· Work In Progress—Lists open projects and projects with sales or cost activity as of a specific date. This report details cost/sales information on both project and phase levels. It includes estimated cost and sales vs. actual figures with percentage of completion, revenue earned, cost in excess of billings, over and under billings, and profit analysis.

· AIA Project Reporting—generates AIA facsimile certificate and continuation sheet per project invoice.

Creating Projects

To create a new project, first locate and open an existing customer, or create a new customer. Right-click on the customer screen and select “New project…” from the popup menu (you can also press Alt+Insert). A new project form will open up under the customer form.

Define the project by competing the information on the different tabs of the project form:

· Setup—This section contains general information about the project and must be completed before you can save your new project. Certain fields in this section are required.

· Phases—Phases coorespond to the jobs of the project on a one-to-one basis. Creating the phases consists of defining a phase type for each phase. Once the project is sold/opened, the jobs for the phases can be created and processed.

· Estimate—The project estimate consists of estimated…

o Parts, labor, and misc sales figures for each phase.

o Cost figures entered by expense type for each phase. This expense type breakdown must include separate entries for at least the three categories of parts, labor, and miscellaneous. It is possible to automatically import/compile these figures from sales quotes.

· Billing—The project may contain a billing schedule which indicates dates and amounts of pre-scheduled billings. While this may be useful, it is not necessary to set up pre-scheduled billings for projects. Invoices can be created as needed in this section.

· Change Orders—Once the estimate is complete and accepted and locked, any changes to the project will be recorded in change orders. Change orders are additional project estimates that either add or subtract from the original estimated sales and cost figures (i.e., Original Estimate + Change Orders = Current Estimate).

General Setup

When creating project you must specify the following (required fields are bolded) in the setup section of the project form:

· Brief Description—Enter a brief description of the project (i.e., ‘City Hall Furnaces’).

· Project/Job Number— When a project is created, like a job it will automatically receive a job number. You may override this job number and enter your own number. In order to differentiate automatically generated numbers from user-entered numbers, the number you enter must include at least one letter.

· Department—the default department for the project. This department will carry through as default to the jobs, quotes, invoices created for this project.

· Project Manager—the employee responsible for the project.

· Project Forman—this employee will be the default foreman for each phase created for the project.

· Sales Tax Code—this code will be used on all invoices created for the project.

· Customer/Project Sales Tax Exemption Number

· Lead Source—the lead source that generated this project. This lead source will carry through as default to the jobs, quotes, invoices created for this project.

· Sales Person—The employee/sales person that is selling/sold this project. This sales person will carry through as default to the jobs, quotes, invoices created for this project.

· Estimate Type—this specifies how you will maintain the project estimate. You can maintain estimates manually or automatically from quotes.

o Manual Estimate: For this type of estimate you will manually key in the estimated figures.

o Quoted Estimate: For this type of estimate you will enter either ‘Quick Quotes’ or ‘Cost-Plus Quotes’. These quotes can then be used to automatically update the estimate’s figures. (Quotes, while similar to A/R Invoices do not post to receivables.)

· Receivable Retention and Percentage—If this option is selected, invoices created for the project will default to this configuration for sales retainage.

· Progress—Use this control to manually maintain the current progress of this project:

o Estimating: Not open or sold; currently building estimates and selling.

o Open/Sold: Estimate has been accepted; jobs can be created and processed for these projects.

o Closed/Finalized: These projects are finished, paperwork and all. No transaction will be allowed for finalized jobs/phases/projects throughout the system.

o Canceled: These are projects that have not been sold. The estimate was not accepted. Any jobs that have been created for a project must be canceled before you can cancel the project.

Defining Phases

Phases are managed in the ‘phases’ section of the project form. You must predefine the phases of the project. These phases will later be used to create the actual jobs. For now you just need to define them so that the project can be estimated on a per phase basis.

When defining phases you need only specify the Phase Type for each phase. Phase types are two character codes used to identify the phases of a project. Phase types can be set up in the ‘Phase Type’ Reference Book.

o The Phase Code is a two-character code used to uniquely identify phases of a project. It is recommended that you use letters for your phase codes (i.e., “RI” for “Rough-in”, or “IE” for “Install Equipment”). This two-character code will be automatically appended to the project number when creating job numbers for the phases. For instance, the project number ‘AA2424’ could have jobs with the job numbers ‘AA2424.RI’ and ‘AA2424.IE’.

o When defining your phase types in the ‘Phase Type’ reference book, your phase code must be unique. The phase type must reference an existing job type and class. This job type and class will automatically be used for the job created for the phase.

