Using "Confirmed" resource plans to calculate total hours...feasibility?

[Staxed]

I've gotten an ask to look into the possibility of updating "actual hours" if a resource plan is in the confirmed state.  OOTB only resource plans that are in the allocated state update actual hours when a time card is submitted.

So my question is two fold:
- