Capturing Costs

[PeggySt1]

I've been using Workfront for about a little over year and still learning so much. I feel that I've just touch the tip of the iceberg. Anyway, we want to start capturing costs; catering, room rental, give-a-ways, etc. What is the best/easiest way to do that. I will need all of this information for reports. Thanks any information will help. Peggy Stanton College of IST PeggyStantonCollege of ISTpstanton@ist.psu.edu

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi Peggy, Congratulations on taking the Financials plunge. There are many useful articles in help.workfront.com worth reviewing, to which I'd highlight these two main concepts: Since (As Designed) Workfront's rate-based financial calculations are not date effective (eg for cases where someone's hourly rate changes periodically as they gain experience), I recommend creating Billing Records periodically to "lock in" those historic cost, both protecting the data, and then freeing you up to adjust the rates on a go-forward basis. Billing Records are relatively easy to create; but if you have a lot of them (eg many projects with lots of tasks and many expenses), can be tedious and time consuming. So when you hit that stage, I invite you to consider our "http://store.atappstore.com/product/auto-bill/">Auto-Bill solution, which removes the drudgery and saves your time. For maximum efficiency, aspire to have Workfront's financials drive the official related documentation (eg quotes, estimates, PO's, invoices, etc.). There are many ways to do so, such as: native Workfront reports; exporting to Excel and reformatting; or our "http://store.atappstore.com/product/estimate/">Estimates solution to generate branded, professional grade documents right out of Workfront. Regards, Doug Doug Den Hoed - AtAppStore Got Skills? Lend a hand! https://community.workfront.com/participate/unanswered-threads

[VicAl]

Hi Peggy, I would use the Expenses tab for items like that. It'll allow you to add the expenses, expense type, amount, Planned Date and Actual Date. And they're easily added to a report. For Labor costs (in Tasks etc.) it gets a little more complicated with Roles, etc. But these costs are pretty easy. And we have a Matrix report that also displays them by month for the project. Let me know if you need that.

[GiselleSeo]

I agree with Vic as this route "Expenses" works for us...in part. I say that because anyone with a "reviewer" license can't see them (regardless of their settings). Which is not to say that it is a bad thing as we are ok with it for our external contractors. However, we have internal clients that can't see the Expenses. That is, if "Financial Data" = "Expenses"...?... These are company employees (reviewer license) who have view rights to the project as well as being designated as the "Sponsor". I have reached out to Support and even asked in a one-on-one at the last LEAP and unfortunately there's no explanation. Giselle Quintero Cross Country Home Services

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi Giselle, According to "https://support.workfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/217179457-Understanding-Financial-Access">this help article, " Not all License Types have full access to Financial Data in Workfront. A user with a Plan license has full access to Financial Data." Reviewer License, we're Looking At You. For your internal users, you might consider creating a special report for them that leverages Workfront's "https://support.workfront.com/hc/en-us/articles/216598698-Running-and-Delivering-a-Report-with-the-Access-Rights-of-Another-User">Run As (i.e. someone who does have Financial Data rights) feature and share it with those internal users. Regards, Doug Doug Den Hoed - AtAppStore Got Skills? Lend a hand! https://community.workfront.com/participate/unanswered-threads

[TeriCh]

Hi Peggy - Here at Harvard we have begun using Workfront to track the many events we have on campus - and are using the Expense tab to track the expenses for each event - we have set up a custom event exp form to capture additional expense related fields (like Vendor name, Date of Invoice etc.) - Happy to discuss more with you if you are trying to use Workfront for University Events. Teri Teri Chisholm Harvard Alumni Affairs and Development