(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.
Vladimir, Rafael,
How do you suggest to handle activities that are finished but they have remaining quatities?
Explanations:
I do not use earned value to track work. 99.99% contracts, either Design and Built, either Build will have bill of quantities which will be used to pay for work done.
There is a need to track progress over time and compare it to the Baseline schedule. In order to do so I track 3 progress items:
This is very easy to understand for anyone, especially some people who have limited knowledge of schedules, project management etc.
I thus get 3 graphs with 6 S curvers for actual vs planned (3 actual, 3 as planned).
Here is my problem. In many cases the activity is finished (ex: all concreting activities ar finished) but quantities remain. The Owner does not issue a change order until the project is finished or almost finished.
How do you handle these quatities and their equivalent in money?
You cannot remove remaining qunatities since you do not have a change order, and even if you did remove them the first 2 progress indicators will drop since you will execute only 93% of the project (for example), however if you leave them in the schedule the indicators will be faulty because you will have less progress than you actualy have.
Also if you leave them how do you leave them in the schedule? Imagine a 1000 activity schedule, of which 300 activities having between 0,10% to 10% volume work that will never be executed...At first I though it will not be a problem...but then I ran into sever problems like...handling 300 activities with remaining work, faulty logic between activities due to these 300 that still have remaining work.
The only ideea I have to leave these quantities and their coreponding money is to create a dummy activity (milestone) linked to the last activity in the schedule. This activity will have all remaining volumes of work with the unit of volume undifined or "global units/units" and their coresponding money. But I think this is a poor way to handle this situation.
Any suggesions would be highly appreciated.
Best regards,
Bogdan
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In many jurisdictions, it is common practice to status activities following AACE International Recommended Practice No. 29R-03 page 24 of 105. Identify the true “finish” of an activity. The same logic as above applies to the finish dates. Generally, the analyst, absent specific data to the contrary, should assume that when the period of concentrated work is completed on an activity, the activity is complete. Another possible criterion is that an activity can be considered logically complete when a successor tied with a simple FS logic is able to start substantive work.
Our hands down approach is to follow the AACEI RP29R-03 practice to status activities, other complicated procedures are considered unnecessary distraction.
Very rarely/never we use the CPM as a payment tool. Such requirement mean that all involved in reviewing the payment request must be proficient in the use of the cost function of the particualar CPM software. Simple adjustments to the payment application require adjustments to the cost database that can be problematic. If not done correctly the prior payment time distribution can become distorted. These issues do not happen when using a separate worksheet. Still some contracts require using the CPM as the payment tool. But in case it is a requirement the above approach usually still holds.
If you are not allowed to record true "finish" as required for purpose of delay analysis and if it interferes with your planning that would be hijacking of your planning, hijacking of your means and methods.
Rafael, Vladimir,
Thank you for you explanations and proposal. The last post from Rafel is very insightful. I will further investigate this situation and come back to this topic with my findings.
Best regards,
Bogdan
When you have an activity that is "finished" for purpose of scheduling its successors but some work/retainage or any other issue is still pending you can inactivate the activity successor links.
- activitiy shall be set as interruptable as this affects resource leveling
- logic will still be visible but inactive
- inactive logic will not create out-of-sequence progress
- pending issue will be visible in the right place, it is not a good idea to hide pending issues
- with a simple note everyone should understand there is an issue still pending
- when the issue is finally settled it will be shown in the update when it happens
- reporting for inactive links is easy
- Please be reminded tha resource leveling of remaining works do matter, usually for the remaining portion resources shall be reduced and some will not be required, no need to create new activity but to adjust resource quantities. By delaying the response the client at some point might delay the job because of resource limitations. Also he might be causing disrruption on your planning. It might be convenient to create a UDF to identify who is responsible to take action, we call it "ball in court".
The following diagram is for Activity 1 only and it shows how Resource A quantity was reduced after update.
Bogdan,
in Spider Project an activity is finished if both remaining volume and remaining duration are zero.
The difference between initial (baseline) quantities and actual (cumulative) quantities are always available if to compare current version with the baseline. The problem with the cost is much more complex if the unit cost was changed during project execution but overall baseline cost and actual cumulative cost will be compared and the difference will be shown in the separate column.
