How to schedule editing and proofreading projects and payments in Excel

If you're looking for an easy and free way to schedule your editing and proofreading projects – clients, income, payment-due dates – this free Excel template is for you.

Keeping track of editing and proofreading projects is essential for every professional editor. 

Download this free Excel template to get you started. The figures are completely made up but show the basic structure. ​If you're a newbie, you can use this as an interim way of managing your accounts and your schedule; one less thing to worry about for now!

This template includes a number of columns with formulae that I find useful.

• The Status column is particularly helpful because it automatically lets me know when an invoice payment is overdue.
• The formula here is derived from the Paid, and Payment Due columns.
• The Payment Due column formula is derived from the Invoice Sent and Payment Terms columns.

As soon as I receive notification that an invoice has been paid, I insert "p" in the Paid column; if payment has not been received by the due date, the cell in the Status column turns to bright orange and I know it's time to chase my client.

I like to differentiate between different stages of the process:
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• black text for complete and paid-for projects
• red for complete and payment pending
• green for active
• blue for forthcoming

It helps me to see, at a glance, what's going on in my schedule, especially when a client asks about availability.

I also track how the job will be returned to a client: via email, the post office or courier (at the client's expense). The UK's HMRC allows the freelancer to offset a percentage of mileage costs against their tax liabilities.

There's a summary box at the bottom of the spreadsheet. This shows me my average earnings, my average hourly rate and my average rate per 1,000 words.

These figures are really only for curiosity, since each job varies quite considerably in size, type, budget, difficulty and speed. If I was doing any serious analysis I'd look more deeply into the data to assess whether there are patterns in terms of, say, client type, service offered and subject matter. Still, it's useful for grabbing quick-and-dirty data for annual comparisons.

Feel free to copy, amend or ignore as you see fit. You can add your own formulae to particular columns if the way in which you charge for your work differs.

Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with crime, mystery, suspense and thriller writers.

She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading (CIEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast.

Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, connect via Facebook and LinkedIn, and check out her books and courses.