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Purchasing and Project Administration

This page covers the day-to-day additions for running projects:

Purchasing from projects​

Most project cost comes through purchasing: materials, hire, and subcontractors. In standard Business Central, the person raising a purchase order has to re-key what's already in the project budget and remember to link every line to the right project and task. If they miss a link, the cost doesn't reach the project, and the project's reported margin is wrong.

These additions make it quicker to buy against the project and harder to lose costs.

Why you need it​

  • Faster ordering. Purchase orders are created from the budget lines that are already on the project.
  • Costs land on the project. Lines created from the budget are linked to the project and task automatically, and you're warned about orders where only some lines are linked.
  • Visibility. Project managers can see every posted purchase invoice for their project and who ordered it.

What you get​

  • A Create Purchase Order action on the project's task lines.
  • A Purchase Gen. Bus. Posting Group on project posting groups, to post project purchases differently from overhead purchases.
  • Project No. and Project Task No. columns on purchase order lines.
  • A Post Receipt action on the purchase order, and prompts when you close an order.
  • Ordered By on posted purchase invoices.
  • A Posted Purchase Invoices list on each project.
  • Fewer confirmation prompts when you post purchases linked to projects.

Creating a purchase order from the budget​

  1. On the project card, in the Tasks part, select the tasks you want to buy for.
  2. Choose Create Purchase Order. The Project Planning Lines page opens with the budget lines for those tasks. Billable-only lines and purchasing-blocked items are left out.
  3. Fill in Buy-from Vendor No. at the top.
  4. For each line you want to order, enter Qty. to Purchase Order. To fill in the remaining quantity (quantity less quantity posted), select the lines and choose Fill Qty. to Purchase.
  5. Select the lines and choose Create Purchase Order.

The app creates one purchase order for the vendor and opens it.

  • Each line has the item, G/L account, or resource, the location, the quantity, and the description from the budget line.
  • Item and G/L account lines are linked to the project and task. The link uses a blank project line type, so the cost is posted as usage without adding more planning lines.
  • The order takes the dimensions of the first task selected.
  • Direct Unit Cost is left at zero. Enter the agreed price before you send the order.

Qty. to Purchase Order is cleared on the planning lines once the order is created.

Posting project purchases to different accounts​

If project purchases need to post to different general ledger accounts, or with a different tax treatment, than your other purchases, fill in Purchase Gen. Bus. Posting Group on the project posting group. When a purchase line is linked to a project in that group, the line's Gen. Bus. Posting Group is changed to this value. If you remove the project from the line, it goes back to the order's posting group.

On the purchase order​

  • Project No. and Project Task No. are shown on the lines, so you can check the links at a glance.
  • Post Receipt posts the receipt only, without asking whether to receive or invoice. Use it when goods arrive on site, so that the cost is recognised as received but not invoiced and is included in the project's forecast. See Cost forecasting.
  • When you close an order:
    • If some lines with an amount are linked to a project and others aren't, you're told, so you can fix missing links.
    • If nothing has been received on the order yet, you're asked to confirm that you want to leave without posting a receipt.
Bill received costs before the vendor invoice arrives

A receipt on its own doesn't post cost to the project. The cost reaches the project, and can be billed to the customer, only when the vendor invoice is posted. Our Purchase Accruals app posts the cost to the project as soon as the receipt is posted, so received costs can go on the next claim and are included in WIP straight away.

Tracking project purchases​

  • Ordered By on the posted purchase invoice shows the user who created the purchase order. It is filled in when an invoice is posted against an order.
  • Posted Purchase Invoices on the project card and the project list shows every posted purchase invoice that has at least one line for the project. It includes the vendor, the vendor invoice no., the order no., the task, the amounts, and Ordered By. Drill down on an amount to open the invoice.

Fewer prompts when posting​

When you post purchase documents with lines linked to projects, the app suppresses the standard confirmation prompts about project line types and planning line links, and it automatically confirms matching purchase usage to the project's planning lines. This keeps receiving and invoicing quick for purchasing staff.

Project administration​

This page covers the smaller additions to the project card and project list. Each one fills a gap that tends to push project information out into spreadsheets.

Multiple project managers​

Larger projects often have more than one project manager, each responsible for different parts of the work.

  • On the project card, next to Project Manager, you can enter a Project Manager 2 and a Project Manager 3. The same user can't be entered twice.
  • On the project's tasks, Project Manager (Responsible) records which of the project's managers owns each task. It can be set on Posting, Begin-Total, and End-Total tasks, and it must be one of the project's managers.
  • If you replace a project manager on the project card, the tasks that were assigned to the old manager are reassigned to the new one.

Filter the Project Tasks list by Project Manager (Responsible) to see a manager's work across all projects. Use the Project Status column to leave out completed projects.

Warranty tracking​

After handover, you need to know which projects are still under warranty, so that callbacks are handled correctly and warranty provisions can be released on time.

  • On the project card, turn on Under Warranty and enter the Warranty Expire Date. You can only enter the date when Under Warranty is on.
  • If you turn off Under Warranty before the expiry date, you're asked to confirm, and the date is cleared.
  • Under Warranty and Warranty Expire Date are shown on the project list, so you can filter for projects under warranty.

Site location​

Site Location on the project card records where the work is carried out. It is printed on the Progress Claim and Contract Variation reports.

Dimensions on the project card​

The Dimensions FastTab on the project card shows the global dimensions and shortcut dimensions 3, 4, and 5, and you can edit them there. You don't need to open the default dimensions page to check or change a project's main dimensions.

Shortcut dimension 5 is also shown on the project list, so you can filter and sort by it. It is kept in step with the project's default dimension.

Ledger Entry Exists​

The project list has a Ledger Entry Exists column. It shows whether anything has been posted to the project, which helps when you're cleaning up unused projects or checking whether a project can still be restructured.

Refreshing customer details on invoicing​

If customer addresses or contacts change during a long project, the project keeps the details it had when the customer was entered. With Revalidate Customer on Invoice turned on in Projects Setup, Create Sales Invoice on the project first refreshes the project's sell-to and bill-to customer, so the invoice picks up the current details.

Correcting posted project invoices​

When you cancel or correct a posted project sales invoice with the standard Cancel or Correct actions, the app keeps the project's invoiced figures consistent:

  • When the corrective credit memo is created, the app records the original invoice against the project's planning lines and adds an offsetting planning line (the original description followed by (Credit)) for the credited quantity. That way, % invoiced, the progress claim, and WIP all reflect the credit.
  • These offsetting lines are locked. You can't change or delete them yourself.
  • If you delete the unposted corrective credit memo, the offsetting lines are removed again.
  • Any retention on the original invoice is reversed. See Retentions.

To use this, fill in Corrective Cr. Memo Nos. in Projects Setup. The app uses this number series internally to link the planning lines to the credit memo before it is posted.