Actual Completion Date - populate with Planned Completion Date or Now?

[JamieHi]

There's a setting I noticed in the Setup area that lets the system - when a task is set as 100% complete - use the planned completion date for the "Actual Completion Date" field, rather than populate it with the date when the task was completed. I've had situations with PMs where the progress status of tasks are showing as "late" even though the lag is only because of when the PM has had time to update the plan. I don't think we're yet in a position where tasks are literally being 100%-completed on the exact day when they genuinely were, and I want to avoid having to always edit the "Actual Completion Date" in-line per task. But maybe changing the setting would have unintended consequences -- has anyone done this? Jamie Hill JLL

[VicAl]

I think it's personal preference and depends on how diligent you keep plans up to date (both the PM and the Team). I think either way you'll find yourself updating the Planned Completion Date to whatever you want. So either setting will work. We use the Now setting and encourage our people to update their Tasks in a timely fashion (no more than weekly). Of course that doesn't always happen, but a good percentage of people do. Then we instruct our PM's to update the Planned Completion Date to reflect the Actual Completion to ensure their Successor Task Dates are accurate (Predecessors and Successors use the Planned Completion Date, not the Actual). The other reason we use the Now setting is it gives me two dates (Planned Completion and Actual). If you use the Planned Completion Date setting your Actual will be set to the same date. So an extra date gives me more information and at least a decent idea when a task was actually closed. Vic Alejandro, PMP, CSM | IT | Sr. Technical Project Manager Denver Water | t: (303-628-7262) | c: (303-319-6473) "http://www.denverwater.org/"> http://www.denverwater.org INTEGRITY | VISION | PASSION | EXCELLENCE | RESPECT