General Settings Tab
Use the General Settings tab to manage settings that affect a variety of locations within Project Analyzer. These settings may require ongoing maintenance due to changes within a firm and as costs change over time.
To access this tab
- In Project Analyzer, click File and select System Configuration.
- On the System Configuration window, click the General Settings tab.
This section lists a number of notifications that are generated by the system. For each notification type, click to open the Select Employees dialog box and select one or more email addresses to which the notification should be sent.
Multiple email addresses should be separated by a semi-colon.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Enable Notifications |
Tick the box to enable notifications. |
Billing | Type in or select the key contact points for global billing related notifications. |
Contracts | Contacts receive a notification when new contracts with an agreement type are identified in the Contract/Fees tab. When new contracts of this type are identified, an email addressed to the selected contacts opens in Outlook , allowing the user to add information before sending the email. |
New Project Requests | Contacts receive a notification when new project requests are submitted. When new project requests are submitted, an email addressed to the selected contacts opens in Outlook, allowing the user to add information as needed before sending the email. |
Accounts Payable | Contacts receive a notification when a project manager revises a consultant budget, causing a consultant invoice to be held. Typically, these contacts are members of the accounts payable department responsible for processing consultant invoices. These contacts receive notifications when the Auto Send AP Notifications and Re-Send AP Notifications options are selected in the ribbon bar Accounting tab. |
This section allows you to set default fee and profit values used throughout Project Analyzer.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Default target profit |
Type in the default target profit. |
Target profit calc. method | Determines if the target profit is calculated and displayed on a gross or net basis. When Gross is selected, profit is calculated before non-reimbursable consultants and expenses are removed. When Net is selected, the profit calculation takes into account the cost of non-reimbursable consultants and expenses. |
Default Hourly Fee Type | Default value shown for Fee Type on the Contracts/Fee tab when working with an hourly project. Available values are populated based on the Fee Types set on the Options Text tab. |
Default Non-Hourly Fee Type | Default value shown for Fee Type on the Contracts/Fee tab when working with a non-hourly project. Available values are populated based on the Fee Types set on the Options Text tab. |
This section allows you to set default values for the staffing elements that are used on the Team tab.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Available Hours |
Use this value to determine the amount of hours available per employee for a typical one-week period. There are two options available:
|
Default Available Hours | The default value for the number of available hours for all employees. This number is used when you select Use Analyzer Default Available Hours for All Employees as the Available Hours option. |
Expected Hours |
Use this value to determine the amount of time that employees should be actively engaged in a project. There are two options available:
|
Default Target Ratio | The default target ratio for the percent of available hours that should be spent on a project. This percentage is used when you select Use Analyzer Default Target Ratio for All Employees as the Expected Hours option. |
Over-Assigned | Use this setting to select the color to display in the Staffing Projections tab of Financial Projections when an employee is overutilized. In Project Analyzer, this occurs when the employee is assigned beyond the sum of the value set in the Available Hours and If Exceeds Available By fields. |
If Exceeds Available By | Sets the value by which an employee will be considered over-assigned. You can calculate the value either by a number of hours over or by a percentage of the selected Available Hours. |
Under-Assigned | Use this setting to select the color to display in the Staffing Projections tab of Financial Projections when an employee is under utilized. In Project Analyzer, this occurs when an employee meets the threshold set in the If Under Expected By field. |
If Under Expected By | Sets the value by which an employee will be considered under-assigned. You can calculate the value either by a number of hours under or by a percentage of the selected Expected Hours. |
Use this section to set how employee names are displayed and sorted. Two common formats include (note the space in the middle delimiter boxes separating the names):
[Preferred or First Name] [ ] [Last Name]
[Last Name] [, ] [Preferred or First Name]
Field | Description |
---|---|
Employee Name Format |
Use the two drop-down lists and the delimiter box to set the employee name format. The following options are available in both Employee Name Format drop-down lists:
|
Employee Name Sort |
Determines the sort order of the employees. The following options are available:
|
Use this section to set default labor rate values.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Labor Rate Source |
Sets how labor rates are calculated on the Team tab for budgeting purposes. The following options are available:
|
Default Hourly Labor Rate | Sets the value for a default hourly labor rate. This rate is used when no other labor rates are available. When a multi-currency implementation is used, the currency type will be displayed here. |
Default Ovhd (Overhead) Multiplier | Sets the value for a default overhead multiplier. This value is used when no other defined overhead multiplier is available. |
Use this section to set team assignment defaults.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Assignment Date Float | This setting allows an assignment on the Team tab to start before the phase start date or after the phase end date by the specified percentage. Selecting No Float forces the assignment to be kept within the establish phase date range. |
Use this section to set billing cut-off dates.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Billing Start Cut-Off |
This setting controls the translation of a phase start date to a billing period. If a phase starts too far into a billing period, it is often not billed until the following period. The Billing Start Cut-Off reflects the day by which the phase of work must start in order to be billed in the same period. The default value is the 15th of the month. For example, consider the default Billing Start Cut-off value of the 15th with a phase of work scheduled to start on the 11th of May (before the cutoff). In this case, the first billing period is assumed to be the current month of May with the first invoice going out on June 1st. In a second example, where a phase is scheduled to start on May 19th (after the cutoff) the first billing period is assumed to be June with the first invoice being July 1st. |
Billing End Cut-Off | This setting controls the translation
of a phase end date to a billing period. If a phase ends early in a billing
period, it is often billed for that period. The Billing End Cut-Off reflects
the end date by which the phase of work must be completed to be billed
in the prior period. The default value is the 5th of the month.
For example, consider using the default cutoff value and a phase of work scheduled to end on the 4th of August (before the cutoff). In this case the last billing period is assumed to be the prior month of July with the last invoice going out on August 1st. In a second example, where a phase is scheduled to end on August 7th (after the cutoff) the last billing period is assumed to be August with the last invoice being September 1st. |
Show Default Labor Billing | Determines whether or not Labor (Hourly) Billing line items appear on the Billing tab. When unchecked, labor billing items will not appear on the Billing tab. The decision to show or hide Labor (Hourly) Billing line items varies by company and is typically based on whether a project is being billed as a fixed fee or time and materials job. |
In cases where access is removed to the Show Expanded Detail button, you can modify timesheet data with the Time Analysis setting.
When the Timesheet Detail column in the Security tab is disabled, the system will modify employee cost rates by replacing values smaller than the threshold value (shown above in red) with the replacement value (shown above in green). For instance, using the settings shown in the sample screenshot above, Project Analyzer will replace any number of hours less than 10 with the number 5.
This substitution does not occur when timesheet detail is enabled.
For more information on disabling Expanded Details or Timesheet Detail Control, see the Security tab topic.
The options in this section are used to help calculate the net revenue for the project as shown on the Net Revenue Projections tab in Financial Projections. Mark the check-boxes for the items you wish to include in the net revenue calculations.
Field | Description |
---|---|
Profit | When selected, takes the calculated target profit value into account in the net revenue projections. |
Consultants | When selected, takes the reimbursable consultants cost into account in the net revenue projections. |
Expenses | When selected, takes the reimbursable expenses cost into account in the net revenue projections. |
Toolbar
For information on the options available in the toolbar, please refer to System Configuration: Toolbar.