If your team bills for its time, pick a ticketing system that also invoices. Our pick: SherpaDesk Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually), first agent free. A helpdesk and PSA a small IT team can run alone. No contract. No implementation project. No dedicated admin.
Key takeaways
| If you… | Pick | Price and why | Limitation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bill clients by the hour, by contract, or from prepaid hours | SherpaDesk | Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually). Ticket time collects by contract in Ready to Invoice, then goes to QuickBooks Online, Xero, or FreshBooks | No built-in RMM |
| Work alone or with one or two technicians | SherpaDesk | First agent free, forever, with ticketing, time tracking, and invoicing. Each added agent pays Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually) | Cloud only |
| Answer customer email as a support team | Zendesk | Email ticketing on Support Team ($25 per agent per month, $19 billed annually) | Live chat needs Suite Team |
| Live in Microsoft Teams | Desk365 | Tickets managed inside Teams. Standard $16 per agent per month, $12 billed annually | Invoicing not verified |
| Need ITSM processes for internal IT | Jira Service Management | Free for 3 agents. Standard $26.90 per agent per month at that team size | Invoicing not verified |
| Must self-host | osTicket | Free open source edition; you run the server | Community support only |
Next to Base Camp's $90 a month or $80 billed annually, a team of 3 pays $75 a month on Zendesk Support Team, or $57 billed annually. Desk365 Standard is $48, or $36. Jira Service Management is $0 on Free, or $80.70 a month on Standard ($66.67 a month billed annually, $800 a year). osTicket's open source edition is $0 plus your server.
DeskDay Standard, the other tool here with contracts and invoicing built in, is $237 a month or $177 billed annually. DeskDay also offers an optional $800 one-time onboarding add-on; Base Camp has no onboarding fee.
Picks By Scenario Comparison Table Cost For A Small Team How To Choose FAQHow we chose
We publish this guide, and SherpaDesk is one of the 9 tools. It uses the same template and lists its limitations.
Definition
A ticketing system is software that turns each help request into a record, called a ticket. It routes the ticket to the right person, tracks it to resolution, and keeps the history. It is the core of helpdesk software.
TechTarget lists the parts most helpdesk tools share: software to track help requests, routing to the right experts, and a knowledge base for notes.
For most small teams, the helpdesk is enough. TechTarget's view is that small and midsize businesses with limited IT or support needs can often get by with a dedicated, experienced helpdesk.
What changes the choice is money. A team that bills clients needs the hours on each ticket to reach an invoice. The billable hours you never captured are the margin you never made.
| Kind | What it adds to tickets | Fits | Examples in this guide |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customer-service ticketing | Email, chat, and social channels; macros; satisfaction surveys | Teams that support customers of a product | Zendesk, Freshdesk, HappyFox |
| Helpdesk that bills | Time entries on tickets, contracts, rates, invoices | MSPs and IT consultancies that bill clients | SherpaDesk, DeskDay |
| IT service desk (ITSM) | Service catalog, change and incident processes, assets | Internal IT teams that follow ITIL processes | Freshservice, Jira Service Management, Desk365 |
| Self-hosted open source | Your own server and your own upgrades | Teams that must keep data on premises | osTicket |
Test each of these eight features in the trial with your own tickets, not the demo data.
| Feature | Why it matters for a small team | Test in the trial |
|---|---|---|
| Email to ticket | Most requests still arrive by email. Setup should be forwarding, not a project. | Forward your support address and send three test emails |
| Routing and queues | With no dispatcher, rules decide who picks up what. | Route one client or one category to one technician |
| SLA goals | Clients and staff remember the slow reply, not the fast fix. | Set a response goal and watch the due time on a ticket |
| Customer portal | Users check status themselves instead of calling you. | Log in as an end user and update a ticket |
| Knowledge base | One answer written once saves the same ticket next month. | Turn a closed ticket into an article |
| Time on the ticket | Hours logged later get rounded down or forgotten. | Log time from the ticket, your phone, and a reply |
| Contracts and invoicing | If billing lives in another tool, every hour has to cross a sync or an export with the right client and rate. | Push one week of ticket time to a draft invoice |
| Accounting connection | Your bookkeeper works in QuickBooks or Xero, not in the helpdesk. | Send that draft invoice to your accounting package |
Most tools in this guide cover the first six in some form. The last two separate a helpdesk that bills from one that only answers. If you never bill for time, as on most internal IT teams, weigh the first six and skip the rest.
