TimeMachine tracks the day, calculates the pay, generates the invoice. Built around the APA Recommended Terms - penalties caught, mileage worked out from a postcode, bank details pre-filled on every send.
It speaks your language
In one app
No spreadsheet handoffs. No second app for invoicing. No copy-pasting to your bookkeeping software. The whole pipeline lives on the phone in your pocket.
Call time, breaks, wrap. Travel, mileage, kit money.
APA rules applied: penalties, OT grades, CWD, TOC.
Clean A4 PDF or plain text for WhatsApp / email.
One tap to invoice. Mark sent. Watch for paid.
Who it's for
You're on APA terms. You know your BDR. You know what an L1 costs. You've worked enough CWDs to spot one coming. TimeMachine takes the running calculator off your phone and replaces it with a tool that already knows the rules.
Role-aware: pick Spark, Grip, Construction Manager, PA / PM / Runner, or whatever you actually do. The right rate card loads, and the right §s of the APA terms apply - §5 and §6 don’t follow Runners around, for instance.
A real day, totalled
Every row is a day. Every chip is a penalty caught. Every number ties back to the APA rate card for your role.
Export as a PDF (looks like the one shown) or plain text for WhatsApp / email. Your name on top, "Made with TimeMachine" on the bottom - that's it.
Lighting Technician on Grade I overtime (BDR ≤ £444, so OT is 1.5 × BHR). BHR = BDR ÷ 10 = £44.40. Penalties from the APA Recommended Crew Terms, September 2025. This is the exact figure the app produces.
On iPhone
Everything above works in any browser. Install the iPhone beta and a few things only a native app can do switch on, built for the bits of the day when your hands are full.
On your lock screen, the whole day at a glance.
Your shoot day on the lock screen: running total, a live timer, a lunch countdown, and two-tap Lunch / Wrap without unlocking. The Dynamic Island shows a quiet status dot while you work - long-press it for the name, the total, and the call/OT line.
“Hey Siri, wrap now in TimeMachine” stamps the time straight onto today’s day. Lunch, too. Hands full of cable, no problem.
Import a call sheet (a PDF, a photo, or something shared in) and it reads the production details and fills in your invoice. Runs on-device with Apple Intelligence, so nothing leaves the phone, and you check every field before it saves.
Features
BDR and OT for Spark, Gaffer, Grip, Camera, Sound, AD, Production and more. Override if you've got a custom rate.
Run your own day, or manage a department - per-crew rates, weekly grid, bulk-edit by date.
Missed lunches, short turnarounds, post-wrap travel, OT, CWD, TOC, night premiums - flagged and costed without you thinking about it.
Sat 1.5×, Sun 2× by default. UK bank holidays loaded through the next decade - Sunday rate applied automatically.
Paste the unit base postcode - distance from W1F is worked out from every UK postcode district. M25 warning. “Same as yesterday” in one tap.
Travel time both ways at BHR. Per diem, kit money, expenses - all line-itemed on the timesheet and invoice.
Job binned with 48h notice? Work out the cancellation fee straight from the §7 block rules. Per-crew breakdown if you’re running a team.
One tap from a day to an invoice. VAT-aware, your bank details pre-filled, auto-incrementing numbers, PDF out, email opens with it attached. Or export straight to QuickBooks, Xero or generic CSV for your accountant.
Draft → Sent → Paid. Overdue auto-flagged from the due date. See every invoice across every job in one list.
Invoice gone overdue? You’re owed statutory interest and a fixed recovery fee by law - TimeMachine works both out and adds them in a tap. One clean document: your original invoice untouched, the charges beneath, new total. Remove them any time.
One tap writes the chase email - polite, to the point, quoting exactly what’s owed, charges and all. On iPhone the invoice PDF rides along too. You just hit send.
Pick a tax year, get two files: a CSV of every invoice, and a summary with month-by-month totals and your mileage. The January handover, done in a tap.
Total earnings, day counts, role breakdown, year-on-year. And yes - how many Greggs that's worth.
Clean A4 timesheet PDF. Formal A4 invoice. Plain text for WhatsApp / Slack. Landscape crew-grid PDF when you're running a team.
No login. No tracking. No server of ours - your data lives on your device, and on iPhone it’s also backed up to your own private iCloud, invisible to everyone else, including us. Export a backup any time, wipe it all in one tap.
Supported roles
TimeMachine ships with rate cards and APA rule subsets for the roles most commonly on a UK commercial. Don’t see yours? Custom BDR covers anything bespoke - the rules apply, the rate is whatever you negotiate.
The details that matter
Truck drivers, pre-light shifts, anyone with an early start - pre-call hours paid at base hourly, lunch deadline left intact.
Asked to cover the Gaffer for the day? Flag the step-up - the higher rate applies for that day, automatically.
Turnaround drops below APA minimums and the app flags a Continuous Working Day before you do, with the right rate.
Where the APA terms allow benefit-of-the-doubt rounding, you get it. Toggle off if you prefer the strict reading.
How a day flows
Name the job, pick Solo or Best Boy mode. Role, BDR and VAT carry over from your settings.
Call time, wrap, breaks. Tap “Now” when wraps run late. Add travel, mileage or per diem in Extras.
Tap the money pill for the full breakdown. Export the timesheet PDF, generate the invoice, mark it sent - all from one screen. Done.
The fine print, plainly
Free now, and staying free for a while yet. If that ever changes, you’ll get plenty of notice - nothing you’ve logged gets held to ransom.
No account. No tracking. Everything lives on your device - in your browser on the web, on the phone in the app, where it also keeps a quiet daily backup in your own iCloud. Export a backup whenever you want.
Built around the published APA terms, but always sense-check your final number before sending. Spotted a bug? Tell me.
Questions you might have
If you work on commercials under APA terms, yes - Sparks, Grips, Construction, Art Dept, Camera, PMs, PAs, Runners. The app applies the right §s of the rate card to each role (e.g. §5 TOC and §6 breaks don't apply to PMs/PAs/Runners - the app knows). Custom BDR for anything bespoke.
Any modern browser, right now - iPhone, Android, laptop. On iPhone there's now a native beta on TestFlight, with the App Store release to follow. On Android or desktop, tap Share → Add to Home Screen and the web app behaves like an installed one.
The web app needs a connection to load - it's a website, so there's nothing to download. The iPhone app is different: it installs on the phone, so it opens and runs without signal, handy when you're rigging somewhere with two bars. Your data is local either way.
Every PDF and text export shows the full breakdown - base day rate, every penalty applied, every multiplier, every extra. If they want to argue a number, they can argue the APA terms. The PDF also shows which rate version was used (currently APA Sept 2025).
When the APA publishes a new rate card, the app updates and the new version shows in Settings → About. Old productions keep the rates they were costed under.
The iPhone beta is live on TestFlight - the App Store release is next. After that: more invoice templates, deeper Siri, and whatever more than three people ask for.
Crew using it
TimeMachine is in beta and these slots are waiting for crew who’ve actually used it on a shoot. If that’s you and you’ve got 30 seconds - send a line.
Your testimonial here? It can be as short as one sentence.
Best for sparks and gaffers who can spot a missed L1 from across the truck.
For trainees still learning what TOC means. We’d love a quote.
TimeMachine started as a phone calculator full of half-remembered APA clauses and OT formulas. It got out of hand. Now it’s this.
If you find a bug, want a feature, or just want to say hi - feedback@timemachineapp.co.uk.
- D.
Stop doing the maths in your phone calculator
No login. Free during beta. Web app or iPhone.