For your accountant

Getting the hours to your accountant without retyping them

At the month end MetronHR produces an Excel overview per person with target, actual, overtime, night, Sunday and public holiday hours and the holiday and sick days. That goes to the accountancy practice as a file, with the figures already calculated and a locked month behind it.

  • An Excel overview per person, at the push of a button
  • Target, actual, overtime and absences in one file
  • The month can be locked, so that nothing moves afterwards

Last checked on4. September 2026

What the practice receives

One Excel file per month, with a row for every person. It carries the target hours from the stored working time model, the hours actually recorded, the balance, the premium hours for night, Sunday and public holidays, and the holiday and sick days.

What the practice does with it is up to them: the values are taken from there into whichever payroll program they use. That is the same route as before, only without the hour of typing up in front of it.

What saves the practice time

Not the handover itself, but what happens before it. The values are calculated before the file comes about: target hours from the stored working time model, recorded hours, balance, breaks deducted under the ArbZG. Nobody adds up slips of paper, and nobody types a figure twice.

The premium hours are shown separately, by night, Sunday and public holiday within the meaning of § 3b EStG, using the public holiday calendar of the relevant state. That separation is exactly the part a practice otherwise has to read out of timesheets.

And the figures stand still: the month is locked, corrections after that run as a change request and stay visible. A practice taking figures out of somebody else's system asks about that first.

The route to payroll, today

  • Close the month

    Who
    Operation
    With what
    lock the month; corrections then run as a request

  • Produce the overview

    Who
    Operation
    With what
    An Excel file per person, at the push of a button

  • Hand the file over

    Who
    Operation
    With what
    email or the practice's client portal

  • Take the values over

    Who
    The practice
    With what
    entry into the payroll program, as before

Four steps, three of which cost one click in the business. The fourth sits with the practice and is the same as before, only without the hour of typing up in front of it.

Why the month end is locked

Once the file is with the practice, nothing in the figures may change quietly. MetronHR has eleven lock options for that, from "not at all" through "after seven days" to a fixed cut-off date, plus a separate editing deadline.

After the lock, corrections run as a change request: somebody files it, somebody decides it, and both stay visible. That is exactly the question an accountant asks before taking figures out of somebody else's system.

Frequent questions

What we are asked most often about For your accountant.

As an Excel file (.xlsx) and optionally as CSV. Both can be passed on unchanged, by email or through the practice's client portal. Nobody there needs an extra program.

Per person: target hours from the working time model, hours actually recorded, the balance, night, Sunday and public holiday hours, holiday days and sick days. The file is an Excel sheet and can be passed on unchanged.

There is no separate login for the practice. The handover runs through the file. That is a deliberate decision: an extra login for a third party brings questions about roles, visibility and data processing that outweigh the benefit here.

Through the lock on the closed period. After that, corrections are only possible through a change request, which is decided and recorded. On the Professional plan the change history of the time entries comes on top, showing the person and the time of every change.

The hours falling at night, on Sundays and on public holidays are identified and shown in the overview. The premium rates can be stored and are displayed. Calculating the premium amount itself belongs to payroll and stays with the practice.

Question not answered here? Every step is explained in the help centre.

Hand the next month end over as a file.

Try it free for 14 days, no credit card. The Excel overview is ready at the first month end.

No credit card, cancel any time

Related

Where to go from here, and what waits for you there.