Each price shows the monthly rate first, then the annual rate. The Cost Section totals a team of 3 for both.
| Tool | Entry price per agent per month | Seat minimum or cap | Free option | Time tracking | Contracts And Invoicing | RMM integration | Free trial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SherpaDesk Ours | Base Camp $45, $40 billed annually | None; first agent free | First agent free, forever | Yes | Built in, to QuickBooks Online, Xero, FreshBooks | NinjaOne, on High Camp ($55, $50 billed annually) | 14 days, no card |
| DeskDay | Standard $79, $59 billed annually | 2 seats on monthly; none on annual | No | Yes | Built in, with QuickBooks and Xero connectors | NinjaOne, N-able N-central, Datto, Level | 14 days |
| Zendesk | Support Team $25, $19 billed annually | None listed | No | From Support Professional or Suite Growth | Not verified | NinjaOne, via NinjaOne's integration | 14 days |
| Freshdesk | Growth $23, $19 billed annually | None listed | No | Yes, with billable flag | QuickBooks Online app logs billable time and creates invoices in QuickBooks; Freshdesk plan not stated | Not verified | 14 days |
| HappyFox | Basic $29, $24 billed annually | Basic capped at 5 agents | No | Yes, every plan | QuickBooks Online app shows invoices on the ticket, read-only; all plans | NinjaOne, from Pro | 14 days, no card |
| Freshservice | Starter $29, $19 billed annually | None listed | No | From Growth ($59, $49 billed annually) | Not verified | NinjaOne, via NinjaOne's integration | 14 days |
| Jira Service Management | Standard $26.90; billed annually, $800 a year for 1–3 agents ($66.67 a month) | Free plan up to 3 agents | Free for 3 agents | Yes, once an admin turns it on | Not verified | Not verified | 14 days |
| Desk365 | Standard $16, $12 billed annually | None listed | 50 tickets a month | Yes | Not verified | Not verified | 21 days |
| osTicket | Open source free; cloud from $12 | None listed | Open source edition | Not verified | Not verified | Not verified | 30 days (cloud) |
Several ticketing-only plans cost less and log time well. "Not verified" means we found no built-in contracts or invoicing on the vendor's pricing page. A connector cell describes the app as the vendor's own doc does. Ask in the trial how an hour reaches an invoice.
These two tools put time entries, contracts, and invoices in the same product as the ticket. That is the test for an MSP or an IT consultancy: the hour you log on Tuesday is on the invoice that goes out Friday.
Best for MSPs and IT teams with 1–15 technicians who bill hourly, by contract, or from prepaid hours
$45 per agent per month on Base Camp · $40 billed annually · High Camp $55 ($50 annually)
A helpdesk and PSA a small IT team can run alone. No contract. No implementation project. No dedicated admin.
Two founders who ran their own MSP have built it since 2001.
You start by forwarding your support address to a SherpaDesk dropbox address, and incoming email becomes tickets. Routing rules send tickets of a chosen class to one technician, and business rules assign by issue type, organization, or severity.
Priorities carry SLA response and completion goals, with your business hours and holidays. The SLA report shows on-time and goal-versus-actual results for closed tickets. Clients log in to a portal to check and update their tickets.
The difference is what happens to the hour. Your technicians log time on the ticket with a timer, a timesheet, the mobile app, or a reply that says "cmd time 1.2". Uninvoiced time collects in Ready to Invoice by contract, and invoices go to QuickBooks Online, Xero, or FreshBooks.
Recommendation
Choose SherpaDesk if you bill clients for your time and want contracts, rates, prepaid hours, and invoices in the same product as the ticket. Consider a ticketing-only tool if nobody ever pays for your hours.
Best for MSPs that want AI-drafted replies in their PSA and run NinjaOne, N-able N-central, Datto, or Level
$79 per tech per month on Standard · $59 billed annually
DeskDay's Standard plan lists "SLA and automated time tracking" and "Contracts & invoicing" next to ticketing, project management, and a knowledge base. Its integrations page lists QuickBooks, Xero, and four RMM tools.
