Calculate costs even when on holiday

[Anita]

I want project to calculate resource costs for staff for work shut down weeks.

How can I do that? I assume it doesn't accrue costs for non working time?
But when staff are on annual leave they get paid.

Thanks

Anita

 

[Dave]

I want project to calculate resource costs for staff for work shut down weeks.

How can I do that? I assume it doesn't accrue costs for non working time?
But when staff are on annual leave they get paid.

Thanks

Anita

If you want to accrue annual leave costs in a given project file, then
you can add activities for those periods and assign resources 100%. The
problem you will have is if there are resources shared across different
Projects.

Another way would be to use a resource pool and have an administrative
project which encapsulated all of these administrative issues. Is it
really the case that leave costs are attributed to your project rather
than administrative overheads?

 

[Jim Aksel]

Generally items like vacation, national holidays, company shutdown, sick
leave, etc are not paid for by the project. As such, the cost of this is
typically rolled into the overall G&A and Overhead of the hourly rate.

It might be reasonable to use an administrative project and resource pool
approach. That seems a bit much as you have to ask yourself, "Where do we
stop? Jury duty? Sick time? Training class?, Staff meeting?" Only include
project cost in a project file. Unless the project must specifically pay for
its own overhead, then leave the costs out.
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[DavidR]

I have a follow-up question. We are using a resource pool that includes a
burden rate that includes vacation, sick leave, etc. If a resource is
assigned to the project 100% for the full year then what is the best approuch
for them to record their "down" time in PWA. The natural tendecy is for them
to put 0 hours for vacation and sick time but that will leave us short on
percent complete. Since the cost is already captured in the rate I think
they need to record their vacation and sick time as hours worked. Is this
correct?

 

[Dave]

It depends exactly on how you will use the information. I find an
administrative project useful, even though it isn't actually a project.
However, it does mop up those non-project hours such as leave, sick
time, training etc. If there is a timesheet based system in which
employees have to show that they have worked their contracted hours then
this approach can work with that.

In short, for your "real" project, it isn't necessary to record the
items you list. However, if you do have an administrative project, it
can help provide better plans and estimates. For example, if you have
tasks for annual leave, then the periods that resources are away will
affect their availability for project work and so your real plans can
take account of that by levellnig around those periods.

It can also help with forward planning as the cumulative sum of all the
activities a resource participates in affects their availability for
future work.

It would be a mistake however to try and use Project as an accounting
appication.

 

[Mike Glen]

Hi Anita,

You should note that the resource cost is the cost to your organization of
using that resource on the project. It is not the wages alone, but wages
plus the costs of holidays, sickness, training, etc. Your accounts
department should provide you with such costs, and then you can forget about
their build up.

Mike Glen
MS Project MVP
See http://tinyurl.com/2xbhc for Project Tutorials