Relentify Timesheets vs Harvest: Time Tracking and Billing Compared
Harvest has been trusted by agencies, consultancies, and professional services firms since 2006. It combines time tracking, expense tracking, and invoicing into a single platform designed for businesses that bill clients by the hour. But if you're managing shift workers, need GPS-verified timesheets, or must comply with UK employment law, Harvest's project-billing focus may not match your actual business.
Relentify Timesheets vs Harvest: time tracking and billing — they're built for different problems, and picking the wrong one wastes money and creates friction for your team.
Check current pricing for all Relentify modules. Or read on to understand where each tool actually shines.
How the two platforms work
Here's the key difference: Harvest is built for project consultants. Relentify Timesheets is built for shift-based operations.
Harvest assumes your team works on multiple client projects throughout the day. You start a timer against a specific project and task, or manually log hours after the fact. This works beautifully for consultants who need to categorise every hour and bill it back to a client. The system then converts that tracked time into professional invoices—no separate billing tool needed.
Relentify Timesheets assumes your workers clock in at a site, work a shift, and clock out. GPS verification captures their location. Photo verification confirms they're actually on-site. The system records precise start and end times, calculates breaks automatically, applies UK Working Time Regulations, and generates payroll-ready data. No invoicing. No client billing. Pure shift-and-attendance management.
The philosophical difference: Harvest trusts your team to self-report their time across projects. Relentify verifies attendance objectively and calculates labour compliance for you.
If you're comparing Relentify Timesheets to other time-tracking options, Clockify and Toggl operate similarly to Harvest—timer-based, project-focused. Relentify's clock-in model is closer to purpose-built shift management tools like Deputy, which sit in a different category entirely.
Pricing: a clearer picture
| Plan | Relentify Timesheets | Harvest |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | Yes (up to 5 workers) | Yes (1 user, 2 projects) |
| Paid tier | From £3/worker/month | $10.80/seat/month (~£8.50) |
Harvest costs nearly three times as much per user. For a 15-person team:
- Relentify: £540–£900/year (depending on tier)
- Harvest: ~£1,530/year
That's a difference of £630–£990 per year. If you're a small operations team tight on budget, it adds up fast.
Harvest's free tier is a demo in disguise: one user, two projects, essentially unusable for a real team. Relentify's free tier gives you five full-featured workers—enough to test it with your whole small team before paying for a single seat.
What each tool actually does
Harvest excels at:
- Converting tracked time into client invoices (its core superpower)
- Expense tracking alongside time tracking
- Project budgets and profitability alerts
- Real-time visibility on whether a project is over budget or at risk
- Integration with project management tools (Asana, Trello, Basecamp) and accounting software (Xero, QuickBooks)
Relentify Timesheets excels at:
- GPS and photo verification (you know workers are actually on-site)
- Shift scheduling and availability management
- Automatic break tracking with UK employment law compliance
- Multi-site workforce management (one dashboard for all your sites)
- Timesheet approval workflows with dispute resolution
- Labour cost analysis and overtime hotspot identification
- Leave management integrated with scheduling
- Integration with your existing business platform (if using Relentify for accounting, support, or other operations)
These aren't minor differences. They reflect fundamentally different use cases:
- Use Harvest if you invoice clients for time worked. You need to track hours per project, convert them to invoices, and see whether each project is profitable. This is software for agencies, consultancies, and professional services.
- Use Relentify Timesheets if you pay employees for time worked. You need to verify attendance, manage shifts, ensure compliance, and generate payroll data. This is software for small operations teams, site managers, and hourly workforces.
The two tools barely overlap. The features they share (basic hours per worker) are table-stakes. The features they don't share (invoicing, GPS verification, scheduling, expense tracking) are the reasons you'd pick one over the other.
Feature-by-feature breakdown
| Feature | Relentify Timesheets | Harvest |
|---|---|---|
| Clock in/out with timestamps | Yes | No |
| GPS verification | Yes | No |
| Photo verification | Yes | No |
| Timer-based tracking | No | Yes |
| Shift scheduling | Yes | No |
| Break tracking (automatic) | Yes | No |
| Overtime calculations (UK rules) | Yes | Basic |
| Leave management | Yes | No |
| Multi-level approval workflows | Yes | Basic |
| Project tracking | Basic | Yes (core feature) |
| Expense tracking | No | Yes |
| Integrated invoicing | No | Yes |
| Budget alerts | No | Yes |
| Geofencing | Yes | No |
| Compliance reporting (UK) | Yes | No |
If you're comparing this table thinking "I need both," you might—but you don't need both from the same vendor. Harvest is time-tracking + invoicing. Relentify Timesheets is time-tracking + payroll. Pair Relentify Timesheets with your existing accounting software (Xero, QuickBooks, Wave, etc.) for the full stack. That bundle typically costs less than Harvest alone.