The Standard plan also lists AI drafting of replies, sentiment analysis on customer messages, and guided resolutions for technicians. Fully branded client apps come with Enterprise.
Standard buyers can take an optional $800 one-time onboarding add-on.
Recommendation
Choose DeskDay if you want AI-drafted replies inside the PSA and run one of its four listed RMM tools, and the higher per-seat price fits. Consider another option if you work alone and want to pay monthly.
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Built for teams that support customers of a product, all three log time on tickets, on the plans noted below. We found no built-in contracts on their pricing pages. Freshdesk and HappyFox connect to QuickBooks Online in different ways, described in each entry.
Best for customer service teams that start with email ticketing and add channels later
$25 per agent per month on Support Team · $19 billed annually
Zendesk sells two lines. Support Team is the ticketing-only plan, described as "For teams that have outgrown a shared inbox". Live chat or messaging in the Agent Workspace needs Suite Team or higher.
The Time Tracking app needs Support Professional or Suite Growth and up. Invoicing, QuickBooks, and Xero do not appear on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose Zendesk if you support customers of a product and don't bill for time. Consider another option if your tickets turn into invoices.
Best for customer service teams that want to try an AI agent on email before buying session packs
$23 per agent per month on Growth · $19 billed annually · Pro $66
Growth includes the Freddy AI Agent with 500 free sessions, a one-time allowance per account. After that, sessions cost $49 per 100.
Agents log time on a ticket with timers in the Time Logs widget. A "Billable" checkbox marks entries as billable in timesheet reports.
A QuickBooks Online app logs ticket time in QuickBooks as billable "Time Charge" transactions, and agents can create QuickBooks invoices from the ticket. The doc doesn't state which Freshdesk plan the app needs. We found no contracts or prepaid hours on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose Freshdesk if you run customer support over email and want to test an AI agent, with a budget for sessions after the first 500. Consider another option if you bill by contract or from prepaid hours.
Best for support teams of up to 5 agents who want SLA rules and time tracking on the entry plan
$29 per agent per month on Basic · $24 billed annually · Team $69, Pro $119
HappyFox charges "a monthly price for each support agent actively managing tickets," and annual billing saves 20%. Agents are capped at 5 on Basic. SLA management, a self-service knowledge base, automatic time tracking, and a time spent report appear on every plan.
Round-robin assignment among active agents starts on Team, at $69 per agent per month. The NinjaOne integration starts on Pro, at $119 per agent per month or $99 billed annually. Its QuickBooks Online app, on all plans, shows a contact's QuickBooks invoices on the ticket, read-only. We found no invoicing on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose HappyFox if you run a small support team and want SLA rules on the entry plan. Consider another option if logged hours must become invoices.
Internal IT teams don't invoice anyone, so the last two rows of the checklist matter less. What matters more is how requests arrive from staff, and whether the tool follows IT processes such as change and incident management.
Best for internal IT teams that want an ITSM service desk with time on tickets, from the Growth plan
$29 per agent per month on Starter · $19 billed annually
Freshservice is the IT service desk from the maker of Freshdesk. Time entries on tickets need Growth, Pro, or Enterprise, and the pricing page marks Time Tracking from Growth up. Growth also adds SLA management and a service catalog.
We found no invoicing on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose Freshservice Growth ($59 per agent per month, $49 billed annually) if you run internal IT and want ITSM processes with time on tickets. Consider another option if you bill clients for that time.
Best for IT teams whose developers already work in Jira
Free for 3 agents · Standard $26.90 per agent per month for 1–15 agents
Requests come in by email, Microsoft Teams, Slack, an embedded widget, or a customer portal. Agents can log time on requests once a Jira admin turns time tracking on. We found no invoicing on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose Jira Service Management if your IT team works next to developers in Jira. Consider another option if you bill outside clients.
Best for internal IT teams that work in Microsoft Teams all day
$16 per agent per month on Standard · $12 billed annually · Plus $28, Premium $39
Desk365 lets your team manage tickets without leaving Microsoft Teams. Its pricing page also lists time tracking, to "Log time spent on resolving tickets," and SLA reminders and escalations.