Ordering of Phases can be achieved by selecting ‘move up’ or ‘move down’ from either the toolbar or the popup menu.

IMPORTANT: The same phase type cannot be used on more than one of the phases for a project (i.e., if the phase type ‘RI’ is used for the first phase of a project, it cannot be used for any of the other phases of the same project).

NOTE: Jobs cannot be created for phases until the project is sold and opened (project progress is ‘sold/open’).

Estimating Project Cost and Sale

The project estimate consists of estimated hours, cost and sales figures. These figures will be compared to actual figures as the project progresses. This comparison will be used to estimate the percentage of completion and aid in determining over/under billing.

Project Estimates

The project estimate is managed from the estimate section of the project form. Projects estimates consist of estimated labor hours, estimated cost, and estimated sale price.

· Hours and cost are recorded for predefined job cost categories. These predefined job cost categories are standard SuccessWare expense types that link directly to your general ledger.

· The estimated parts, labor, and misc sale price is recorded for each phase. Recording the estimate figures for each phase of the project allows SuccessWare to estimate completion of a project at the phase level.

The following example illustrates the structure of the project estimate:

Estimates for Project 100001:

Phase Expense type Est. Hrs Est. Cost Est. Sale Price

Phase 1: 100001.RI

Parts

Equipment Parts 500.00

Materials Parts 250.00

750.00 1,500.00

Labor

Mgmt (30 hrs) 200.00

Standard (210 hrs) 1000.00

1,200.00 6,000.00

Misc

Permits 250.00

Subcont 750.00

1,000.00 1,000.00

Phase 1 Total (240 hrs) 2,950.00 8,500.00

Phase 2: 100001.CA

Parts

Materials 220.00

220.00 440.00

Labor

Mgmt (25 hrs) 50.00

Standard (85 hrs) 120.00

170.00 850.00

Misc

Subcont 250.00

250.00 250.00

Phase 2 Total (110 hrs) 640.00 1,540.00

Project Total (350 hrs) 3,590.00 10,040.00

In the example above, ‘Equipment’ and ‘Materials’ are parts expense types. ‘Mgmt’ and ‘Standard’ are labor expense types, and ‘Permits’ and ‘Subcont’ are misc expense types.

Cost and hour figures are recorded for the applicable expense types and then summed for the phase and project totals. Labor expense types allow estimated hours entry.

The sale price figures are recorded for each phase of the project by ‘part sale’, ‘labor sale’, and ‘misc sale’. These figures are then summed for the phase and project totals.

How these figures are generated/recorded depends upon the setting you choose for the project’s estimate type.

o Manual Estimate: For this type of estimate you will manually key in the estimated figures.

o Quoted Estimate: For this type of estimate you will enter either ‘Quick Quotes’ or ‘CostPlus Quotes’. These quotes can then be used to automatically update the estimate’s figures. (Quotes, while similar to A/R Invoices do not post to receivables.)

Manual Estimates

For manual estimates figures are manually entered; Estimated hour and cost figures by expense type for each phase, and estimated sale price by part sale, labor sale and misc sale for each phase.

Project estimates should only be recorded…

· After the project has been created.

· For projects set up with ‘manual’ estimates.

To manually enter the figures for a project estimate:

1) Access the ‘Estimate’ page of the project form

2) Select the ‘Detail’ page of the estimate (The ‘Quotes’ page is inaccessible for manual estimates)

3) Select a phase from the phase combo box or by pressing Ctrl+Left or Ctrl+Right. This will access the figures for a single phase of the project.

By default, the ‘Detail’ page shows a total project summary. This summary cannot be modified directly. You can only modify the individual ‘phase’ estimates.

NOTE: the estimate automatically loads the preset Job Cost Categories. These Job Cost Categories are user defined within the expense type reference book. Within this reference book, you can specify which expense types are considered to be default job cost categories.

4) Enter estimated hours and cost for each of the categories/expense types.

The item type for each category is initially identified based on associations with parts, labor, and miscellaneous items in the pricebook. You can change the item type for a category on the estimate if desired. If an item type is not identified by default, you must enter P, L, or M as the item type.

You can leave hours/cost entries blank, or enter zero if desired. You can also delete the line if you do not want the category to show up on you estimate for that phase.

5) Enter the estimated part, labor, and misc sale prices for the phase in the edit boxes to the right of the grid.

6) Save changes to the phase estimate.

NOTE: You can also add and delete cost entries.

