Progress Billing Rule - Strange Behaviour

This is just a post for me to remember the strange behavior about the billing rule functionality.

Whenever a progress billing rule is configured, for it to make it automatically calculate the % complete, all the projects till date should be selected in the 'Selected projects' section, with 'Chargeable categories' selected for the project configured in the 'Billing rules' section.

If all the projects till date are not configured then the system does not calculate the % complete automatically and that particular billing rule line is treated as manual progress billing rule line, with user having to define the % complete manually.

Not sure why the system behaves this way, but this is how it behaves as of now. More information to be added, if i get to know the 'WHY' for this behavior.

Please refer to the screenshots below.

Billing rule 76 with project selected in the 'Project' field in the 'Billing rules' section

Billing rules 76 with all the projects till date, selected in the 'Selected projects' in the 'Project' section

Billing rule 75 where all the projects till date, NOT selected in the 'Selected projects' in the 'Project section', hence system treated it as a candidate for 'Manual progress billing rule'

Billing rule 76 where all the projects till date, selected in the 'Selected projects' in the 'Project section', hence system treated it as a candidate for 'Automatic progress billing rule'

Thanks
Sarang

Receipt of a Non-stocked item versus a Stocked item

Receipt postings for the 'STOCKED' type of a project:

DEBIT Cost of purchased materials received          1000
            CREDIT Purchase expenditure, un-invoiced          1000
DEBIT Purchase expenditure, un-invoiced             1000
            CREDIT Purchase, accrual                                     1000

So effectively it is:

DEBIT Cost of purchased materials received          1000
            CREDIT Purchase, accrual                                     1000


Receipt postings for the 'NON-STOCKED' type of a project:

DEBIT Purchase expenditure, un-invoiced             1000
            CREDIT Purchase, accrual                                     1000


Thanks
Sarang

Use Tax and Line Property in WBS, Forecast and actual transaction

I have encountered two separate incidents related to use tax and line property, which are totally not linked to each other. Just wanted to note this down somewhere and hence this article.

Use Tax

I created a vendor record and attached a Sales Tax group to it. Then i created an item and attached an Item sales tax group to it. After that i created a purchase order and clicked on the 'submit' button to submit the record for approval. However i got this error:

One or more accounting distributions is missing a ledger account. Use the Accounting distribution form or the Posting profile to update the ledger account.

After reading this 'generic' message, i knew there was an issue with the accounts setup. So i checked the vendor posting profile, item posting profile and all seemed to be working fine. Then i checked the VAT setup as well. Checked whether the Sales tax codes are properly setup in both the Sales Tax group and Item sales tax group. I also checked the 'Ledger posting group' but all seemed to be ok. I tried and tried but couldnt really understand why this message was coming. Then i decided to navigate to the PO lines > Financials > Distribute amount. There i realized that i could see the ledger account for Line 1, but could not see any ledger account for the tax line. I was not able to figure out why. And this was only happening with one specific vendor and not with other vendors. This gave me a firm understanding that there is something wrong with the Sales Tax group. I checked the Sales tax group minutely this time and i realized that in this Sales Tax group, for the Sales tax codes, the 'Use tax' checkbox is checked. Then i checked the 'Ledger posting group' again and realized that in the ledger posting group there is a provision to define the 'Use tax' accounts, which i completely missed. I configured the 'Use tax' accounts in the 'Ledger posting group' and then submitted the PO successfully for approval.

Use tax (From wikipedia) : It is essentially the same as a sales tax but is applied not where a product or service was sold but where a merchant bought a product or service and then converted it for its own use, without having paid tax when it was initially purchased. 

For e.g.(From technet) : Assume that you order office supplies over the Internet. You receive an invoice for USD 500, which does not include the 6 percent sales tax that is applicable in the state where the goods will be used. When you enter the vendor invoice, enter a USD 500 credit for the vendor account and a USD 30 credit for the use tax payable account, for a total USD 530 debit for the Office supplies expense account.

Line property

I created a project and then imported the WBS into it from a template. The line property in all the lines of the WBS was 'No charge' because i wanted the project transactions to be non-chargeable. I defined all the cost and sales price for all the lines in the WBS and then pushed this WBS into project forecast. The reason to define the sales price for the non-chargeable transactions was i wanted to calculate the contract value from the same. I only had a 'Fee' line in the WBS with chargeable line property and sales price defined. After i pushed these WBS lines into forecast, all the lines were successfully transferred to forecast with respective line properties and cost&sales prices. I then started posting transactions, which obviously were non chargeable as i configured the ledger posting setup and the line property setup for the transactions such that the transactions are not chargeable.
However when i ran the project statement to see budget versus actual, in the revenue section i could only see the sales value of the Fee category from the forecast. I was wondering why is this happening, if i have defined everything correctly. I was expecting to see the total of sales price of all the lines of the forecast in the revenue section, however i was only seeing the sales price for the fee category only. Then i decided to change the line property of all the lines in the forecast to 'Chargeable' and then again ran the project statement. This time, to my surprise' i could see the revenue figure exactly how i wanted it to be .i.e. the total of the sales prices of all the lines in the forecast.

From this incident i concluded that the project statement with budget will always take into account the line property of the lines in the selected forecast model to calculate the revenue figure. However this still did not matter from the actual line property on the project transaction,as they were still 'Non-chargeable' because of the project-line property setup.

However for the fixed price projects, where there is WBS, Budget and Forecast all defined for the project, then in the project statement with budget, always the 'Budget' forecast model should be selected, so as to see the revenue figure. If you select the 'Forecast' forecast model, then the revenue figure will not be see, even if the line property is billable.