The free plan lets you "Manage up to 50 tickets per month" and starts when the 21-day trial ends. We found no invoicing on the pricing page.
Recommendation
Choose Desk365 if your staff live in Teams and you don't bill for time. Consider another option if tickets must become invoices.
Free comes in three forms: open source you host, a capped free plan, and a free first seat.
Best for teams that must host their ticketing on their own servers
Free open source · cloud-hosted from $12 per agent per month
osTicket's open source edition is free to download and comes with community support. The cloud-hosted edition starts at "$12/agent/mo" and adds phone support, managed upgrades, and daily backups.
You patch, back up, and upgrade it yourself. We found no time tracking or invoicing on the editions page.
Recommendation
Choose osTicket if a client or policy requires self-hosting and you have time to run a server. Consider another option if nobody on the team wants to own upgrades.
The other free options in this guide:
The table totals a team of 3 on the plan each entry recommends, with any extra charges the pricing page lists.
| Tool and plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually | Additional Charges | Contracts And Invoicing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SherpaDesk Base Camp (first agent free) | $90 | $80 | None; migration included | Built in |
| DeskDay Standard | $237 | $177 | Optional, one-time: $800 onboarding add-on | Built in |
| Freshservice Growth | $177 | $147 | None | Not verified |
| HappyFox Basic | $87 | $72 | None | Read-only QuickBooks Online app |
| Jira Service Management Standard | $80.70 | $66.67 ($800 a year) | None | Not verified |
| Zendesk Support Team | $75 | $57 | None | Not verified |
| Freshdesk Growth | $69 | $57 | Usage: $49 per extra 100 AI Agent sessions, after the one-time 500 | QuickBooks Online app; plan not stated |
| Desk365 Standard | $48 | $36 | None | Not verified |
Billed annually, a team of 3 pays $80 on SherpaDesk Base Camp and $177 on DeskDay Standard, the two tools here with contracts and invoicing. On monthly billing, DeskDay's first month is $1,037 with the optional onboarding, against $90 and $0 onboarding on Base Camp. On the ticketing-only plans, the same team pays $36 to $147 billed annually, or $48 to $177 billed monthly.
If you don't bill for time, the cheaper plans are the right buy. If you do, add the billing tool or connector you'd pair with them, and test the hand-off in the trial: does every hour arrive with the right client and rate?
Estimate the time that never reaches an invoice
hours × rate × 52 weeks ÷ 12 months.
Start with one question: does anyone pay for the hours on your tickets? The answer splits this list in two.
The r/msp threads we read show where small shops get hurt. One owner described their month-end: "End of month a powershell pulls line items from Syncro API - This works well sometimes".
Another answered with the setup they wanted instead: "My PSA integrates with Qbo or Xero and just creates the invoices automatically. I send them from the PSA".
Then run the same test in every trial. Use real tickets from last week, and time each step.
If you use Microsoft 365, check email forwarding first. Microsoft may block forwarding to external addresses by default, so an admin may need to allow it.
You can, with a shared mailbox, a form, and a spreadsheet or a low-code app. Practitioners who tried it are blunt. "Don't build it yourself, your valuable time could be better spent generating revenue," one r/msp member wrote.
Another, after three years on a ticketing system built on Power Platform and SharePoint: "seriously don't even consider it". The cost of building is your hours: routing, SLA clocks, a portal, and every fix after that. Price those hours against a free first agent or a free 3-agent plan before you start.
Bottom line: for an MSP or IT team under 15 technicians that bills for its time, our pick is SherpaDesk. If nobody pays for your hours, pick the ticketing-only plan that fits your channels and budget.
How this works in SherpaDesk
A client emails your support address, and the forwarded message becomes a ticket. Your technician fixes the problem and logs the time on the ticket with the timer, or replies "cmd time 1.2" from the inbox.
