Contents of the Plan Settings Form

Use the Plan Settings form of Resource Planning Settings to specify a variety of settings related to plans for projects and opportunities.

If you set up multiple companies in DPS, you specify plan settings separately for each company.

The Resource Planning Settings form is only available if you activated the Resource Planning application.

Contents: Global Plan Settings

If you set up multiple companies in DPS, the settings under this heading apply to all companies. If you did not set up multiple companies, the Global Plan Settings heading does not display.

Field	Description
When No Organization Selected, Plan Settings Default from This Company	If you set up multiple companies in DPS, select the company whose default plan settings you want to use when a new project or opportunity has no organization specified. If you set up DPS initially with multiple companies, this field defaults to the company that you use in the DPS setup process. If you first set up DPS with a single company and then switch to multiple companies, this field defaults to your lowest numbered company. When you add a new project or opportunity, DPS automatically creates an empty plan for it using the default plan settings for the company it is associated with through its organization. However, you are not required to assign an opportunity to an organization, and you are not required to assign a project to an organization if Available to Accounting users is not selected on the General tab of the Projects hub in the Desktop application. If you do not specify an organization for a new project or opportunity, DPS uses the default plan settings for the company you select in this field to create the project or opportunity plan. While most of the default plan settings inherited from this company can be overridden for individual plans, the following settings are only set at the company level: Enable Expense Planning Enable Consultant Planning Starting Day of Week To change these settings for a project or opportunity, you must assign it to an organization that is associated with the company with the correct settings. In addition, plan currencies for projects and opportunities without organizations are set to the functional currency for the default company you select in this field if the currencies are not specified in the project or opportunity record. You can override this default currency by assigning different currencies in the project or opportunity record. (If a project or opportunity plan has no planning assignments, you can also override the default currency by assigning the project or opportunity to an organization that is associated with a company with a different functional currency.)
Hour Decimal Places	Select the number of decimal places you want to display in plan hours values: none, one, or two.
Amount Decimal Places	Select an option for decimal places in plan amounts: No Decimal: Enter and display amounts with no decimal places. Currency: Enter and display amounts with the number of decimal places set for the type of currency used.
Job-to-Date (JTD) Through	If you have not activated either the Time & Expense module or the Accounting module, select the cutoff date for calculating job-to-date (JTD) hours and amounts, which in turn are used to calculate estimate-to complete (ETC) and estimate-at-completion (EAC) hours and amounts. If you have activated either the Time & Expense module or the Accounting module, this field is not available, and the current date is used to calculate JTD hours and amounts. Under normal circumstances, you do not need to set this date. Initially, it defaults to the current date. From that point on, when you use the API or the Historical Labor import process to load actual hours and amounts that employees have charged to projects, DPS automatically sets the JTD date to the date of the latest historical labor record in the database. If you need to set the date yourself temporarily, you can do that, but the next time that you load historical labor, your entry will be replaced with the latest labor record date.
WBS Level Delimiter	If the Resource Planning module is activated but the Accounting module is not activated, select the character (a period, for example) that you want to use as the delimiter between WBS levels in project numbers. When you import projects from a .CSV file or using the API, include this delimiter to separate the levels in the project numbers so DPS can create the plan structures correctly. Also include it in project numbers when you import plan assignments and actual labor, expenses, consultants, and overhead for plans so that those records can be assigned to the correct WBS elements. If you have activated the Accounting module, this field is not available

Contents: Active company settings

If you set up multiple companies in DPS, the name of the active company displays, and the settings under it apply to that company only. To specify settings for another company, select that company from the drop-down list on the DPS toolbar. If you did not set up multiple companies, the heading containing the company name does not display.

Field	Description
Enable Expense Planning	Select Yes if you want to be able to enter plan data for expenses. You can enter plan data for direct, indirect, and reimbursable expenses.
Enable Consultant Planning	Select Yes if you want to be able to enter plan data for consultants. You can enter plan data for direct and reimbursable consultants.
Starting Day of Week	Select the first day in your work week. If you set up multiple companies in DPS, a resource manager working in Resource View or Project View or using a resource management report can display plans for projects from more than one company. Each of those companies could have different starting days for their work weeks. Because of that, the Resource Management applications always use the starting day of the week specified for the user's currently active company.
Target Multiplier	Enter the default target labor cost multiplier. The target multiplier represents how much revenue is anticipated for each labor cost dollar spent on a project. It is commonly used as the basis for evaluating the EAC labor cost multipliers as projects move forward. This target multiplier is assigned automatically to all new plans, but if you do not use the same target multiplier for all projects, it can be changed for individual plans on the Plan Settings dialog box.
Overhead %	Enter the default overhead percentage for plans, as a whole number. For example, enter 10 for 10 percent. With the necessary security rights, you can enter different percentages for individual projects and opportunities. The overhead percentage is used to calculate the ETC portion of overhead, which is in turn used to calculate EAC profit for a plan.
Expense Planning Level	If you selected Yes for Enable Expenses Planning, select the default level of the plan structure at which to plan expenses: Plan Level 1, Plan Level 2,...: Plan expenses at the specific level you select. Lower numbers are higher in the plan structure. For example, for a project plan, level 1 corresponds to the project level of the work breakdown structure (WBS). Lowest Level: Plan expenses at the lowest level of each branch of the plan structure. For example, if the lowest level is level 2 for one branch and level 3 for another, you enter expense plan data for the first branch at level 2 and for the second branch at level 3. With the necessary security rights, you can select different levels for individual projects and opportunities.
Consultant Planning Level	If you selected Yes for Enable Consultant Planning, select the default level of the work breakdown structure at which to plan consultants: Plan Level 1, Plan Level 2,...: Plan consultants at the specific level you select. Lower numbers are higher in the plan structure. For example, for a project plan, level 1 corresponds to the project level of the WBS. Lowest Level: Plan consultants at the lowest level of each branch of the plan structure. For example, if the lowest level is level 2 for one branch and level 3 for another, you enter consultant plan data for the first branch at level 2 and for the second branch at level 3. With the necessary security rights, you can select different levels for individual projects and opportunities.