How to Track Pre-Project Time So You Stop Giving It Away for Free
Discovery calls, scoping, and proposal work are real hours. Here is how to track them before you decide whether to bill them.
The Work Before the Work Is Still Work
Every project starts before it officially starts. There are calls to understand the problem, time spent writing the proposal, back-and-forth to clarify scope. None of that is free to produce.
Most freelancers do not track it. So they never know how much it costs. And they never factor it into their pricing.
Set Up a Pre-Project Space in Time-Trak
Create a project called something like `Pre-Project - [Client Name]` the moment a real conversation starts. This is not about billing the client immediately. It is about knowing what this kind of work costs you so you can make smarter decisions.
Keep it separate from the main project. If the deal falls through, you want to see the full cost of that lost opportunity. If it converts, you have a record of what the onboarding phase actually took.
Use a consistent naming pattern so you can filter these across the year and see your total pre-sales time investment.
Track Every Task Type Separately
Within the pre-project space, log tasks by type:
- Discovery call
- Proposal writing
- Scope clarification
- Contract review and revision
- Client research
Do not lump it all into one entry. The detail matters when you look back. You might find that proposal writing takes twice as long as your discovery calls. That is worth knowing when you are deciding whether to offer free proposals or charge a scoping fee.
Start the Timer for Every Call
This is the part people skip. The call feels casual, so they do not track it. But a forty-minute discovery call is forty minutes. If you have four of those before a project closes, that is almost three hours before the contract is signed.
Start the timer in the floating widget when the call begins. Stop it when it ends. That is the whole habit. Time-Trak runs in the background so there is nothing complicated about it.
Decide Your Policy on Billing Pre-Project Time
Once you are tracking, you can make a real decision about whether to bill this time.
Some freelancers absorb it and build it into project rates. Some charge a scoping fee for projects over a certain size. Some bill discovery work at a lower rate to lower the barrier for new clients.
All of those are valid choices. But you cannot make a smart one without knowing what you are actually giving away.
Look at your pre-project logs after a few months. If the average opportunity costs you four hours of untracked time and converts at fifty percent, that is eight hours of cost for every five projects that close. That number belongs in your rate calculation somewhere.
When a Project Closes, Merge the Data Into the Full Report
When the pre-project work converts to a real engagement, note the pre-project hours in your project records. You do not need to move the entries. Just keep the reference so you can account for total time spent when you close the project and review profitability.
If the project does not close, the pre-project log stands on its own. Review it periodically to see what your business development time actually costs. This is useful when you are deciding whether certain client types or project sizes are worth pursuing.
The Habit Is Simple, the Insight Is Not
Tracking pre-project time takes almost no effort once the habit is in place. The floating timer widget makes it fast enough that there is no excuse to skip it.
What it gives you is the full picture of what a client relationship costs from the first conversation forward. That is the picture you need to price and choose work intelligently.
Track your time, bill every minute.
Time-Trak is a native Mac and Windows time tracker with a floating timer, automatic screenshots, and one-click invoicing.
Free during beta.
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