Using the Allocate feature in Web Suite, you can define hours-to-complete (activities or their groups) and units to incur (expenses or their groups) for employees and teams (employee groups). Setting expectations for how long it should take to complete a task (allocated hours) or how much expense to incur (allocated units) establishes a self-policing process. Web Suite does not stop timekeepers from exceeding allocated hours or units, but it does provide instant information so they can police themselves. When the rules, ‘Lock at Control Hours’ and ‘Lock at Control Units’, are selected in the Project screen, and the hours or units entered exceed the allocation, user is warned accordingly. In short, a project manager does not need to micro-manage timekeepers and their tasks. They know what is expected of them.
You can limit allocated hours to a start-end date range, thus putting an expiration or target date on the work.
Web Suite searches for allocation data in the following order:
1. Employee ID + Item ID
2. Employee ID + Item Group
3. Employee Group + Item ID
4. Employee Group + Item Group
We can have the following scenarios for allocation:
Allocation with no Start Date and End Date: When you exceed allocated units or hours, negative values display.
Allocation with End Date only: While searching, Web Suite looks for the time entry Date to be less or equal to the End Date. When you exceed allocated units or hours, negative values display. However, no values display after the End Date.
Allocation with Start Date and End Date: While searching, Web Suite looks for the time entry Date to be greater or equal to the Start Date but less or equal to the End Date. When you exceed allocated units or hours, negative values display. However, no values display after the End Date.
If you assign the same employee to the same items (hours/units) in multiple rows, thus creating a duplication or overlap, Web Suite uses the sum of those hours or units. For example,
CJ AR:CAD February 1, 2016 to February 28, 2016 30 hours
CJ AR:CAD February 12, 2016 to February 19, 2016 10 hours
The Assigned Hours for a date between 12th and 19th will be 40 hours.
Allocation with Start Date only: While searching, Web Suite looks for the time entry Date to be greater or equal to the Start Date. When you exceed allocated units or hours, negative values display.
You can find useful reports in Web Suite to see allocated and used hours, staff workload, revenue forecast and more related to task allocation.