Costs Tab of the Change Details View

This tab displays resource assignment time phased data for the control account or work package.

Rates and calculations are defined in the cost system and summarized to the work package level before the calculations are performed. Since the cost system does not calculate nor store costs at the activity level, when you select an activity in the Change Details grid the Costs tab is disabled and the Resources tab is enabled.  

A rate file is assigned to the class, which is copied from a template project. You can check the rate file in the Advanced tab of the Budget Change Request form or in the Classes tab of the Projects form.

By default, the totals for the resources are rolled up to the control account level. This means that when you select a control account, the values in the grid are the combined values from all of the work packages under that control account. If you select a specific work package in the grid, the values are broken down to the resources for the selected work package.

When requesting a change in budget or forecast, this tab allows you to do the following:

For more information, see Rules for Editing Change Details Data.

Edit Cost and Schedule Data in the Change Details View

With all change requests, you should enter changes to the schedule using the Resources tab before editing time phased costs. This will help ensure that the work package dates are correct before you start entering costs. If the work package dates move, the time-phase costs will have to be respread into the new dates which may cause a change in the cost due to rate escalation.

Using the Cobra Option: Prevent Editing of Historical Time Phased Values

For Planned and In Progress change requests, the Prevent Editing of Historical Time Phased Values option in Cobra influences the manner in which the costs are spread as well as which fields are editable.

Using the Cobra Option: Allow editing current period

This option only applies to Budget Change Requests with budget classes.

For planned and in-progress work packages, the Allow editing current period option in Cobra determines the editability of the current period in the Time phased grid.

If the current period is disabled and you update the Total column, the current period will not be updated.

Control Account/Work Package ID

The information in this field changes based on whether you select a control account or work package in the Change Details grid.

Description

This field displays a description of the selected control account or work package.

Status

This field displays the current status of the selected work package or control account: Planned, In-Progress, or Complete.

Cost Set

By default, two cost sets are selected in this view. The first cost set is configured on the Cost Details on Form tab of the Workflow Type Configuration form. This cost set typically represents the “original” value of what is being requested to change. In other words, it is typically BCWS or EAC. The second cost set selected by default is the one where changes in the change request type are stored. See Storing Change Request Data for more information on how the data for a change request is stored.

Click to display the Cost Set Search dialog box and select other cost sets that you want to display in the grid. The Time Phased grid will automatically update when you click the Select  or Select All button on the Cost Set Search dialog box.

Units

Click to select the units that you want to display in the grid. Use this field to specify how the result is measured.

The first time you access the Change Details view, Units defaults to First Result. If you change to a different unit, the next time you access the Change Details view, it displays in the unit that you last selected.

The time phased grid automatically updates when you choose a new unit option. The units in PM Compass are used to identify the result in the calculation to be displayed in the Cost grid. All resources have calculations. Each row in the calculation is identified by the result and the units for the result.  

Each of these results have units defined in the calculation. Select First Result to enable you to enter data for both labor (entered as hours) and material (entered in the result direct with units of dollars) in the same grid.  

Show Total

Select this check box to display the total row at the bottom of the grid.

Time Phased Grid Toolbar

Field

Description

Time Phased

Click the drop-down arrow to display the following options:

  • Print: Select this option to display the Print Preview form.

  • Export to Excel: Select this option to open the Microsoft Excel application with the grid’s contents displayed.

  • Enable Grouping: Select this option to set a field that will be used to group the records in the grid. You can then drag a column heading from the grid to use as the main grouping field. Drag a second column to the right or left of the first to sort by both columns.  Select Enable Grouping again to disable grouping.

Insert

Click to insert a new row and display the Add Resource Assignment dialog box where you can add cost details for the new resource assignment.

This button is disabled if the baseline change of the work package is before the status date.

Delete

Click to delete the currently selected row. This button is enabled if the selected resource assignment was just added, or when all of the following are true:

  • The workflow is a new or change amount.

  • There are no resource assignments on the linked activity in Open Plan.

  • The selected row contains a target class and the selected cost set only has one class. For example, if the Budget cost set contains two classes, the Delete button is disabled.