Vladimir,
In your description of how things work with goverment contracts is much more eloquent than my atempt. I also keep two schedules, one is for internal performance and one for the Owner/Client.
However Rafael did not make things clear, neither did you explanations.
The question remains: What do you do with remaining work (quantities), that will never be done/executed/implemented, but you do not have the paperwork to remove it from the schedule?
Best regards,
Bogdan
Rafael,
many of our customers use economical criteria for justifying management decisions and so their schedules are cost loaded and budgeted.
There are two levels of performance control: one is for management and other for accounting. Spider Project is rarely used for accounting. Project updates are based on actual data that are collected on sites, the data that is not intended for accounting. Usually accounting reports are created once in a month and include only accepted volumes that are not the same as actually done. For understanding what is the real cost of work done vs accepted cost of work done it is necessary to compare these data.
Some companies create and manage two parallel lines of project files: one is usual, second includes only accepted and paid volumes.
Many customers integrate Spider Project with accounting software: both systems must use the sme reference books, payment information is imported from accounting system to Spider Project.
Financial constraints exist in the state programs - their yearly budgets are determined by the law and additional expenses require a lot of approvals and usually are delayed to the next year.
It is not rare when the owner spends money that are received from some sources with limited flow.
Use the Worksheet for Payment Applications (PA). We have Bill of Quantities and unit prices for payment application in over 99.5% of our jobs. The use of the schedule as a Payment Tool is a rare monster, but as some say, "shit-happens"! I do not believe it is a good idea to present the PA in CPM to the Designer, the inspection and a few others that must evaluate the PA but are no expert in whatever scheduling software is used. Usually we are required to submit paper and Excel file.
This approach might be called Best-of-Breed Approach: "Best-of-breed" technology is a term in the tech community that refers to individual solutions that are really good in their specific area. Actually, best-of-breed refers to the best solutions out there—based on customer reviews and tech ratings—compared to a single platform that can do everything, but may not do each function as well as a single solution dedicated to that specific capability.
What is Best-of-Breed-Technology? | Ping Identity
Integrated Scheduling and Enterprise Resource Financial Systems (ERFS) are very few, usually (if not always) are poor at Scheduling, and almost never used for Payment Applications. To my mind comes SAP, software used by large corporations but rarely by Contractors/Designers/Inspectors.
Contracts in my country do not require that the Schedule be used as a payments method/means. We have Bill of Quantities and unit prices for payment application.
From what I undestand you are saying is that actual progress should be kept in (spreadsheets) and not in the planning sofware. Basically you propose to use the scheduling software only to plan activities and resources, not to track performance. I am understanding this correctly?
Even if the software could do it it seems like too complicated, to us a waste of time when using Excel we can all do it so easily. When using Excel everyone can verify electronically the payment application using their own worksheet. In the old times, everyone would verify the submitted paper using a hand mechanical calculator like if an abacus but easier than using the "modern" scheduling software.
Here no one use the scheduling software as a payment tool with very rare exceptions, like in a few Federal Government jobs. If so common, why no one is available to show us how they solve these issues? Perhaps some cheat the system while the others use simplified methods that do not follow the traditional payment application columns for quantities and unit prices but a dollar amount and percentage values.
Adding complicated procedures to an already long procedure, we would not consider of practical application. Calculating the period expenditures was a simple arithmetic, even the forms would provide the formulas for the user to follow, like Current = To Date - Prior Amount, so easy.
Part of the problem is that software developers sell the idea of Payment Application using the scheduling software when most of us do not like this idea.
Rafael,
I know the paper, it is well formulated and correct in may ways. However the paper does not solve a few issues:
Best regards,
Bogdan
The Great Divorce: Cost Loaded Schedules
We do not use scheduele as a payment tool, in any case if need be the second recommendation using a “running punchlist” activity would be my choice. In such case in the BL I would create the “running punchlist” activity with no predecesso, no cost then as need be it would start with the first divorce and end after settlement of all current anf future divorce dues. This activity will remain open until the very end. I believe the procedure should be made clear form the start of the job for the understanding of all involved.
I wonder how Payment of Materials on site would be handled when the schedule is used as a payment tool.
Best Regards, Rafael
Email: PPadmin@planningplanet.com
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