Entering Summary Planned Hours

When you enter planned hours for resources in Resource View or Project View or on the Labor tab of the Projects form, an alternative to entering them calendar period by calendar period is to enter the sum of hours for a range of dates, let DPS allocate those hours across the calendar periods, and then make any necessary changes.

Summary Hours Entry Options in Resource View

You have several options for entering summary hours in Resource View:

• To allocate summary hours over the assignment date range for a WBS element, enter the hours in Total ETC Hours.
• To allocate summary hours over the current forecast range, enter the hours in Range ETC Hours.
• To allocate summary hours over the portion of the assignment date range that precedes the start date of the current forecast range, enter the hours in ETC Before.
• To allocate summary hours over the portion of the assignment date range that follows the end date of the current forecast range, enter the hours in ETC After.

Before entering summary hours in Range ETC Hours, ETC Before, or ETC After, make sure the forecast range is set correctly.

Summary Hours Entry Options in Project View or on the Labor Tab of the Projects Form

In Project View or on the Labor tab of the Projects form, you have these options for entering summary hours:

• To allocate summary hours over the remaining working days in the assignment date range for a resource, enter the hours in ETC Hours in the resource grid row.
• To allocate summary hours over the remaining working days in the plan date range for all resources assigned to a WBS element, enter the hours in ETC Hours in the grid row for the WBS element.

Allocation of Summary Hours

In labor planning grids, you can enter summary hours for any WBS element at any level of the tree structure. In Project View and on the Labor tab of the Projects form, you can also enter summary hours for individual resources. When you enter summary hours, DPS allocates the hours to calendar periods for that assignment row. If you enter summary hours for a parent WBS element, DPS further allocates the hours to each calendar period for each lower-level row. Likewise, if you change the scale of the calendar period columns (from Days to Weeks, for example), DPS reallocates the hours for the new scale.

How the hours are allocated to the calendar period grid columns depends on whether or not hours have already been entered in calendar period columns for the affected assignments:

• If the range of dates to receive the allocations includes no days, weeks, or months for which hours have been explicitly entered for any of the affected assignments, the hours are allocated to each calendar period in proportion to the number of work days in the period. (Effectively, the summary hours are spread equally among all work days.)
• If the range of dates to receive the allocations does include one or more days, weeks, or months for which hours have been explicitly entered for any of the affected assignments, the hours are allocated to each calendar period in proportion to its current number of hours. Calendar periods that currently have no hours receive no allocation.

  Note that this is the case whether or not the same scale is in effect when you enter the summary hours as when you made the earlier hours entries. Regardless of the scale involved, the allocation of summary hours always takes into account any previously entered hours that fall within the date range of the allocation.

Example: Enter Summary Hours for an Assignment with No Existing ETC Hours

You add a new resource assignment with a start date of 4/4/2016 and an end date of 4/8/2016. That date range includes five work days. With the scale for the grid set to Days and calendar period columns displayed for the assignment dates, you enter 30 in Total ETC Hours. Because you did not previously enter hours in any calendar period columns for the assignment, DPS allocates the thirty hours equally among the five work days and displays 6.0 in the calendar period column for each day.

Example: Enter Summary Hours for an Assignment with Existing ETC Hours

You decide to increase the total hours for an existing assignment that has a start date of 4/4/2016 and an end date of 4/8/2016. Currently that assignment has a total of six ETC hours, which were previously entered in calendar period columns for individual days as shown below:

• 4/4: 3.0 hours
• 4/5: 2.0 hours
• 4/6: 0.0 hours
• 4/7: 0.0 hours
• 4/8: 1.0 hour

With the scale for the Resource View grid set to Days and calendar period columns displayed for the assignment dates, you enter 12 in Total ETC Hours. Because of the previously entered hours, DPS allocates the twelve hours proportionally to the calendar period columns based on those existing ETC hours. This is the result:

• 4/4: 6.0 hours
• 4/5: 4.0 hours
• 4/6: 0.0 hours
• 4/7: 0.0 hours
• 4/8: 2.0 hours

Summary Hours and the Current Date/JTD Date

Summary hours are only allocated to dates later than the current date (or JTD date if the Resource Planning module is activated but the Accounting module is not activated). However, a calendar period that includes the current/JTD date may still receive an allocation if it contains work days later than the current/JTD date. In that case, DPS only considers work days after the current/JTD date when calculating the number of ETC hours allocated and displayed for that calendar period.