Time narratives clients accept on a bill

How accounting staff should describe their time so a client understands and accepts it, and where the reviewer checks narratives before a fee is billed.

By Achekam · 11 October 2026 · 4 min read · For Accountants & audit firms in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya

"Work on file: three and a half hours." A client who reads that on a bill has two choices: trust the firm completely, or phone to ask what it means. Most phone. The partner then spends twenty minutes reconstructing what a junior did six weeks ago, and often ends up discounting the fee because the explanation sounds thinner than the work was.

A time narrative is the sentence attached to an entry that says what was done. It costs a few seconds to write well at the time, and a lot of goodwill to write badly. It is also the firm's record, for itself, of how the hours were spent.

Why narratives matter

Narratives do several jobs at once:

• They justify the fee. A client accepts a charge they can connect to work they recognise.
• They help the reviewer. A manager approving a timesheet can only judge time they can understand.
• They help next year. When the fee is set for the following year, narratives show where the hours went.
• They protect the firm. In a fee dispute, a clear contemporaneous record of the work is far stronger than a partner's recollection.

There is a professional side too. The International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants builds on five fundamental principles, integrity first among them; IESBA's introduction to the Code sets them out. A time record that says what was actually done, no more and no less, is part of acting with integrity towards a client who pays by it.

What a good narrative says

A good narrative answers three questions: what was done, on what, and why it mattered to the client. It is written for the client, not for the person who wrote it.

Some rules of thumb:

1. Start with a verb. Reconciled, prepared, reviewed, drafted, agreed.
2. Name the thing. The account, the return, the schedule, the letter.
3. Name the person on the client side when the time was spent with them.
4. Avoid internal jargon. Working paper references mean nothing to a client.
5. Do not explain the firm's inefficiency. "Re-did schedule after error" belongs in a review note, not a bill. That time should be looked at for a write-down instead.
6. Keep it short. One clear sentence is enough.

Confirming captured time before it reaches the timesheet

Achekam records a person's working time automatically while they work on a client, an engagement or a work item. It tells activity from inactivity using only counts of key presses, clicks and scrolling, and never sees the keys typed. That means it knows where the time went but not what was done. The narrative is still the person's job.

By default, captured time reaches the timesheet only when the person confirms it. Confirmation is the natural moment to write the narrative: the work is fresh, the entry is in front of them, and a sentence takes seconds. Narratives written on Friday afternoon for Monday's work are always vaguer.

Encourage staff to confirm and describe their time daily, not weekly. It is the single habit that most improves the quality of narratives.

The reviewer's check at approval

Staff submit weekly timesheets that a manager, partner or administrator approves or returns. By default, time becomes billable only after someone other than its recorder approves it.

The reviewer should read narratives, not just totals. Questions to ask:

• Would the client understand this entry if they read it?
• Does the time look reasonable for the work described?
• Is anything described here outside the engagement letter, and should it be billed separately?
• Is anything here really internal work that should not be on the client at all?

Returning a timesheet with "please describe these entries" is a small act that teaches more than any training session. The wider set of controls before billing is covered in billing controls before invoices go out. Internal time has its own discipline, described in recording non-chargeable time.

Narratives on the invoice and the statement

Approved time then reaches billing. In the WIP Register, a partner, manager or administrator bills unbilled time into a client invoice, and those hours cannot be billed again. They can also write time up, down or off with a reason before billing.

How much of the narrative appears on the invoice is the partner's choice when the invoice is prepared. Some firms list every entry; others summarise. Either way, write every narrative as if the client will read it, because when a fee is queried, the narratives are what the partner reads out.

For clients on regular fees, the detail lives elsewhere. From a client's Billing tab in Client 360, staff can issue a numbered statement of the services the client buys and their fees as a PDF on the firm's letterhead and e-mail it. The statement describes the services; good narratives explain the time spent delivering them. Together they leave little room for "what am I paying for?"

A one-page guide for staff

• Describe every entry when you confirm it, the same day.
• Start with a verb, name the item, and name the client contact if one was involved.
• Write for the client.
• Keep rework and internal time off client narratives.
• Expect your reviewer to return unclear entries.

Put that guide in front of every fee earner this week, and ask reviewers to return any entry on the next timesheet run that a client would not understand.

General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.