Logging Labour on a Production Order

Logging Labour on a Production Order

Labour is often the single largest cost in handmade production, yet it is the cost most commonly left out of pricing calculations. CrafterBy lets you log every hour spent on a production run — your own time and your team's — so the actual labour cost is reflected in what it truly costs to make your product.

Labour Rate

Labour entries use a cost rate per hour. By default, this is the organisation's standard hourly rate set in Settings. You can override the rate on individual production orders — for example, if a specialist contractor worked on that run at a different rate. The rate is stored on the order, not on the individual log entries, so a single rate applies to all labour entries on that order.

Steps to Log a Labour Entry

1. Open the production order (status: In Progress).
2. Go to the Labour tab.
3. Click Log Labour Entry.
4. Select or type the team member name (or your own name if working solo).
5. Enter a brief task description — for example, "Pouring and levelling", "Quality control inspection", "Labelling and packaging".
6. Enter the time spent in hours and minutes.
7. Click Save. The labour cost is calculated (hours x rate) and added to the order's actual cost total.

Example: Candle Production with an Assistant

You produce a batch of 50 pillar candles. You and your assistant both contribute time.

• You: 2 hours 40 minutes pouring and levelling
• Assistant: 1 hour labelling and boxing

Labour rate: EUR 15.00 per hour

Labour log entries:

• "Pouring and levelling" — 2h 40m — EUR 40.00
• "Labelling and boxing" — 1h — EUR 15.00

Total labour for batch: EUR 55.00. Per unit (50 candles): EUR 1.10.

If your product BOM had estimated 3 hours total (EUR 45.00), the actual EUR 55.00 shows a +EUR 10.00 variance — your time estimate was 22% too low.

Multiple Team Members and Multiple Sessions

Labour entries are independent. You can have as many entries as needed:

• Log your own time from a morning session
• Log a helper's afternoon contribution separately
• Log QC time the following day

Each entry is stored with its own timestamp, team member, task, and duration. The Labour tab shows a running total of hours and cost across all entries.

Using Labour Data to Improve Pricing

If your actual labour time is consistently higher than planned, your product's labour estimate in the BOM is too optimistic. After a few production runs, you will have reliable data on how long each product actually takes to make. Use this to update the planned labour hours in the product definition — and recalculate your prices accordingly.

A product that takes 20% longer to make than estimated is effectively priced 20% below its true labour cost. Over a year of production, that gap becomes significant.