Changing Hourly Rates and Effect on Projects

[CalvinFold]

We're using Company to control hourly rates. Our setup is something like this: RATE -- Scenario 1 = No users, but all the roles and rates for that scenario (say: FTE) RATE -- Scenario 2 = No users, but all the roles and rates for that scenario (say: Contingent Worker) z_Company = Where all the users are stored, no role rates used. Project Managers are required to carefully choose the proper Company before the project starts, and on-notice they can't change it once they start. We are not using APIs or Fusion; all integrations with our external finance software is via reporting via Workfront and exported to Excel for import into that external system. We do not use billing records due to the time sink that would cause for all involved, opting instead to simply export timesheet and expense data for an external system to handle invoicing. So hours logged and material charges logged are handled outside the system. Timesheets are used, approved, and closed per WF practice (the data, however, goes outside the system or invoicing, billback, crosscharging, or payroll as appropriate). With that in mind, what happens if we had, say, 6 months of projects and changed the hourly rates in the two "RATE" companies above? Would completed ("Closed" status) past projects be affected? What about projects in-progress and have an obligation to bill at the older rate? Are the affects above also true of project-level and user-level rate changes? For example, if I change an specific user's hourly rate (over-riding their Role rate), how does that effect other projects in the system? Kevin Quosig

[BarryBu2]

Dear Kevin, There are two questions here. The first is about changing the hourly rate. In that case, the new rate is 'effective' for past tasks, but you won't see a change in actual cost / actual revenue until the task or issue is recalculated. This happens whenever you edit anything about the task/issue or can be triggered by going into an individual project and selecting 'recalculate finances'. Note that you can bulk-edit projects and recalculate the finances. As you most likely won't be editing tasks (and hopefully don't allow it at the global level) and can control which projects you calculate finances for it shouldn't affect closed projects. However, it will affect ALL open projects, including ones that have been open for some time. So even if you don't bill out of Workfront, you probably want to use billing records as your once-a-year rates change process. That process would be: Create an hours filter for all hours before the effective date on open projects. In your case it may be only for specific companies as well (the companies that are changing their rates). Create an hours report (grouped by project) using the above filter Using the report, open each project listed in a new tab, add a billing record and use the hours filter defined in step 1. Add all the hours. Mark the record as billed Refresh the report every now and again until it doesn't return anything Change the rates Create a report of all open (non request queue) projects (optional - again include the company filter). Select them all and bulk-edit to recalculate their finances Your second question relates to user rate vs role rate. Each individual task indicates how cost and revenue is calculated - role hour or user hourly (or with caps, or fixed + hourly). WF effectively uses the one you specified and ignores the other. So if a task cost is user hourly, changing the role rate will have no effect on that task's cost but changing the user role will. You can of course create reports that calculate the user cost for you, even if you are using role hourly (or vice versa). https://experience.workfront.com/s/article/Preventing-the-Recalculate-Finances-Action-from-Affecting... Barry Buchanan - WMA Work Management Australia

[CalvinFold]

Wow...this is contrary to Support's comments, which made it sound like the moment hours are logged, they are pegged to the hourly rate at that moment, regardless of billing record, which means rate changes would be no big deal whenever they happen. Perhaps I am misunderstanding either Support or you, Barry? Using Billing Records is not tenable...our pre-Workfront workload was automated in this regard; the level of effort for every Project Manager to do regular billing records, or of the finance person to do some sort of pre-change audit, would be a real time sink and require added staff. :-( Kevin Quosig

[Doug_Den_Hoed__AtAppStore]

Hi Kevin, I agree with Barry's assessment (i.e. using Billing Records is the proper way to lock in rates and costs), and to lessen the burden on your finance folks, invite you to consider our "https://store.atappstore.com/product/auto-bill/" Auto-Bill solution which can provide peace of mind and save time by automatically creating Workfront billing records to prevent accidental deletion of project data and lock down the associated time and financial information. Regards, Doug Den Hoed - AtAppStore

[BarryBu2]

Can you share support's response? The answer is different for cost and revenue. It should be the same for closed projects (nothing should really trigger a recalc for them) but your in-flight projects, with time logged both sides of the rate change and/or time still to be logged post rate-change are certainly going to be tricky to get right without billing records. Barry Buchanan - WMA Work Management Australia