Time Tracking Settings in Zoho Desk enables support team administrators to configure how agents log and bill time spent on customer tickets, ensuring accurate cost tracking and revenue recognition for support operations.[1]
What is it
Time Tracking Settings allows you to establish organizational policies for how support agents record time invested in resolving tickets. By configuring these settings, you create a standardized framework for time capture that links agent effort directly to billing and customer satisfaction metrics. This feature is essential for support teams that need to track labor costs, measure productivity, and ensure billable hours are properly recorded and invoiced to customers.[1]
When to use it
- Billing-driven support operations — When your organization charges customers based on support hours consumed, configure time tracking settings to ensure every billable minute is captured and attributed correctly to customer accounts.[1][4]
- Cost analysis and resource planning — Use time tracking settings to gather visibility into how much agent time each ticket category or customer consumes, helping you forecast staffing needs and optimize team allocation.[1]
- Performance and SLA monitoring — Set up time tracking to measure how long agents spend on tickets, identify bottlenecks in resolution workflows, and validate whether your team meets service-level agreements.[1]
- Revenue protection — Configure settings to prevent untracked time from slipping through unnoticed, since untracked hours typically do not get billed and therefore do not convert to revenue.[4]
- Compliance and audit trails — Establish time tracking policies that create auditable records of agent activity for regulatory requirements or customer disputes about service charges.[1]
How to access it
Navigate to your Zoho Desk admin panel and locate the Time Tracking section under ticket management settings. From there, you can configure billing preferences, set time entry requirements, and define how time logs are associated with tickets and customers. The exact menu path and available configuration options depend on your Desk subscription tier and organizational setup.[1]
Related features
- Ticket management and lifecycle — Time tracking integrates with your ticket workflow; understanding ticket states and resolution paths helps you determine when and how to log time entries.
- Billing and invoicing — Time tracking data feeds directly into customer invoices; you may need to configure billing rules and rate cards alongside time tracking settings.
- Agent performance reports — Once time tracking is enabled, use reporting dashboards to analyze agent productivity, ticket resolution times, and billable utilization rates.
- Customer billing preferences — Some customers may have different time tracking or billing rules; configure per-customer policies to reflect contract terms and service agreements.