Compare · Time tracking
WorkMonitor vs QuickBooks Time
Time tracking and scheduling inside the QuickBooks ecosystem, with clock-in, GPS and direct payroll handoff.
Written from public materials and reviewed September 7, 2026. Check anything here against QuickBooks Time’s own site before you decide, and everything below about WorkMonitor is read from the same catalogue as our product pages.
Filling in a timesheet, or having one already written
workmonitor.vsTimer-based time tracking
How the sheet gets filled
With WorkMonitor
Captured as the work happens, with idle detected and split out rather than rounded away.
Timer-based time tracking
Somebody starts a timer, or reconstructs the week on Friday from a calendar and memory.
Corrections
With WorkMonitor
Corrections append, carrying the author and the reason, with the original still readable.
Timer-based time tracking
A cell is overwritten. The original number is gone, and so is the reason it changed.
From hours to money
With WorkMonitor
Approved hours seed the invoice and the payroll run directly, through one shared rate engine.
Timer-based time tracking
Export, reformat, paste into payroll or invoicing, then reconcile to find what got mangled.
Rounding
With WorkMonitor
An integer-cent pre-flight that has to balance before a run can be exported.
Timer-based time tracking
Floating-point maths in a spreadsheet, discovered at audit as a recurring few pence.
Proving the hours
With WorkMonitor
A finalized invoice seeds a certificate the client checks themselves, without an account.
Timer-based time tracking
A line item and a total. The client either accepts it or opens a thread about it.
Who signs it off
With WorkMonitor
Multi-stage approval that refuses a self-approval rather than warning about it.
Timer-based time tracking
Whoever has the file, which is usually more people than anyone intended.
The question we get asked
Our payroll runs out of QuickBooks. Does moving time tracking break the accounting chain?
It does not have to. Approved hours produce a payroll run with an integer-cent pre-flight that has to balance before it can be exported, and the export is designed to be consumed by the accounting system you already run. What sits in front of it is the part QuickBooks does not do: multi-stage approval that refuses a self-approval, and a client-verifiable certificate behind the hours.
Payouts — a payroll run built from approved hours
What WorkMonitor ships, with its real status
- Productivity scoring (score, heatmap, category breakdown, rollups)
- Score explainability / breakdown
- App classification & category overrides + per-app privacy deny-list
- Focus & deep-work analysis
- Workload capacity signal (feeds AI Burnout Guardian)
- BI warehouse export (connector in Integrations)
Switching
Bringing your QuickBooks Time history across
Nobody switches tools if it means abandoning a year of history. Export yours as CSV and the importer maps it onto our columns. There is no dedicated QuickBooks Time preset yet, so expect to line the columns up once rather than not at all.
The columns your export needs to line up with
- date
- minutes
- project
- task
- note
Six columns, mapped once on the first import. Rows that cannot be normalised still pass through, so the importer reports exactly which ones need attention rather than rejecting the file.
After the import
Where your QuickBooks Time history lands
Imported hours sit on the same ledger as everything captured after them, so a week from before the switch and a week from after it are read the same way. Corrections append with an author and a reason rather than overwriting, which is what lets you answer why a number changed long after anyone remembers.
Invoices — backed by recorded work
When QuickBooks Time is the better answer
Your accounting already lives in QuickBooks and a native payroll handoff inside that ecosystem is the deciding requirement. That integration depth is theirs, and we do not match it.
If that is the deciding requirement, buy that instead. Nothing on this page is worth reading if the unflattering half is missing from it, which is also why every capability above carries its real status rather than a tick.
Questions
Moving from QuickBooks Time
Answered about what WorkMonitor does, including where the answer is no.
- Can I import my QuickBooks Time data into WorkMonitor?
- Export it as CSV and the importer maps it onto our columns — email, date, minutes, project, task, note. There is no dedicated preset for this vendor yet, so the columns get lined up once on the first import. Once it lands, approved hours feed invoicing and the payroll run through one shared rate engine, so the accounting chain picks up where the import left off.
- Does WorkMonitor integrate with QuickBooks?
- Yes. Approved billable hours are priced on the same rate ladder as our own invoicing and written into QuickBooks Online as a draft invoice — never approved, emailed or paid, so a person still signs it off. Payroll runs export in a format built for an external accounting system too.
- Does WorkMonitor do payroll?
- It produces the payroll run: approved hours through one shared rate engine, with an integer-cent pre-flight that must balance before export. It is not a payroll bureau — it does not file taxes or move money — so it feeds the system that does.
- Does WorkMonitor support GPS or geofenced clock-in?
- Yes. You define each job site as a centre point and a radius in metres, and a clock-in made from a phone browser captures the device GPS fix and is measured against every active site. The verdict is written onto the punch rather than used to block it, so being legitimately off-site starts a conversation instead of locking someone out of their own timesheet.
- What does WorkMonitor add on top of time tracking?
- The seams the stack usually leaves: captured hours rather than typed ones, corrections that append with an author and a reason, approval that refuses a self-approval, and a certificate the client verifies without an account.
- How is WorkMonitor priced?
- Per seat, per month, with two seats free and no card. Every tier is on the pricing page in full — there is no enterprise tier that hides its number behind a form.
Ask AI
Ask anything about your team
Plain-language answers about your own workforce data, with the figures behind them. Pick a question to see how it reads.
Pick a question above and WorkMonitor AI will answer from your team's real numbers.
Also comparing
Other time tracking tools
- WorkMonitor vs DeputyShift scheduling, rostering and time clock for hourly teams, with award interpretation and labour-cost forecasting.
- WorkMonitor vs ConnecteamAn all-in-one operations app for deskless teams: time clock, checklists, training and internal communication on mobile.
- WorkMonitor vs HomebaseScheduling, time clock, hiring and payroll for small hourly businesses — retail, hospitality and local services.
- WorkMonitor vs ClockifyFree time tracking for unlimited users, with timesheets, reporting and paid tiers above it.
Take these with you
The software is the easy part of a rollout
Here is what we would send a manager doing one for the first time: how to read a productivity number, what to say to a remote team before anything is installed, and a policy you can adopt as written.
Point it at one team for a week.
Create the account, put the agent on a handful of desks, and leave it alone. On Friday you read the week instead of reconstructing it: hours against their projects, focus and idle per person, and the timesheets already filled in.
Free for two seats. No card, and no sales call to sit through.