Other options in the ‘Estimate | Detail’ section of the project form:

· Refresh Categories—For manual estimates, this will refresh the cost categories for the selected phase. If you have deleted any of the default categories, you can use this feature to add them back into the list.

· Clear Zero Entries—This will remove any cost entries with zero cost from the estimate.

· Lock/Unlock—Locking an estimate will prevent any changes to the estimate. The process of locking and unlocking project estimates and change orders is controlled with specific project user abilities. An estimate cannot be locked until all phases have cost and sales recorded.

· Print—Print the Original Estimate, Change Order, or Revised Estimate. When printing the Estimate, there is an option to compare to actual figures and to include/exclude actual sale and cost detail.

Quoted Estimates

Another way of preparing project estimates is by recording sale items and cost detail on one or more Quotes for the project. Project phases must be identified for each sale item on the quote. This sale and cost information can then be summarized into the project estimate. When using quoted estimate preparation, the estimate cannot be directly modified through the ‘Estimate | Detail’ section of the project form. Instead, you must modify the estimate’s quotes to change the estimate.

Quotes should only be added…

· After the project has been created.

· For projects set up with ‘quoted’ estimates.

From the ‘Estimate | Quotes’ section of the project form, you can…

· Select ‘New’ to add a new quote to the estimate. This will create a new quote. When you save the quote it will be added to the estimate. The figures will not be summarized into the project estimate until you ‘lock’ the quote.

· Select ‘Add’ to add and existing quote (from a sales job) to the estimate. This will open a window prompting for an existing quote number. Enter the number and select ok. If the quote is found and is not already assigned to a managed project, a window containing quote information will open for confirmation. Select ok, and the quote will be added to the estimate. If the quote is locked, it will automatically be unlocked. It must be modified to identify phases for each line item, after which it can then be locked and applied to the estimate.

· Select ‘Open’ to open an existing estimate quote for editing.

Project Quotes

Project quotes are similar to the A/R Invoice. These quotes can be presented to the customer for evaluation and the cost and sales figures can be used to complete project estimates and change orders. On project quotes, you must associate each line item with a phase of the project. The phase is a column in the line item grid for project quotes and invoices. The phase defaults to the first phase of the project or the phase of the line item focused when ‘New Item’ is selected. You can enter either the phase number (1,2,3…) or the phase type, or select from the drop down menu. This phase relationship for the line item is displayed in the extended item information panel below the line item grid. Each line item must be associated with a phase before it can be locked. When you lock a project quote, the cost and sale figures will be summarized into the project estimate or change order to which the quote belongs.

NOTE: You cannot lock or unlock quotes for an estimate or change order that has been locked.

Change Orders

Change orders are managed from the change order section of the project manager. You can add a change order to the project at anytime before the project is closed. Change orders must be configured for ‘manual’ or ‘quoted’ preparation, similar to the project Estimates. The recording of information is the same and recording the original estimate with one exception: change orders allow negative entries for hours, cost and sales.

Original and Current Estimates

The current estimate is calculated by adding change orders to the original estimate. Adding change orders will not change the original estimate but it will affect the current estimate.

Project Manager

This is where you manage your ongoing projects. The project manager lists all your projects in three views:

· Estimating—Projects that have not yet been sold.

· Sold/Open—Projects that have been sold and are in progress.

· Search—Search for a particular project at any progress stage.

You can use the project manager to locate and open projects. The project form can also be accessed from the job form (for any job that is a phase of a project).

Opening the Project and Creating Jobs

A project can be opened from the Project Manager, or by using the Open Job (or Project) shortcut key (F9) from the Job Form when focused on a job that is a phase of a project, or from the Invoice Manager or Invoice Form when focused on a project invoice, also using the Open Job (or Project) shortcut (F9).

Once a project has been sold, access the setup page of the project form and change the status of the project from ‘estimating’ to ‘sold/open’. Then access the phase’s page of the project form and create the jobs for each phase as desired. Once the job is created for the phase, it can be scheduled, dispatched and information recorded for the job just like any other type of job.

To create a job for a phase:

· Select the appropriate phase you wish to create the job for.

· Select ‘create/open job’ from either the toolbar or the popup menu. This will open the new job in the job form. The job class and job type will be pre-filled based on the job class and job type of the phase type. These fields cannot be modified on the job. The department for the job will be copied of the job type if it exists, or it will default to the department as identified on the project.

Job Number—The job number for the newly created job will be the project number and phase type separated by a period (<project no>.<phase type>). For example “P101.RI” might be a job or phase number for the project numbered “P101”. The job number for a phase of a project cannot be modified. The same phase type cannot be used on more than one of the phases for a project.

