🕰️ Est. Time: 5 minutes
🎯 Goal: Understand how to manage freelancers and contractors within Streamtime
🔑 Requirements: Access to your company Settings and ability to create Jobs
How do I handle Freelancers within Streamtime?
Hiring freelancers is a common workflow within agencies, allowing you to find the best person for the task, and hire them for a set period of time across your project. However, along with this comes managing their workflow, and keeping an eye on your expenses - that's where Streamtime comes in.
In this resource, we will cover two simple ways to manage your freelancers, ensuring you can focus on the things that matter most.
Adding a Freelancer as a User in Streamtime
When bringing a freelancer into projects, adding them as a user can be a game-changer. This method gives your freelancer clear visibility of what's needed from them during their time on the project through the use of Scheduling, allowing you to track their time, manage availability, and allocate tasks - just like you would for a permanent member of the team.
By using this method, they also get to see the projects they're apart of in one simple screen, and you can use the insights from their time tracking within reporting to influence things like future hiring patterns.
Adding a freelancer is just like adding any regular employee. See below steps:
Team Members Screen: Head here first.
Create a New Team Member: Click Create > Team Member.
Enter Details: Fill in their key information - their name, email, branch (if applicable) and role.
Tag: Don’t forget to label them as a freelancer for easy reporting later.
Set Permissions: More on user permissions here.
Send Invite: Click Save & Send to shoot an invite over to your freelancer.
💡Tip: When setting up cost rates, input the hourly rate your freelancer has quoted for their time to you. For sell rates, consider adding a mark-up, as this is what your client will be paying for your freelancers time.
For more details on adding new users, check out this guide.
Once you've added your freelancer, you're all set to start Scheduling tasks for them, as you would with any other member of the team. If you're not confident on Scheduling for your team, you can learn more here.
Recording freelancers/contractors time as an expense on the job
If you prefer not to invite your freelancers/contractors into Streamtime, that’s all good. In Streamtime, you can manage freelancer and contractor costs as third-party expenses in a few ways across the Job.
Adding a freelancer to your general Expenses on the Job
Your first option is to add your freelancer Expense to your general Expenses section, which would sit at the bottom of your Job plan.
To do this, follow the below steps:
Click Create > Expense
Search for a Master Expense, or name your Expense
Add your Cost and Sell rate
Adding a Freelancer against a specific Phase within your Job
As part of our New Job page release, you can now add Expenses against specific Phases within your Job - which is a game changer for adding in those freelancer Expenses.
To add an Expense against a specific Phase within the Job, follow the below steps:
Against the Phase you want to add your Expense to, click 'Add Expense'
Search for a Master Expense, or name your Expense
Add your Cost and Sell rate
✏️ - To amend any additional details, click the Pencil icon at the left hand side of the Expense to bring up the Expense pop up
Within this space, you can amend the QTY (which is a great place to record the hours agreed for your freelancers time), record any notes in the description, add any necessary Labels, and a reference if needed.
Tracking your supplier invoice
Once you get a supplier invoice, we recommend adding the invoice number to the relevant Purchase Order. This helps avoid accidental double handling, and allows you to see the supplier invoice status at any time from the Expenses list view. We've shared a quick walkthrough below.
Troubleshooting Expense Management Issues
Even with these streamlined processes, you might encounter some challenges. Below are some tips to help address common issues:
Ensuring Access to the New Job Page
If the 'add expense' option is missing from the dropdown menu, you may still be using the old Job page. To resolve this:
Switch to the new Job page by following the upgrade steps provided within the Streamtime app.
On the new Job page, you can easily add expenses to specific job phases.
Leveraging New Expense Management Features
Streamtime's updated system automatically includes expenses in the job plan. You can manage these as follows:
Click the pencil icon next to a recorded expense to modify its details.
View all job-associated expenses in the 'Expenses' section within the job progress area.
For an overview across jobs, use Streamtime's list view for expenses.
Addressing Permission-Related Issues
If the 'Expenses' option does not appear (e.g., in the yellow Progress box):
Check if 'edit job' permissions are enabled in your account settings.
Contact your account administrator to adjust permissions if needed. By addressing these issues, you can ensure a smoother experience when managing expenses within your jobs. For more details, consult Managing Job Plans in Streamtime or Understanding Permissions in Streamtime.