records.

Setting Up Rates

Step 1 — Navigate to Settings

Click Settings in the left sidebar, then select the Rates tab. If no rates have been configured yet, you will see: “No rate cards yet — Rate cards define what you charge clients and what your team costs. Set up rates to enable profitability tracking and invoicing.”

Step 2 — Choose Billing Rates or Cost Rates

The rates page has two tabs: Billing Rates and Cost Rates. Start with billing rates, as these drive your client-facing invoicing.

Step 3 — Add a rate for each member

Each team member appears as a row. Click Add Rate next to a member to create their first rate. Enter the hourly amount, currency (defaults to your organisation’s currency), and the effective-from date.

Step 4 — Set customer or project overrides (optional)

If a customer has negotiated special pricing, open the customer detail page and go to the Rates tab. Click Add Rate to create a customer-level override. The same process applies on a project’s Rates tab for project-specific overrides.

Project Budgets

Budgets help you set financial guardrails on projects. You can cap hours, revenue, or both — and receive alerts when consumption approaches your limit.

Configuring a Budget

Open a project detail page, click the Budget tab, and configure:

Budget Hours — a cap on hours worked (for example, 200 hours)
Budget Amount — a revenue cap in a specific currency (for example, R50,000)
Alert Threshold — a percentage between 50% and 100% (default 80%) that triggers a notification when reached

You can set hours and amount independently or together. Both are tracked in real time as your team logs time.

Budget Statuses

The budget tab displays a progress bar and stat cards showing Budget, Consumed, Remaining, and Used percentage. The overall status updates automatically:

Status	Colour	Trigger
On Track	Green	Consumed is below the alert threshold
At Risk	Amber	Consumed has reached the alert threshold but is below 100%
Over Budget	Red	Consumed has reached or exceeded 100%

Going over budget does not block work — your team can continue logging time. The status serves as a signal to leads and admins that the project needs attention.

Profitability Reporting

The Profitability page (left sidebar, Admins and Owners only) brings together rate and time data to show financial performance across your organisation. It includes:

Utilisation — each team member’s billable hours as a percentage of total tracked hours. Industry benchmarks range from 60% to 80%.
Project profitability — per-project billable hours, revenue, cost, margin, and margin percentage. Sortable and filterable by date range.
Customer profitability — the same breakdown aggregated across all of a customer’s projects.
Projections toggle — adds projected values based on in-progress work and current rates, helping you forecast outcomes before an engagement is complete.

Tips and Best Practices

Set org defaults first — configure a billing and cost rate for every member at the org level so all time entries have a rate.
Use customer overrides for negotiated pricing — a customer-level override applies to all work for that client.
Review profitability monthly — regular check-ins help you spot underpriced engagements early.
Set realistic alert thresholds — 80% gives you time to act; lower to 70% for tighter projects.
Trust the snapshots — if you need to correct a past rate, adjust individual time entries rather than the rate card.

Projects — configure project-specific rates and budgets on the project detail page
Customers — set customer-level rate overrides on the customer’s Rates tab
Time Tracking — logged time drives budget consumption and profitability calculations
Invoicing — billing rates determine invoice line item values
Expenses — track out-of-pocket costs alongside time-based charges