Once all the jobs for a project have been closed and finalized, you can close/finalize the project. Just change the status on the setup page of the project form.

Billing

Project billing is managed from the billing section of the project form. You can predefine a billing schedule for each project that will help to ensure that invoices are prepared on time. When preparing the schedule, you make an entry for each invoice that must be prepared. When making invoice schedule entries you must specify:

· Estimated Sale: This is the amount to be billed on the invoice. This amount can be selected from the drop down menu, which maintains the scheduled billing balance for the project and each phase. The phase balances are only valid if billing by phase and entering the option phase field as mentioned below.

· Prepare Date: This is the date by which the invoice should be prepared/posted/delivered.

· Phase (optional): This field can be used if billing by phase. It will relate the estimated sale with a phase of the project and allow SuccessWare to calculate the estimated sale balance to be billed to assist with creating a billing schedule.

Project Invoices

Project invoices are created form the billing section of the project form and are similar to ordinary A/R Invoices. On project invoices, you must associate each line item with a phase of the project. The phase is a column in the line item grid for project invoices. The phase defaults to the first phase of the project or the phase of the line item focused when ‘New Item’ is selected. You can enter either the phase number (1,2,3…) or the phase type, or select from the drop down menu. Each line item must be associated with a phase before it the invoice can be posted. This phase relationship for the line item is displayed in the extended item information panel below the line item grid.

Phases that have not yet been created as jobs, and canceled phases/jobs cannot be referenced on the line items. Jobs that are referenced on invoices, in turn, cannot be canceled.

A billing schedule is not required for multi-phase projects. Multiple invoices can be created for a project without ever creating a schedule.

Invoices cannot be created for ‘estimating’, ‘finalized’ or ‘canceled’ projects.

The print/preview option for the project invoices has two options:

· Print Invoice—Previews/prints the A/R invoice.

· Print AIA Certificate and Continuation — Opens the AIA Certificate and Continuation Sheet interface. Here you can review/modify the amounts stored (at the time of billing) for each phase of the project. These amounts stored are not carried forward in any way. They are only entered for printing the AIA Certificate and Continuation Sheet for the specific invoice.

The “Work In Progress” Report

The Work In Progress report can be access from the management section of the report gallery. This report requires an “As-of-date” to filter for projects/phases that…

· Have cost or sales activity on or before the “As-of-date”, and

· Are either open or have activity after the “As-of-date”.

Note that the Work In Progress report will summarize cost and sales information at either the project level or phase level. Individual Project detail (parts purchased or pulled from inventory, timecard entries, and miscellaneous wages, not including commissions) can be obtained as an option on the project estimate report. To access the project estimate, open the project, access the ‘estimate’ section of the project form and select print.

Sales Activity

Sales activity consists of a project’s posted receivable invoices. Invoices are created for projects from the billing section of the project form. Once created, these invoices are just like other receivable invoices with a few exceptions:

· Each line item of project invoices must be associated with a phase of the project. This identification is important. It allows SuccessWare to calculate actual sales figures per phase of a project to compare to estimates.

· Besides printing the invoice, you can also print the AIA Certificate and Continue Sheet from project invoices.

Cost Activity

Cost activity consists of Payable Invoices, Receipts, Material Requisitions and Returns, and Timecard entries and non-commission miscellaneous wage entries. The actual cost to date of a project/phase is determined by adding up the line item totals from these source documents. These source documents each allow job number designation on the line items or documents themselves. Like the project quotes and invoices, this allows SuccessWare to calculate actual cost figures per phase of a project to compare to estimates.

NOTE: items purchased/received for a job into inventory (with a warehouse specified) will not be included in cost. These items will eventually be requisition from inventory for the job and will show as cost at that time.

Project Cost and Sales Tracking

Project cost and sales tracking consists of monitoring both the earliest and most recent dates of cost/sales activity. Before you run a work in progress report, make sure this tracking is up to date. The report interface shows the last time the tracking was updated. Click the “Update” button to check and record the earliest and most recent activity on the project.

Percentage of Completion

The percentage of completion for projects/phases is determined by the actual cost vs. the estimated cost. Projects may run behind or ahead of schedule. From the work in progress report, you can access the “Percentage Of Completion” spreadsheet by clicking the “% Complete” button. This spreadsheet lists the same phases the report is set for (based on your “As-of-date”). You can use this spreadsheet to override the percentage of completion as follows:

Phase EstCost ActCost Orig% Override CompletionAdjustmentFactor
100001.RI $1,000 $250 25% 50% 2

The phase above has an estimated cost of $1,000. The actual cost as of the “As-of-date” is $250 yielding the original percentage completion of 25%. If you override the percent complete and enter 50%, the phase will be 50% ahead of schedule with an adjustment factor of 2. The percentage of completion will be calculated as

(ActCost X Factor) / EstCost, or, (250 X 2) / 1,000 = 500/1,000 = ½ or 50%.