  • The work package is planned.

When PM Compass deletes the row, the system displays the change amount in the Cost Change log, Budget Details grid, and Change Details report.

Time Phased Grid Columns and Rows

The available columns in the Time Phased grid vary depending on the cost system you are using. You cannot modify the values in these columns. By default, the grid is sorted by Cost Set and then by Resource: however, you can sort by any column by clicking the column heading.

The other columns in the time-phase grid display the costs for each period as defined by the dates in the calendar associated with the project.

Copy Data from a Spreadsheet into the Grid

If you have an Excel spreadsheet with time phased data already defined, you may want to copy that data into the Change Details Time Phased grid. PM Compass allows you to copy one or more cells from multiple rows in the spreadsheet and paste them into multiple, continuous periods.

For example, to copy a spread over four periods for a single assignment from your spreadsheet to the grid, copy the four cells in the spreadsheet, click on the first cell to which you want to copy in this grid and CTRL + V to paste. PM Compass overwrites the data in the selected cell plus the three cells to the right of that cell with the new data.

You can paste data from your spreadsheet into a Forecast Change Request total column. If your clipboard contains multiple cells, PM Compass will paste the data from the first cell into the Total column and ignore the rest. That is, PM Compass will ignore data from the other cells in the spreadsheet.

Field

Description

Resource ID

This field displays unique ID's for all resources associated with the control account or work package. If no resources are assigned to the selected control account or work package, the Time Phased grid will be blank.

Description

This field displays a description of the resource.

Cost Set

By default, two cost sets are displayed, based on the selection in the Cost Set search.

  • The first cost set is configured on the Cost Details on Form tab of the Workflow Type Configuration form. This cost set typically represents the “original” value of what is being requested to change. In other words, it is typically BCWS or EAC.

  • The second cost set is the one where changes in the change request type are stored. For a forecast class change with the A Replacement of Existing Time Phased Data option selected, this cost set includes the actuals class.

See Storing Change Request Data for more information on how the data for a change request is stored.

Unit

This field displays the unit you selected in the Units drop-down.

Total

This field displays the current total value allocated for each resource over the life of the project. This value is calculated per resource. The amount in this column is calculated as the sum of the change classes in the sandbox project.

When there are time phased periods, this column is editable. When you change the total, the remaining data is adjusted proportionally. If there is any time phased data in the current period, it is deducted from the total and the remaining time phased amount is automatically adjusted across all periods after the current period to meet the new total value.

For example, you have a total of 80 hours with 50 hours in the current period and a spread of 10, 10, 10 in the next three periods. If you change the total to 110, the current period remains at 50 and the spread in the next three periods becomes 20, 20, and 20. If you then change the current period to 40, the total changes to 100.

If there are no time phased periods other than the current period, the Total column is disabled.

Time Phased Columns

These fields display the budget units for each period. The period is based on the calendar in the cost system. If you select a control account in the top grid, the units displayed in each column are for all associated work packages rolled up to the control account level.

If the A Replacement of Existing Time Phased Data option is selected, the data in these columns includes actuals values. The total on the line shows the requested EAC instead of the ETC and allows direct comparison with the existing EAC which is also shown in the grid. When you insert a new resource assignment, the spreading starts the period after the status date.

When you view the time phased costs in the Change Details view, the data comes from a combination of the source project and the temporary project. The default selection is the change class and cost set selected in Workflow Type Configuration. This information comes from the temporary project. If you choose a cost set that includes classes that are not in the temporary project, the entire cost set is retrieved from the source project.

See Storing Change Request Data for more information on how the data for a change request is stored.

PM Compass saves up to six digits to the right of the decimal when entering time-phased data in this grid.

What do you want to do?

Add time phased data

Delete time phased data

Find control accounts or work packages that are not progressing according to plan

View time phased resource data for a control account or work package

View explanation of variance for a control account or work package

Add costs to a work package

Enter cost progress

Set up project-level thresholds

Change a rate file or date set

View the rate file Used

Edit cost in the Time Phased grid

Respread costs


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