Website Upgrade Incoming - we're working on a new look (and speed!) standby while we deliver the project

Tips on using this forum..

(1) Explain your problem, don't simply post "This isn't working". What were you doing when you faced the problem? What have you tried to resolve - did you look for a solution using "Search" ? Has it happened just once or several times?

(2) It's also good to get feedback when a solution is found, return to the original post to explain how it was resolved so that more people can also use the results.

cost control in p3

6 replies [Last post]
Thu, 2009-04-02 14:35
faik ulku
User offline. Last seen 15 years 25 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Apr 2009
Posts: 21
Groups: None
we build commercial buildings and we purchase hundred of materials every day. we have 2500 items of schedule. is it logical to enter every purchasing item in p3? i mean is it logical to follow up cost control in p3? or it would be better to use another program? thanks in advance.
Top

Replies

Tue, 2009-04-07 12:15
#1
faik ulku
User offline. Last seen 15 years 25 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Apr 2009
Posts: 21
Groups: None
Dear All,

Thank you for your valuable advices. I got my answer that i searhed.

We perform our cost conrol reports in excel and we have a special cost accounting and purchasing system. hence we are able to follow our situation in the project, i mean whether we are in budget or not.

up to now in company we have been using Ms Project and we are now passing to Primavera. we are purchasing P6 and i use p3 let say advanced. i always thought that it is not much possible to follow %100 correct cost control in p3, thats why i wanted to ask you.

so i will use p6 for scheduling and budgetin and cash flow etc but not cost control.

thank you all.
Top
Tue, 2009-04-07 07:27
#2
Rafael Davila
User offline. Last seen 2 weeks 4 days ago. Offline
Joined: 1 Mar 2004
Posts: 5241
Groups: Spider Project Team
I dont’t believe any CPM oriented software should be used for Cost Control as at best they do offer 50% cost control, that is, just budgeting.
Unit prices have been for many years the contractor’s choice but CPM software companies insist in pushing for systems wich are merelly budgetting, missing the units or production imput in their reports.
A good cost control system provides you with detailed weekley report for "LEMSO" - Labor, Equipment, Materials, Subcontracts and Other. It provides you with average unit cost up to date as well as unit cost for a time period, usually last week.
With a good cost system you do not enter data twice, it should be integral with the accounting purchase order and payroll moduels for cost coding, it should accounf for every penny.
As an example; you might have in a single project 20 types of doors you are to spread in let say 30 activities within let say five cost accounts (roll up doors, metal doors, wood doors, sound doors, ..,), it would be insane to develop your schedule to satisfy job costing requirements. You should not detail activities to satisfy job costing, activities detail should be based in a detail usefull for management. By the same token you should not detail cost accounts based on schedule activities.
Don’t get me wrong, today no Construction Company should do business without a Scheduling System nor without a Job Costing System. Just "KISS it" (Just "Keep It Simple S...."). Too much detail for cost coding as well as for scheduling is as bad as too little.
Top
Tue, 2009-04-07 06:49
#3
Safak Vural
User offline. Last seen 4 years 24 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 12 May 2008
Posts: 117
Groups: Petro-Chem / Oil & Gas
Dear Faik,

The situation depends on the primavera version. In P3 it is much harder to relate the software with a database than P6. If I were you I will follow the cost control with access (or any other database) with excel tables and similar….. The planner’s nirvana is to follow every item and costs through software. There are packages for construction management that are being used in market.

For your situation the answer depends on the cost system you are going to use (Both for income and expenditure). As far as I see in the market, you will not have the real information about Procurements as planning engineer and the Accountant will prepare the Expenditure Reports in their system. But if you push harder at the mobilisation stage and take the support of your PM, you can create a coding system that you can monitor the situation from Account Reports with the help of procurement records that will give you the classifications of the sums in the account.

Ex:
Item: Concrete
Account: From XXXX Concrete Company ……….USD Cost for JAN 09
Procurement: Floor:1 , CONCRETE TYPE C20, VOLUME: 200m3, COST …..USD

If you create a subproject for yourself for cost control, then you can create hammock activities with the resources as cost items and you can see the forecasted expenditure after updating the activities in your plan. For usual costs as project running expenses and etc. you can create a hammock activity with a fixed resource in time period with whole project to monitor. The best advantage for this kind of study will be the more realistic and user-friendly reports for procurement programmes. I use all of the equipments (Dozers, Excavators, Loaders etc.) as resources in a pipeline project with the material quantities (Material Unit Rate Project) and then I level my work schedule as equipment numbers and then determine the real equipment need in order to finalize the project in given time. And then I can directly present the Cost Plan with the options to CLIENT.

In order to monitor this kind of cost control system in Primavera you need to know how to relate the software with databases, or at least a good import-export study. You need to be aware of all the Auto-cost rules and calculation methods of PRM in order to monitor the costs. My suggestion is to use excel &databases-access (Oracle or LOGO for Accounting). You are going to update the construction programme weekly but the cost control system monthly.

You can create a subproject with hammock activities for some cost types. And then you can forecast the costs for your budget as the costs actually happened (From Account & Procurement dep.) with cost type activities in primavera.

Sorry for long thread, finally the best, do nothing then for every budget update go and guess about what is going to be happening for next 6 months.

Best Regards,

Safak
Top
Fri, 2009-04-03 08:51
#4
Samer Zawaydeh
User offline. Last seen 5 years 39 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 3 Aug 2008
Posts: 1664
Groups: Civil Engineering, Regional Representatives
Dear Sajid,

I have small information about "Hard dollar" at this stage, so I can not answer that question correctly.

With kind regards,

Samer
Top
Fri, 2009-04-03 08:48
#5
Sajid Balma
User offline. Last seen 13 years 23 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 8 Jun 2007
Posts: 151
Groups: None
Hi Samer
Is it a new name to Timberline?

I haven’t gone through the details yet but it seems so.

Regards
Top
Fri, 2009-04-03 02:06
#6
Samer Zawaydeh
User offline. Last seen 5 years 39 weeks ago. Offline
Joined: 3 Aug 2008
Posts: 1664
Groups: Civil Engineering, Regional Representatives
Dear Faik,

Please have a look at the following site:

http://www.harddollar.com/

This was presented to us during a seminar held by Primavera representatives.

Good luck,

Samer
Top