A Cost Centre is like an account that we use to allocate money to or from tasks in our project. Tasks can take expenditure from or provide income to a cost centre.
Costs can either be fixed i.e. a cheque payment, or variable so that they are dependant on time, work or the amount of resources used.
Cost centre libraries can be organized in a flat structure or in a hierarchy eg/ Overall Costs broken down into individual costs. You will need to adopt a hierachical structure if you want to record or report on cumulative information from a group of cost centres.
Creating New Cost Centres
To create the Project Cost Group:
Select the Cost Centre folder on the left hand side.
Right click in the right hand window and from the menu select New Folder.
Change the name to “Project Costs” and press ENTER.
Double click on the folder so that the right hand window appears empty.
Right Click with the mouse and select New Cost Centre
Type in “Labour” and press ENTER
Type in the remaining cost centres: Materials, Plant and Sub-contractors pressing ENTER after each one.
Setting Cost Centre Defaults
Default information can be set that will apply each time a cost is allocated through your project. For example, each cost centre may have its own appearance once it has been assigned to a task in the bar chart.
To set the appearance of a cost allocation bar:
Right click on the Labour cost centre and select Properties from the menu. The properties dialog box is displayed
Click in the “Foreground Fill Colour” field in the Appearance section and select a choice from the colour menu.
This can be repeated for each Cost centre.
By default a cost allocation is set to spread over the duration of the task. The allocations can either be spread over a period of time or happen at once (a ‘point spend’). They can happen within the duration of the task or outside it, eg/ delayed payment for materials 10 days after delivery.
“Materials” will be a one off cheque payment, hence a cost at a single point in time (Point Spend), that will be paid after receipt of the goods.
Right click on the Materials cost centre and select Properties from the menu.
Select the ‘Default Assignment’ tab.
Put a tick in the Point Spend box
Under the Start heading, change the ‘Relative to Task Start’ to ‘Relative to Task End’ (this will make the point spend milestone appear at the end rather than at the beginning of the task)
Also under the Start Delay type in 10ed (this will make the point spend milestone appear 10 elapsed days after the task)
Click on Close.
Hope this helps.
Matthew Edwards
Member for
21 years 8 months
Member for21 years8 months
Submitted by Rafael Davila on Wed, 2010-02-24 18:05
You can assign a single cost code to several cost centers, for example Concrete Pouring cost code A, can be assigned to several Jobs, within the Job to several job areas, also to job phases.
Say you have cost codes A,B,C,D,E & F and Cost Centers 1, 2 & 3 and you can assign the following cost code distribution.
Cost Code alone will not tell you about the assignments, will not be able to know in which report for each cost center the particular cost code budget and actual expenditures are to be included. Cost centers add a much needed dimension for your reporting. In combination cost codes and cost centers make the dynamic duo.
Member for
19 years 10 monthsRE: Cost Centres
Hi Matthew
That is the way to answer a query - step by step guidance.
I cant wait for someone from Oracle to do something similar - so I wont.
Best regards
Mike Testro
Member for
15 years 9 monthsRE: Cost Centres
Cost Centres
A Cost Centre is like an account that we use to allocate money to or from tasks in our project. Tasks can take expenditure from or provide income to a cost centre.
Costs can either be fixed i.e. a cheque payment, or variable so that they are dependant on time, work or the amount of resources used.
Cost centre libraries can be organized in a flat structure or in a hierarchy eg/ Overall Costs broken down into individual costs. You will need to adopt a hierachical structure if you want to record or report on cumulative information from a group of cost centres.
Creating New Cost Centres
To create the Project Cost Group:
Select the Cost Centre folder on the left hand side.
Right click in the right hand window and from the menu select New Folder.
Change the name to “Project Costs” and press ENTER.
Double click on the folder so that the right hand window appears empty.
Right Click with the mouse and select New Cost Centre
Type in “Labour” and press ENTER
Type in the remaining cost centres: Materials, Plant and Sub-contractors pressing ENTER after each one.
Setting Cost Centre Defaults
Default information can be set that will apply each time a cost is allocated through your project. For example, each cost centre may have its own appearance once it has been assigned to a task in the bar chart.
To set the appearance of a cost allocation bar:
Right click on the Labour cost centre and select Properties from the menu. The properties dialog box is displayed
Click in the “Foreground Fill Colour” field in the Appearance section and select a choice from the colour menu.
This can be repeated for each Cost centre.
By default a cost allocation is set to spread over the duration of the task. The allocations can either be spread over a period of time or happen at once (a ‘point spend’). They can happen within the duration of the task or outside it, eg/ delayed payment for materials 10 days after delivery.
“Materials” will be a one off cheque payment, hence a cost at a single point in time (Point Spend), that will be paid after receipt of the goods.
Right click on the Materials cost centre and select Properties from the menu.
Select the ‘Default Assignment’ tab.
Put a tick in the Point Spend box
Under the Start heading, change the ‘Relative to Task Start’ to ‘Relative to Task End’ (this will make the point spend milestone appear at the end rather than at the beginning of the task)
Also under the Start Delay type in 10ed (this will make the point spend milestone appear 10 elapsed days after the task)
Click on Close.
Hope this helps.
Matthew Edwards
Member for
21 years 8 monthsRE: Cost Centres
You can assign a single cost code to several cost centers, for example Concrete Pouring cost code A, can be assigned to several Jobs, within the Job to several job areas, also to job phases.
Say you have cost codes A,B,C,D,E & F and Cost Centers 1, 2 & 3 and you can assign the following cost code distribution.
Cost Center.................................Cost Codes
1 (BUILDING A).......................ABC a new concrete building
2 (BUILDING B)........................BCDF an existing building with no concrete work
3 ….
6 (ALL BUILDINGS).................ABCDEF
7 (ALL JOBS).............................ABCDEFGHIJKLM…….
Cost Code alone will not tell you about the assignments, will not be able to know in which report for each cost center the particular cost code budget and actual expenditures are to be included. Cost centers add a much needed dimension for your reporting. In combination cost codes and cost centers make the dynamic duo.
Member for
19 years 10 monthsRE: Cost Centres
Hi Laurie
PowerProject cost centres are a way of keeping track of costs as well as progress and resource usage.
It is an Add On if you are following Earned Value mechanisms as well as other processes.
I have used PowerProject for 19 years and never yet used the Cost Centres for normal planning operations.
If you need to use it then it is very simple to do so - otherwise dont bother.
Best regards
Mike Testro
Member for
17 years 3 monthsRE: Cost Centres
Dear Laurie,
The cost centers are usually used to calculate the actual cost of the project.
AACE International has been the leading-edge professional society for cost estimators, cost engineers, schedulers project managers, etc
www.aacei.org
You can visit their website and learn more about the cost issues.
With kind regards,
Samer