That time entry lands in Ready to Invoice, grouped by the client's contract, with any expenses. The contract carries the client's rate plan, such as hourly or retainer, and any prepaid hours. You create the invoice and send it to QuickBooks Online, Xero, or FreshBooks.
| Account | Contract | Next billing | Last inv. | Billable | Non-billable | Included | Accum. | Overage | Labor | Travel | Products | Total | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Harbor Dental Group | Flat + Hourly | 10-01-2026 | 09-01-2026 | 14.50 | 2.25 | 10 | 0 | 4.50 | $562.50 | $0 | $0 | $562.50 | + | |
| Maple Street Law | Hourly | 10-15-2026 | 09-15-2026 | 9.75 | 1.00 | 0 | 0 | 0 | $1,218.75 | $45.00 | $0 | $1,263.75 | + | |
| Brightline Accounting | Block Hours | 10-01-2026 | 09-01-2026 | 12.25 | 0.75 | 0 | 0 | 0 | $1,531.25 | $0 | $129.00 | $1,660.25 | + | |
| Cedar Ridge Veterinary | Retainer | 10-20-2026 | 09-20-2026 | 6.00 | 0.50 | 8 | 2.00 | 0 | $0 | $0 | $389.00 | $389.00 | + | |
| Northgate Property Co. | Blended Hourly | 10-31-2026 | 09-30-2026 | 7.50 | 1.50 | 0 | 0 | 0 | $862.50 | $60.00 | $0 | $922.50 | + | |
| Oak & Pine Bakery | Main | 11-01-2026 | Never | 2.00 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | $250.00 | $0 | $0 | $250.00 | + |
Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually) covers tickets, time tracking, and invoicing. Your first agent is free, forever.
Ticket Management In SherpaDesk →
Where SherpaDesk fits
We don't build RMM. We integrate with yours, and the stack stays yours. Today the documented RMM integration is NinjaOne, on High Camp ($55 per agent per month, $50 billed annually).
You get SherpaDesk as a cloud service only, so a policy that requires self-hosting points to osTicket. Ticket statuses are fixed, and you add custom fields for other states.
There is no built-in survey tool; you attach your own survey to the closed-ticket email. A customer-service team that lives on chat and social channels fits Zendesk or Freshdesk better.
It depends on who pays for the work. For an MSP or IT team that bills clients, pick a helpdesk that turns ticket time into invoices.
Our pick is SherpaDesk Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually). A team of 3 pays $90 a month, or $80 billed annually. For customer service by email, Zendesk Support Team starts at $25 per agent per month and Freshdesk Growth at $23, so $75 and $69 for the same team.
For internal IT on Jira, start with Jira Service Management. See the Picks Table.
For a team of up to 3 that needs ITSM, Jira Service Management is free forever for 3 agents. For self-hosting, osTicket's open source edition is free, with community support.
For one technician who bills, SherpaDesk's first agent is free, forever, and includes time tracking and invoicing. Desk365's free plan covers 50 tickets a month.
Microsoft sells Dynamics 365 Customer Service, with case management in every plan, from $50.00 per user per month billed yearly. A team of 3 pays $150 a month, billed yearly. On SherpaDesk Base Camp ($45 per agent per month, $40 billed annually) the same team pays $80 a month billed annually.
To work in Microsoft Teams, Desk365 manages tickets inside Teams, and Jira Service Management takes requests from Teams.
In SherpaDesk, you can sync users from Office 365 and Azure AD nightly, with single sign-on.
You can start with a shared mailbox, a web form, and a spreadsheet or low-code app. Before you build, compare the hours it takes with the free plans in this guide. See How To Choose.
The ticketing system is the core of the helpdesk. It records, routes, and tracks each request. A helpdesk adds the people and the rest of the tooling around it, such as a knowledge base.
A service desk goes further, into change management, service requests, and incident management.
Some can. In this guide, SherpaDesk and DeskDay have contracts and invoicing built in, with QuickBooks and Xero connections. Freshdesk's QuickBooks Online app logs billable time and creates invoices in QuickBooks, and HappyFox's shows QuickBooks invoices read-only. We found no contracts on their pricing pages.
In SherpaDesk, time logged on tickets collects in Ready to Invoice by contract. For the wider category, read our guide to PSA Software.
Patrick co-founded SherpaDesk and has led it as CEO since 2013. He has worked with IT service providers since 1998, first on network projects for schools and government offices, then on the helpdesk software their technicians use every day.