Calculation of Estimate-to-Complete Hours and Amounts in Resource Planning

Estimate-to-complete (ETC) hours and amounts are key metrics for evaluating a project's progress against its plan.

ETC hours and amounts are estimates of the remaining hours and amounts to be spent to complete work on a project or part of a project. ETC values are calculated differently for expenses and consultants than they are for labor because how you plan expenses and consultants differ from how you plan labor.

JTD Date

Because ETC is an estimate of future work, the date that marks the boundary between the past/present and the future, is a crucial component of the ETC calculation. That date is referred to as the JTD date in DPS because that is the cutoff date through which job-to-date totals of actual hours and amounts are calculated.

In most cases, DPS uses the current date as the JTD date. However, there are exceptions to this:

• For some reports, options are available for specifying a date other than the current date as the JTD date. For example, when you generate the Project Planning Performance report, you have the option to use the fiscal period end date, another date that you specify, or the current date.

• If the Resource Planning module is activated but the Accounting module is not activated, actual hours and amounts charged to projects must be periodically imported into DPS either from a .CSV file using the import processes (Utilities > Imports & Exports > Imports) or using an API. When you use the API or a historical data import process to load actual hours and amounts charged to projects, DPS automatically sets the JTD date to the date of the latest transaction record in the database.

ETC Hours and Amounts for Labor

When you plan labor for a project, you can associate planned hours for each resource assignment with specific calendar periods (days, weeks, months). DPS calculates planned amounts for those hours based on the plan settings selected for each plan. Those time-phased hours and amounts are used to calculate labor ETC for individual resource assignments and for work breakdown structure (WBS) elements, including for the project as a whole:

• Individual resource assignment ETC: Sum of the planned hours and amounts for the assignment for dates later than the JTD date.
• WBS element labor ETC: Sum of the ETC hours and amounts for all of the WBS element's resource assignments for dates later than the JTD date.

ETC Amounts for Expenses and Consultants

For expenses and consultants, you can plan amounts for accounts (or for a combinations of an account and specific vendor) for a WBS element's plan date range. Unlike for labor, you cannot specify how the planned amount is distributed across days, weeks, or months, so the ETC calculations are different:

• Individual expense assignment ETC: Planned expense amount for the assignment - JTD actual amount for the assignment through the JTD date. (If planned expense amount - JTD actual amount is less than 0, then ETC = 0.)
• WBS element expense ETC: Sum of the ETC amounts for all of the element's expense assignments for the plan date range.
• Individual consultant assignment ETC: Planned consultant amount for the assignment - JTD actual amount for the assignment through the JTD date. (If planned consultant amount - JTD actual amount is less than 0, then ETC = 0.)
• WBS element consultant ETC: Sum of the ETC amounts for all of the element's consultant assignments for the plan date range.