In short

Fixed fee projects can now behave like monthly retainers. Turn on the new
“Fees reset monthly” checkbox on a Fixed Fee project and Harvest bills that
fee every calendar month instead of once for the whole project. One full fee
“accrues” each active month, and that accrued-to-date figure — not the entire
future contract value — drives the budget card, the project chart, the invoice
prefill, the uninvoiced reports, and Profitability revenue.

The feature is rolling out per company (new accounts first). Until it reaches an
account, nothing changes.

Enabling recurring monthly

On a Fixed Fee project’s edit page, under Project fees, there’s a new
checkbox:

• Fees reset monthly
• Bill this amount every month, like a retainer. Requires a project start date.

A few things to know about when it’s available and what it requires:

• Fixed Fee projects only. The option appears only when the project type is
   Fixed Fee and you have permission to see fees.
• A start date becomes required. When the box is ticked, the start-date
   field switches to required: *“Required, because ‘Fees reset monthly’ is on.
   You’ll still be able to track time outside of this date range.”* Accrual has to
   know when to begin. (This is enforced on save, not just in the form.)
• Not available for “Fees per task” budgets. When a project is budgeted by
   task fees, its fee is a computed total of the per-task budgets rather than a
   single monthly amount, so the checkbox is hidden there.
• Web only. The setting is set through the Harvest web app; it isn’t exposed
   in the public API, and it can only be changed by someone who can edit fees.

Switching a project away from Fixed Fee, or over to a “Fees per task” budget,
automatically clears the monthly setting.

How the fee accrues

The core idea is accrual: one whole fee accrues per calendar month the
project is active.

• Accrual is never day-prorated. A month counts in full if any part of the
   project falls in it — a project that starts on the 31st still accrues that
   entire month’s fee.
• Accrual starts at the project start date.
• Accrual stops at the end date (if set) or today, and is capped at the point
   a project is archived — so a retainer with no end date doesn’t keep racking up
   a new fee every month forever after you retire it.

So a $2,000/month retainer that has been running for three active months has
accrued $6,000 — that’s what’s earned and billable so far, not the full
contract value of all future months.

What changes on the project page

Budget. For a money-budgeted retainer (budget = “Total project fees”),
the budget option and card relabel to “Fees accrued to date.” The budget
grows by one month’s fee each active month rather than showing the whole contract
up front:

Your budget is the fees accrued to date — it grows by one month’s fee each active
 month, not the whole contract up front.

Project chart. The cumulative chart draws a stepped baseline that climbs by
one fee each month, tracking accrual over time.

Over-budget alerts are switched off for these projects, by design. A
retainer’s budget is the fees accrued so far, while the spend it’s compared
against is lifetime spend — so it’s completely normal for effort to run ahead
of accrual mid-contract and catch up later. To avoid a stream of misleading
weekly “over budget” emails, the alert control is hidden and the notifications
don’t fire:

Over-budget alerts don’t apply to a monthly retainer: its budget is the fees
accrued so far, so spend running ahead of accrual is normal until the fees
catch up.

Note: the monthly-retainer budget behavior (the “Fees accrued to date” card and
chart) applies to money-budgeted projects. The monthly billing itself applies
to any fixed-fee retainer regardless of how it’s budgeted.

Invoicing

When you create an invoice from tracked time and expenses, the project picker
shows each retainer’s accrued-but-not-yet-invoiced balance — the catch-up
amount owed to date — and pre-selects it when there’s something to bill.

• Missed months roll forward. If you skip a month, that fee isn’t lost; it’s
   still accrued and simply shows up in the next invoice’s catch-up balance.
• Billing in advance is fine. If you invoice ahead (say, a February invoice
   that covers March), the picker won’t show a negative balance — the
   accrued-vs-invoiced figure is floored at zero. A retainer that’s already caught
   up shows in the picker unselected, with nothing to invoice.

Reporting

Profitability. Revenue for a retainer recurs at one fee per active month,
never day-prorated. Each month’s invoices are credited to that month (capped at
the fee), and a catch-up invoice that covers several months is spread back across
the earlier unbilled months it settles. The Revenue explanation on the report
updates to describe this monthly-retainer basis. A retainer that hasn’t accrued
anything inside the report’s date range still appears (as a zero-revenue row) so
its costs aren’t misread as a total loss.

Uninvoiced amounts. Uninvoiced figures for a retainer reflect the
accrued-to-date catch-up balance rather than the full contract, and never go
negative on the cards or the Uninvoiced Report.

Budget columns in reports. In the reports where budget is shown over a chosen
timeframe, a retainer’s budget for that window is the fee times the number of
monthly billing dates that fall inside it. A practical consequence: a short
timeframe that contains no monthly billing date can read as $0 budget, and
“Budget remaining” can look negative for that window. That’s expected for a
retainer — it isn’t a real overage — and an info note on the budget column
explains it where it can occur.

FAQs

Does the fee prorate for a partial first month?
No. Accrual is by whole calendar month — any day in a month accrues the full fee
for that month.

What happens to a month I forget to invoice?
Nothing is lost. It stays in the accrued balance and appears in the next
invoice’s catch-up amount.

Why don’t I get over-budget alerts on a retainer?
By design. The budget is the fees accrued so far while spend is measured over the
project’s life, so spend leading accrual is normal until the fees catch up.
Alerts would be noise, so they’re turned off for these projects.

Can I use this with a “Fees per task” budget?
No. The monthly option isn’t available for task-fee budgets, where the fee is a
computed total rather than a single monthly amount.

Is a start date really required?
Yes — accrual needs a defined start. You can still track time outside the
project’s date range.