A retainer gives a client a set number of hours each period for a fixed fee. Fee-Lion bills the fee on a schedule, draws your logged time down from the bank, and handles rollover and overage so you don’t have to do the math at month end.
When you’d use this
Use a retainer for ongoing maintenance, support or service agreements where the client pays the same amount every period and you want to show how many hours they’ve used.
How to create a retainer
- Go to Invoices → Retainers and click New retainer.
- Choose the client (company) and, optionally, a project.
- Enter the fee per period and the hours covered per period.
- Pick a rollover rule: none, capped, or unused hours expire after a set number of periods.
- Set an overage rate and choose whether overage is billed on the next retainer invoice or as a separate draft invoice.
- Choose whether the client is emailed at 80% and 100% of their hours, then save.
How it runs
The fee bills through a recurring invoice, so drafts arrive for review like your other recurring invoices. Billable time on the retainer’s project, or on any of the client’s projects for a company-wide retainer, draws down the bank. That time is marked as covered, so “bill unbilled time” and unbilled figures skip it and nothing gets billed twice. Each day, ended periods close and any overage is billed once for that period. Owners and admins get alerts by email, plus an admin-only activity note.
Keeping an eye on it
The Retainers list shows active retainers, monthly retainer revenue, and how many clients are at 80% or more of their hours. Each retainer has a usage bar, for example “6.5h of 10h used this month · 1.75h rolled over · 5.25h left”. Filter by Active, Paused or Ended.
Open a retainer to see its terms, a This month card, time drawn this month, and a period history table with hours, rolled in, used, left or over, and overage billed with a link to the invoice. From there you can Edit, Pause, End or Delete.
FAQ
Can my client see their hours?
Yes. The client portal shows a retainer card with this period’s usage, rolled-over hours, remaining hours and period history.
Will retainer hours show up on a regular invoice too?
No. Covered time is skipped when you bill unbilled time.
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