As a consultant, I have to enter my time in more than one place. My own hours go into my invoicing system, and a lot of the time they also have to go into a customer’s system, especially if you’re a subcontractor working under a prime contractor. Those prime contractors almost always require you to log time directly into their tools.
The problem with keeping three systems in sync
Most of those customer systems don’t give you an API or any kind of native integration, especially if you’re just a sub. You’re not setting up a real integration. You’re stuck manually re-entering the same hours somewhere else.
In my case I track time in Toggl Track because it’s easy to use day to day. I don’t invoice out of Toggl though. I invoice out of QuickBooks. And on top of that I have to enter the same time into a third party ERP system like NetSuite, Finance and Operations, or Acumatica, depending on the client.
That’s three places the same hours need to end up.
Using Claude Desktop instead of a real integration
This is where computer use comes in. Since there’s no API to hook into, I use Claude Desktop to click through the browser and do the data entry itself, the same way I would.
I built this into a skill. Claude Desktop opens the browser, looks at Toggl, and figures out which time entries still need to be recorded somewhere else. I use tags in Toggl to track status, so it can tell which entries haven’t been entered into the other system yet and which haven’t been invoiced yet.
To teach it the format, I gave it some of my own existing entries from the other systems as examples. From there it goes and creates the matching records itself.
What it has to figure out per system
Each system wants something a little different, and Claude Desktop handles the differences fine.
For invoicing, I like each line to start with the date so my customers can scan it easily. It also has to go look up the right rate for that work so the invoice comes out correct.
For the third party ERP systems, the entry format varies a lot more. Sometimes it’s a simple timer style view. Other times it’s a grid with project lines down one side and a column of hours for each day of the week. Claude Desktop is able to work out either layout and enter the hours in the right spots.
The model I’m using
For this one I use Sonnet rather than Opus. It’s noticeably cheaper and it’s been reliable enough for this kind of repetitive, well defined browser work. I’d rather spend the Opus budget on things that actually need the extra reasoning.
Hope this helps!
(If you’re dealing with the same kind of multi-system time entry mess, this is exactly the sort of workflow Tapestries Group helps clients build.)