How todo.vu works

Welcome to todo.vu! This is a basic overview of how todo.vu works.

Quick glossary

If you’re already ready to get started in todo.vu, here are 7 easy steps to help you on your way.

The best way to approach todo.vu

todo.vu is a unique productivity tool that integrates task and project management with time tracking, billing and even elements of customer relationship management.

The best way to approach todo.vu is to treat everything you need to do as a task, such as:

• a sales lead
• your tax return
• a phone call you need to return
• a meeting with a client
• updating the HTML on a web page for your client
• delivering a change to an architectural drawing
• fixing a tap in one of your client’s units.

Either you need to do these tasks yourself, or you need to delegate them to one of your team members or contractors. You need to make sure they are done on time and bill for that time appropriately, if required.

Even if a task is not billable, you will still want to track the time you spend on it to gain a broader understanding of your operations and productivity.

When everything you need to do is recorded in todo.vu as a ‘task’, you can:

• group your tasks according to the client they’re for, or group them as in-house (non-billable) tasks
• track and record the time spent directly on tasks, adding detailed time annotations to your time records
• raise billing reports based on your tracked time, if required, to add to your invoices with ease
• delegate tasks to different team members
• collaborate on tasks with team members, contractors and even clients
• keep a detailed record of task activity, file attachments and conversations on tasks
• keep track of task and project progress
• create detailed activity reports to understand how time is spent in your business.

todo.vu’s unique set-up

todo.vu is different to other productivity tools because it integrates three core features of time tracking, task management, and billing.

To understand how these features work together in todo.vu, and why it’s beneficial that they do, it helps to understand how todo.vu structures its data.

The todo.vu hierarchy

Data in todo.vu is organised in a simple hierarchy, like so:

• All time is tracked, recorded (as time entries), and linked to specific tasks*.
• All tasks, and their time entries, belong to specific projects.
• All projects, and their tasks and time entries, belong to specific clients.
• All clients, and their project, task and time entry data, belong to a single workspace.

Time is tracked at hourly billing rates by todo.vu users. (For example, a user may track their time at $150 per hour.)

Tracked time is recorded in detail on tasks as time entries. Tasks are grouped according to projects, and projects are grouped according to clients.

Time data is therefore recorded both in minutes and monetary values, according to individual users, tasks, projects and clients.

All of this data is stored in a single todo.vu workspace.

*todo.vu won’t slow you down. You can start todo.vu’s timer and track your time freely whenever you want to, and add task details to the time tracked afterwards.

For example,

In the animation below, this task ‘Update HTML on site’ (Task no. #998) belongs to a todo.vu Workspace owned and managed by a team called ‘Acme Widgets’. This task is organised according to a client, ABC Physiotherapy, and a project, ‘Website’. It is due on Monday May 1 at 5 p.m.

The time spent on the task so far (time entries) amounts to 2 hours and 5 minutes. This has been tracked by a todo.vu user, Keelie French, who has also added a time note as to what she completed during that time (“Investigating HTML error”).

Keelie French will have been tracking this time at her set charge-out rate.

Based on this tracked time, todo.vu can then create detailed activity and billing reports.

We can see, for example, in the billing report below, that todo.vu has calculated a total bill based on our user Keelie French’s charge-out rate of $150. The time tracked and recorded has categorised by the task it belongs to, and then the project that task belongs to: ‘Website’.

If Keelie had tracked hours to a separate project for this same client, and then included these hours in this same billing report, they would be categorised by that separate project. We would then see subtotals per project and a final total per billing report overall.

This demonstrates how the relationship between time entries, tasks and projects allows for insights and calculations at various levels of detail.

An example time report from time tracked on task #998. (Click to enlarge.)

Key benefits of todo.vu

With a single click, todo.vu users can track their time at any billing rate, and ensure that tracked time is recorded against any business activity via todo.vu tasks. Users can see task details, deadlines, attachments, clients, projects, priorities, team calendars and more and collaborate on one platform.

Every minute of your workday can be accounted for, whether it is billable time or not. You can clearly see which user did what task, when, for how long, and at what cost to your clients or business. And, todo.vu can neatly collate all of this information for you, even calculating time-cost totals, in highly accurate activity reports and itemized billing reports.

This leads to:

• fewer (or no!) missed billable hours
• a greater understanding of billable and non-billable work
• Better productivity
• Accurate record keeping and billing
• Streamlined workflows
• Quicker invoicing
• Improved client relations
• Informed decision-making.

The todo.vu workflow

todo.vu is designed to power a simple but effective workflow. Every task is organised into three primary workflow states according to its status, either: ‘Snoozed’, ‘To Do’  or ‘Done’. Tasks can also be ‘Archived’ to be removed completely from your workspace, but never deleted.

This makes it easier to visualise and organise your work, and keep your immediate to-do list clean, clear and manageable. Upcoming tasks, ideas for tasks, or future occurances of recurring tasks can be placed into the Snoozed column until they’re ready to be actioned. Your current work can appear in the ‘To Do’ column for quick and easy access, and you can simply drag-and-drop your task to the Done column, or mark it as Done, when you are finished with it.

todo.vu also provides a basic quality assurance loop. When you assign a task to someone else and they mark it as done, you will be alerted with the option to archive the task if you are satisfied with the work, or re-open it; i.e., move it back to the ‘To do’ status, if you are not.

No distractions

Working in todo.vu will not slow you down. You can invite new users and add new clients and contacts on the fly when you create tasks, so there is no need to interrupt your flow, and no complex setups.

And, the powerful context filter makes it easy to find tasks even when you have many thousands in the system.

A simple solution for everyone

todo.vu is flexible and designed to suit many businesses’ unique needs and workflows.

For example, it is not like a traditional sales-focused CRM, but you can use it to track sales leads. It is not like a traditional project management tool, but it can ensure you complete every task for multiple client projects. todo.vu is not designed specifically as help desk or support software, but you can easily use it for that purpose.

If you have an online store, you could use todo.vu to track your sales. If you provide inspections or testing for your clients, then todo.vu could help you track each request.

todo.vu is ideal for:

• architects
• virtual assistants
• engineers
• landscapers
• surveyors
• town planners
• accountants
• bookkeepers
• property managers
• realtors
• web developers
• programmers
• creative designers
• business coaches
• wedding planners
• event planners
• any type of freelancer or consultant
• most teams.

The Support documents on this site will give you an insight into how it works, but really the best way is to just create an account and try it out for yourself.

All new users get a free 14-day trial of todo.vu’s Business Time premium subscription. After the free trial period, solo users can continue using todo.vu on a Solo Free plan for $0.

Users with two or more team members can continue using a Business Time subscription for just $9 per month per user, capped at $99 per month. That means every user after the eleventh user on your subscription is free.

We recommend you follow our 7 easy steps to get started once you have your new account up and running.

READ NEXT:

Learn about your todo.vu account, including how to create a new account. Read here >>