ERP for IT services companies
An IT services firm sells its people's hours and pays their salaries. When timesheets, invoices and payroll sit in three different tools, you end up guessing at utilisation and margin. Frappe puts all of it in one system.
Problem and fix
What usually goes wrong, and what fixes it.
01
Billable hours go unbilled
Timesheets are in one tool and invoices in another, and every month some billable hours never make it onto an invoice.
Invoice from timesheets
ERPNext projects
02
Nobody knows the margin on a project
Revenue is tracked by client and salary cost by employee, and nobody puts the two together for each project.
Activity cost
ERPNext projects
03
Payroll is a black box
A per-seat HRMS works out statutory deductions in ways finance can't look into, so someone rechecks payroll by hand.
Salary structures and payroll entry
Frappe HR
04
Support lives in an inbox
Client issues arrive by email with no SLA, and the hours spent on them are never billed.
Frappe Helpdesk
Helpdesk
The modules
The Frappe apps and modules we use.
ERPNext projectsProjects and tasks, Timesheets, Activity cost, Invoice from timesheets
- Projects and tasks
- A project for each client engagement, with tasks, dependencies and expected hours.
- Timesheets
- Staff log time per activity and mark it billable. Billing hours and billing rate are kept separate from the hours actually worked.
- Activity cost
- Costing and billing rates per employee and activity type, so every time log carries both what it cost and what you can bill for it.
- Invoice from timesheets
- Billable timesheets are pulled into a sales invoice, and the project's costing updates as they're billed.
Frappe HR and HelpdeskSalary structures, Income tax, Payroll entry, Frappe Helpdesk
- Salary structures
- Every earning is worked out from the base, so loss of pay reduces the whole gross in proportion.
- Income tax
- Income tax slabs per regime, payroll periods, and employee tax exemption declarations and proofs.
- Payroll entry
- One run for the month that creates every salary slip and posts the accounting entry.
- Frappe Helpdesk
- Client tickets with SLAs and a customer portal, on the same database as the projects.
Compliance
India compliance notes.
- PF and ESI checked by hand
- Professional tax by state
- TDS on salary annualised
- E-invoicing with IRN and QR code
The detail on eachThresholds, returns and how we set each one up.
- PF and ESI checked by hand
- PF is worked out on basic pay up to the wage ceiling, and ESI on gross pay up to the eligibility threshold. We set both up as salary components and check them against figures worked out by hand.
- Professional tax by state
- Professional tax depends on the state. Delhi doesn't have it, while Maharashtra and Karnataka do, so we set it up for each state you have staff in.
- TDS on salary annualised
- TDS on salary is annualised over the payroll period, so someone who joins mid-year doesn't have too little tax deducted.
- E-invoicing with IRN and QR code
- If your turnover is above the notified threshold, you need to issue e-invoices. The India Compliance app generates the IRN and signed QR code from the sales invoice through the NIC portal.
Engagement
How a project with us runs.
01
A call
30 minutes, no charge
02
Discovery
1 to 2 weeks, paid
03
Blueprint
Included in discovery
04
Build
3 to 8 weeks
05
Acceptance
1 to 2 weeks
06
Go-live and run
Ongoing
We explain the full method, and why we charge for discovery, on the services page.
Evidence
Our work in this sector.
The payroll case study below is a client engagement for a 30-person IT services firm.
Questions buyers actually ask.
Yes. Billable timesheet hours, at the billing rate, are pulled into a sales invoice for the project or customer.
Yes. Salary structures, income tax slabs, exemption declarations and payroll entry come standard. We set up the statutory deductions for the states you operate in and check them against figures worked out by hand.
We work out the expected figures by hand first, then run the month and compare. In our verified run, all 30 slips reconciled to the rupee.
No. Frappe HR and ERPNext are open source, so you pay for hosting and for whatever implementation and support you choose.
Services for this sector.
- Frappe HR and payrollIndian payroll with PF, ESI, PT and TDS, checked against figures worked out by hand.
- ERPNext implementationAccounts, stock, buying, selling and manufacturing, with your setup kept in code.
- Frappe HelpdeskTickets, SLAs and a customer portal on the same database.
- Frappe CRM implementationPipelines that match how your team actually sells or admits.
Let's start with a call.
Thirty minutes, free of charge, and you won't sit through a sales deck.