If you're using multiple time-tracking tools across your business (say, Harvest for consultants and another tool for field staff), consolidating to Relentify eliminates sync headaches and reduces your overall SaaS spend.
Integrations and the bigger picture
Harvest integrates with accounting software (Xero, QuickBooks), project management (Asana, Trello, Basecamp), and Slack. Its integration roadmap reflects its audience—project-focused businesses that already own these tools.
Relentify Timesheets integrates with payroll systems and lives inside the Relentify business platform. If you're already using Relentify for accounting, CRM, helpdesk support, or other operations, Timesheets slots in cleanly. No Zapier required. If you're not, you can integrate Timesheets with most payroll providers via standard exports or API.
The integration philosophy differs: Harvest connects you to external tools. Relentify (as a platform) is the integration—time tracking, payroll, invoicing, CRM, support, and more all speak the same language internally. One login. One data source. No sync delays or broken connections.
Who should use which?
Choose Relentify Timesheets if:
- You manage shift workers who clock in and out (field staff, retail, hospitality, security, construction, etc.)
- GPS and photo verification matter for your business (proves attendance and location)
- UK employment law compliance is a real requirement
- Shift scheduling and availability management are core workflows
- Your primary need is payroll data, not client invoicing
- You want significantly lower cost per worker and a cleaner payroll export
Choose Harvest if:
- You run a project-based business and bill clients by the hour
- Converting tracked time into client invoices is your primary need
- Detailed project budgets and profitability analysis matter
- Expense tracking alongside time tracking is essential
- Your team self-directs their time across multiple projects
- You need integrations with specific project management or accounting tools
In short: if you're trying to use Harvest to manage a warehouse crew or field team, you'll be frustrated. It's not built for that. If you're trying to use Relentify Timesheets to invoice clients, you'll need a separate billing tool—which defeats the purpose of consolidation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Can I use Harvest to manage shift workers?
A: Technically yes, but it's the wrong tool for the job. Harvest has no GPS verification, shift scheduling, geofencing, or the kind of approval workflows that operations teams need. You'll spend more time working around Harvest than with it. Relentify Timesheets is purpose-built for shift-based work and costs a third of the price.
Q: Can I use Relentify Timesheets to invoice clients?
A: No. Relentify Timesheets exports timesheet data for payroll processing. If you need to invoice clients, you'd use your accounting software (Xero, QuickBooks, etc.) or a dedicated invoicing tool. Harvest does this out of the box, which is why it's valuable for agencies. They're solving different problems.
Q: What if I have both hourly employees and project-based consultants?
A: Many small businesses do. Use Relentify Timesheets for your hourly workforce and Harvest (or equivalent) for your consultants. They operate on different time models—one clock-in/out, one self-directed timers—so separate tools often make sense. The combined monthly cost is still lower than running Harvest for everyone.
Q: Does Relentify Timesheets work with my payroll software?
A: Yes, most of them. Relentify exports timesheet data (hours, overtime, breaks, leave) in formats that payroll systems expect. We've integrated with all the major UK payroll providers. Contact us if you want confirmation for your specific software.
Q: Is Harvest's integrated invoicing worth paying three times as much?
A: If you bill clients by the hour and need invoices generated straight from time-tracked data, absolutely. If you're an operations manager paying employees and don't invoice clients, absolutely not. Know which business model you actually have. Don't pay for features you'll never use.
Q: Does Relentify handle UK employment law compliance?
A: Yes. Relentify Timesheets has UK Working Time Regulations built in—automatic break calculations, weekly rest period tracking, and compliance reporting. Harvest has none of this because it's not designed for UK shift workers. If you're operating in the UK with hourly staff, this matters for legal and operational reasons.
The real choice
Harvest and Relentify Timesheets are not really competitors. They're tools for different business models. Harvest is for agencies and professional services firms that bill clients hourly. Relentify Timesheets is for shift-based operations—field staff, warehouses, retail, hospitality, security.
Picking between them is like asking whether to buy a cargo van or a sedan—they both have wheels, but they solve different problems for different types of business.
If you're a small business drowning in SaaS subscriptions, Relentify Timesheets is significantly cheaper and purpose-built for workforce management. If you run an agency and need to bill clients for time, Harvest's integrated invoicing genuinely solves a problem Relentify doesn't.
Know your business model. Pick the tool that matches it. Don't try to use the wrong tool and then complain it doesn't work—it will, but not for you.
Ready to test Relentify Timesheets with your team? Sign up free, add up to five workers, and see how shift management should actually work. No credit card required. Try Timesheets free today.