Thanks
Sarang

WBS and Project Budget - IMP Point

If the WBS is defined for the project and also for the same the Budget is also defined, then tracking of project can be done from the WBS as well as Budget. However there is a very minute and important catch here, which if not taken into consideration, the WBS and the Project Budget values will not match.

Whenever the WBS is created, it automatically creates the 'Activities'. However if there are sub-activities or sub-tasks, then the 'Header Activity' has NO 'Category' assigned to it, as seen in the screenshot below.

WBS Planning View

If the same WBS is imported to create a Project Budget, then the Budget is created for the 'Categories' in the WBS.

Project Budget Balances

However when the project transactions are created for the project, then the 'Activity' drop down displays the 'Header Activity' as well against which no 'Category' is assigned to it in WBS.

Hours Journal

Hence when the journal is posted, the 'Budget' is not updated but the WBS tracking / progress is updated and hence both seem to be out of sync.

See below the screenshots for 'Project Budget Balances' after the project transaction (Hour Journal) is posted for the SUB activity for whom the category is assigned in WBS.

WBS Tracking View

Project Budget Balances

See below the screenshots for 'Project Budget Balances' after the project transaction (Hour Journal) is posted for the Header activity for whom the category is NOT assigned in WBS.

WBS Tracking View

Project Budget Balances

Hence the only precaution to be taken is to make sure that while posting the project transaction, the selected 'Activity' is NOT the header activity.

Thanks

Sarang

Importance of 'Active in Journals' and 'Stocked Product' control WRT Project Supplier Invoice

Direct Supplier invoice (without a PO) that is to be created for the project can make use of items as well as procurement categories. In that case, items as well as the procurement categories should be linked to a project category. To setup and link a procurement category to a project category, refer the post Procurement Categories and related setup.

Please refer below for the two main configuration items that can frustrate you if you are trying to create a supplier invoice directly without a PO.

Importance of 'Active in Journals'

Very often it is required to create a supplier invoice for the project and in that case the item that is to be used in the supplier invoice should be linked to the project category. You think that the steps to that are very simple, which actually are, but with a small catch. You think you will create a project category and you will create a released product and then link it, which is correct as well. While linking the same, you need to navigate the 'Manage Project' fast tab of the Item record and select the project category from the drop down. However when you look for the desired project category, recently created, for the item, you cannot see it and then you get baffled as to why other item categories are being seen and why not the one which was recently created. You know that you have missed some setup, but there seems to be no clue. I faced the same situation and was frustrated to the core about it, until finally i found out that issue, which after fixed, the project category started appearing in the drop down and i could link the item to the project category. The frustrating toggle switch (as called in AX7 aka Dynamics 365) is called the 'Active in journals' in the 'Project Categories' window, which when turned to 'Yes', the category started showing in the drop down in the 'Manage Project' fast tab of the Item record.

Importance of  'Stocked Product' checkbox

After the released product is linked with the project category, as mentioned above, the task is still not over, as that item should be visible in the 'Item number' drop down of the supplier invoice. The items that are visible in that drop down are the ones for which are of type 'Non stocked'. Hence for all the items, for which supplier invoice needs to be created, without the PO, make sure that in the 'Item model group' of the item, the 'Stocked' checkbox (as seen in the screenshot below) should be unchecked or else the item will not be visible in the 'Item number' drop down of the supplier invoice.

Thanks
Sarang

Intercompany Vendor / Customer creation

Intercompany Vendor and Customer can be created by creating a relationship between the two intercompany records.

Whenever the intercompany vendor and customer is created, the 'Active' checkbox should be checked in the 'Miscellaneous details' tab of the Vendor / Customer record. However, this is a non-editable field and hence cannot be checked manually by the user.

To check that 'Active' checkbox and form an intercompany relationship, a user should navigate to 'General' tab of the customer / vendor record and click the 'Intercompany' button in the ribbon. This will open up an intercompany form, where an intercompany relationship can be formed.

User will have to check the 'Active' checkbox and then will have to select the company and the appropriate intercompany customer / vendor record from the drop down, of the selected company.

Note : One very much important thing to note here is the 'Remove relationship' button at the top. Suppose you no longer need the relationship between the intercompany customer /vendor and so you decide to uncheck the 'Active' checkbox. However this will just make the relationship inactive, but the relationship will still be there. This will mean that, even if the relationship is inactive, you will not be able to link that record with other intercompany customer / vendor. Hence if you are sure that the relationship is no longer needed, always ,make sure that first, you uncheck the 'Active' checkbox and then click the 'Remove relationship' button to completely delete the relationship.

Thanks

Sarang

Two IMP parameters from Procurement and Sourcing

There are two parameters worth noting from the Procurement and Sourcing module (under Parameters > Update) . They are:

1. Safety level of invoiced orders
2. Check for product receipt number used

• "Safety level of invoiced orders" drop down has three values. They are as follows:
• None - User can change the value on the fully invoiced PO
• Warning - User will receive a warning, if the user tries to change the value on the fully invoiced PO
• Locked - User will not be able to change the value on the fully invoiced PO
• "Check for product receipt number used" drop down has four values. They are as follows:
• Reject duplicate - Duplicate receipt number not allowed
• Reject duplicates within accounting year - Duplicate receipt number not allowed, within same year, but will be allowed if the numbers are from different accounting year.
• Accept duplicates - Duplicate receipt numbers allowed
• Warn in case of duplicates - User will be warned, in case of duplicate receipt number detected.

Though these parameters seem trivial, but for reference purpose noting it down here.

Thanks

Sarang