Free Construction Timesheet Template

What a construction timesheet is for

Every contractor runs payroll. Far fewer know what labor cost on each job, because the hours were collected as a total per person per week and never tied to a project or a task. A construction timesheet fixes that at the source: one line per day with the job and the cost code, so the same sheet that pays the crew also tells you that sanitary rough-in on the medical office ran 46 hours in a week you estimated at 40. That is the difference between a time card and a job costing record.

The second thing the sheet has to get right is overtime. The split between regular and overtime hours is where timesheets are most often wrong, and it is a wage-and-hour liability when they are. This template does the split by rule rather than by memory.

The Weekly Timesheet sheet computes hours from start, end and break, splits regular and overtime by the daily and weekly thresholds you set, and computes regular pay, overtime pay and gross from the rate. The Crew Summary sheet takes one row per person — rate and hours by day — and gives the weekly split and pay per person and for the crew, with the dates filled in from the week-ending cell. Both print to one landscape page. Every formula has been checked with a real week of hours, including the case where a Saturday tips the week over 40.

Field-by-field notes

• Classification and rate. Journeyman, apprentice, foreman, laborer — with the rate. On prevailing-wage work the classification determines the required rate, so it belongs on every sheet.
• Job and cost code. The project on every line, and the task within it. Spec section numbers work well as cost codes for mechanical, electrical and plumbing subs; use whatever your estimate is broken down by, so hours can be compared to it.
• Start, end, break. Times in, times out, unpaid break in minutes. Hours are the difference. If a crew works a straight eight and nobody tracks the clock, type the hours — the sheet still works.
• Regular and overtime. Weekly overtime after 40 hours is the federal floor. Several states add daily overtime after 8 hours, and many union agreements do too. The Excel version has both thresholds as inputs; the PDF leaves the split to you.
• Notes / exceptions. Who approved the overtime, and when. Absences, late starts, travel and per diem. Injuries — which should also be on the daily report for that day.
• Signatures. The employee certifies, the supervisor approves. Same week.

A worked example

The preview shows the completed example that ships with the download. A journeyman plumber on a medical office job works the week ending Sunday, August 23, 2026: four eight-hour days on sanitary and domestic water rough-in, a ten-hour Wednesday because a pressure test ran late for the city inspector, and a four-hour Saturday make-up approved by the foreman. Each line carries the project and a spec-section cost code. The week totals 46.0 hours. With a daily threshold of 8 and a weekly threshold of 40, Wednesday’s two extra hours are overtime and so are all four Saturday hours, because the 40 regular hours were used up by Friday: 40.0 regular, 6.0 overtime. At $42.00 an hour and $63.00 for overtime, the week grosses $2,058.00. The notes say who approved the Saturday and why Wednesday ran long, and both signatures are dated the same weekend. Those 46 hours should also appear, day by day, on the daily reports and on the T&M ticket for any directed extra work.

Timesheet vs. daily report vs. T&M ticket

The timesheet is one person’s hours for the week, for payroll and job costing. The daily report is the whole crew for one day, for the project record. The T&M ticket is the hours and materials on one piece of directed extra work, signed by the GC that day, for the change order. All three record hours, and they should reconcile: the same person, the same day, the same number. When a claim is reviewed, the first thing a consultant does is put the three side by side.

Prevailing wage and certified payroll

On public and prevailing-wage projects the timesheet is not the end of the paperwork. A certified payroll report is due every week, listing each worker by classification with hours by day, the rate paid and deductions, signed under penalty of perjury. The timesheet is the source for that report, which is why classification and rate are on every line here. Our guide to prevailing wage and certified payroll covers what the report requires and the mistakes that get contractors debarred. This template is not legal or payroll advice.

Common mistakes this sheet is built to prevent

• Hours with no job or cost code — payroll gets paid, the job never gets costed.
• Overtime split from memory instead of by rule.
• A ten-hour day recorded as eight because “that is what we bill”.
• Overtime with no note of who approved it.
• Timesheets that disagree with the daily report for the same day.
• Supervisor sign-off weeks later, after payroll has already run.

Roll the coded hours into the construction budget template to see labor against the estimate by cost code.