The EstCost will be shown on the work in progress report as

(EstCost/Factor), or 1,000/2 = $500.

Along with the estimated cost, the original estimate will be reported as well for phase with overridden cost of completion. The phase’s percentage of completion will be reported as such in the work in progress report. For instance with the ActCost reaches $375, the phase is considered 75% complete. This will stay in effect until you override the percentage of completion again. To return the phase to normal calculation, select ‘reset adjustment factor’ from the popup menu in the Percentage of Completion Spreadsheet.

Select the ‘reset’ option from the popup menu to reset the adjustment factor to one (1). This will return the phase to its actual percent of completion based on actual cost without any adjustment.

When adjusting completion, the percent and factor column show up as red until you modify the percentage. You can also select ‘accept’ from the popup menu. Modifying or accepting will set the ‘factor-date’ on the job to the ‘as-of-date’ for the report/completion spreadsheet. Once modified or accepted, the columns change from red to the standard window color and stay that way until the ‘as-of-date’ for the report/spreadsheet changes. This allows you to exit the form and come back and easily identify where you left off. It also identifies which jobs have been overridden or accepted for the given report ‘as-of-date’.

Report Columns

(a) Original Contract—Total sale for the phase from projects original estimate (before change orders)

(b) Change Order—Net change to sale for the phase from change orders with a change order day on or before the “as-of-date”.

(d) Cost To Date—Include a summary of cost recorded on or before the ‘as-of-date’ related to the job from the following sources:

- Timecard entries (hours*rate) for hourly and salary employees expensing labor via time card (not salary split or piece rate employees)

- Miscellaneous wages (total amount) all non-commission entries related to job

- Posted A/P invoices, sum of line item totals related to the job

- Posted Receipts (where invoice was not posted), sum of line item totals related to the job

- Posted Material Requisitions, sum of line item totals related to the job

- Posted Material Returns, sum of line item totals related to the job

(e) Est Cost to Complete— (f) – (e)

(f) Total Est Cost—Total cost from revised estimate (original estimate + change orders).

(g) % Cmplt— (f) / [ (d) X Factor ] where factor is the completion adjustment factor set when overriding percentage of completion in the percentage of completion spreadsheet accessible from the report interface.

(h) Earned Revenue— (c) X (g)

(i) Billings To Date—sum of all line items on posted A/R invoices associated with the job/phase.

(j) Cost in Excess of Billings— [ [ (h) – (i) ] / (h) ] X (d) i.e., cost associated with billings under revenue earned.

(k) Billing in Excess of Earnings— (i) - (h)

(l) Under Billed— (h) - (i)

(m) Gross Profit— TotalExpectedRevenue (greater of (c) and (i)) less TotalExpectedCost (f).

(n) Gross Profit %— (m) / TotalExpectedRevenue (greater of (c) and (i)).

NOTE: If the percent of completion is overridden, the Total Est Cost will be modified to reflect the completion change. The original estimated cost and cost to complete will be directly above the modified total estimated cost and cost to complete. For example, a job with an original estimated cost of $1,000 and actual cost of $250 that is overridden to reflect a 50% completion would be represented as follows:

Cost Est Cost Total %
ToDate To Complete Est Cost

(1) 100001.RI $750 $1,000

$250 $250 $500 50%

User Abilities

A new page has been added to the user group ability form for projects and it includes the following abilities.

· View Projects

· Create/Modify Projects

· Delete Project

· Lock Estimates and Change Orders

· Unlock Estimates and Change Orders

· Override Completion—allows the user to access to the percentage of completion spreadsheet.

Cost Adjustments

You can use the cost adjustment entry feature of SuccessWare21® to record cost for a project that has not been recorded within SuccessWare21® via material receipts, a/p invoices, material requisitions, returns, timecard entries, or miscellaneous wage entries (to read more about the cost adjustment feature, click here).

Open balance cost adjustments will be included in all calculations and reports when summarizing costs for projects.

Opening Balance Entries

Adjustments to the cost, sales and retainage figures for a project can be made via cost adjustments (noted above) and opening balance billing entries (to read more about the opening balance billing feature, click here).