Instead of Harvest
Stop renting Harvest. Own your time billing system.
We build your version around how you track hours, bill clients, and manage margin, bring your Harvest data across, and run it for you. No plan tiers, and the system is yours.
Harvest charges per person, per month, with profitability reporting and unlimited custom reports locked behind the top tier.
- check_circleYour data in a database you own
- check_circleOpen source, no lock-in
- check_circleBuilt and run by Enterprise DNA
What you are paying for
Most of a Harvest bill is the front end
An hour of work is one row: who, what, how long, billable or not. The screens around those rows are what you rent, and the rent is set per person, per month, per tier.
A seat for everyone who logs an hour
Billing is per person per month. The contractor who enters four hours a week costs the same seat as the person billing forty.
The profit numbers sit on the top tier
Profitability reporting, timesheet approvals and unlimited custom reports are above the entry plan. The upgrade is priced per seat as well.
A free plan you cannot run on
One seat and two projects. Enough to see that it works, never enough to bill a real month with.
Reports the vendor chose to build
You get the charts on the menu. "Which fixed fee jobs earned under your target hourly rate once the design time is counted" is not on the menu.
Chasing the timesheet, not doing the work
Reminding people to fill it in, tidying entries, re-keying the invoice into your accounting system. That is work the tool creates.
Your history behind their export
Years of hours, rates and invoices live in their account. Leaving means a CSV and a rebuild, and the budgets do not even come out.
What you get instead
Billing you can ask questions of
Timesheets
Ask where the week went
The data is plain records. Claude Code reads them, so any question about hours gets an answer, not just the ones with a chart.
- check Hours by day, by person against capacity, and by project
- check The billable share of the week, and who is below it
- check Who has not filled in a timesheet for five days
- check Any question you can phrase, not the four the plan allows
Unbilled work
It tells you what to invoice
One command lists every hour and expense that is billable and not yet on an invoice, ranked by money and by age, then drafts the invoice.
- check Billable work not yet invoiced, oldest and biggest first
- check Expenses in the same list, so nothing gets missed
- check A draft invoice built from the entries, grouped by task and rate
- check A covering note written from the project history. Nothing sends without you
Project margin
What the job actually earned
Every entry carries a bill rate and a cost rate, so the margin is arithmetic. Harvest puts that behind its top plan.
- check Hours and value against the budget, per project
- check What the work cost, and the margin left over
- check Effective rate per hour worked, per project and per person
- check Fixed fee jobs measured against the hours they ate
Your data
A database you own
Runs on a laptop with no database install, or on your own database for a team. Plain records any tool can read.
- check Built-in database for one person, or a shared database for a team
- check Import your Harvest time export in one command
- check Plain records. Your accountant can look through them.
- check MIT licence, no vendor to leave
Make it yours
Design your own Harvest replacement
Everything starts from the open-source base. Then it gets your name, the parts you run, your rules and your data from Harvest. Try it here, and we build the real one.
2. What it runs
3. Make it fit
4. Your colour
Answered from your own database
Good morning. Here is what needs you today.
We build it from the open-source base, bring your Harvest data across and run it for you.
Switching
How to switch from Harvest
The move comes down to one export out of Harvest, one import command into the new database, and a short stretch of running both side by side before you cancel the Harvest plan.
- 1
Export your data from Harvest
Pull the detailed time report from Harvest as CSV. That single file carries clients, projects, tasks, people, hours, notes and rates. If you also want expenses and invoice history to come across, export those from Harvest too, in whatever format your account allows (usually CSV or Excel). Check Harvest's own export settings if you are unsure what your plan permits.
- 2
Run the import command
From the free version, import your Harvest data by pointing it at the time, expenses and invoice files you exported. The import matches entries on their own content, so running it again does not create duplicates if something needs redoing. Sample files in Harvest's export shape are included if you want to check the format first.
- 3
Check what came across
Time, notes, rates, clients, projects, tasks and people should all be in the records after the import. Budgets, approvals and timers do not carry over, since Harvest and this tool handle them differently. The guide spells out exactly what needs setting by hand, so go through that list before you treat the import as done.
- 4
Run both systems together briefly
Keep logging time and drafting invoices in both Harvest and the new database for a short stretch. Compare the timesheet, unbilled work and invoice totals against what Harvest shows for the same period. This is where you catch a missed project, a rate that did not map, or a client name that split into two records.
- 5
Turn off Harvest
Once the numbers line up and everyone is logging time through the new commands instead, cancel the Harvest subscription. There are no seats to remove and no per-user cleanup, since the whole team already shares one database with no per-seat fee attached to it.
Where the real effort goes
The import handles the mechanical part. The real work is deciding which of your own fields, rate rules and approval habits actually need to exist in the new database, and how much history is worth bringing over versus starting clean from today. That decision takes judgment about your business, not just a command. Enterprise DNA does this mapping and migration for you when they install and run it as part of Omni.
Not ready for a call?
Get your Harvest switch plan by email
We will send you the step-by-step plan for moving your business off Harvest, what the move really involves, and how we would do it for you.
Sent. Check your inbox.
Your Harvest switch plan is on its way.
Rather talk it through? Book a call arrow_forwardTwo ways to run it
Run it yourself, or have it run for you
Open source
Run it yourself
Free
- 1 Clone the repo
- 2 npm run demo, then open the folder in Claude Code
- 3 Type /timesheet
- 4 Point it at your own database when your team needs it
Omni by Enterprise DNA
Have Enterprise DNA install it
One setup fee, then a monthly retainer
- check We migrate your Harvest history
- check We set the budgets, rates and fee types Harvest never exported
- check We write the commands for the way you bill: month end runs, retainers, chasers
- check It runs inside Omni, our managed Command Center, with the rest of your business
Questions
Instead of Harvest, answered
Is it really free? expand_more
Yes. MIT licence. Run it anywhere, change anything, no account with us.
How do people log time without a timer? expand_more
In one sentence: you say something like log Kauri intake, 2h15, conflict check screens. Durations take any shape you would say out loud. Most timesheets are filled in after the fact anyway.
Does it send invoices? expand_more
Not today. The free open-source version builds the invoice from the hours and writes a covering note to a drafts folder, then you send it from your own email and your accounting system stays where it is. When Enterprise DNA builds your version, sending invoices directly and connecting to your accounting system can be added.
What happens to my Harvest history? expand_more
Export the detailed time report as CSV and run the import command. Clients, projects, tasks, people, hours, notes and rates come with you. Budgets, approvals and timers do not, and the migration guide says exactly what to set by hand.
Can my team use it? expand_more
Yes. Point everyone at a shared database project and they run the same commands against the same data, with no per-seat fee.
Stop renting a place to type your hours
Thirty minutes with Sam. We look at what you pay Harvest for, how your team really logs time, and what the installed version would look like for you. If it is a fit, we install it. If it is not, take the free version and run it yourself.
Time Billing for Claude Code is free and open source, published by Enterprise DNA.
Done paying for Harvest?
Get your version built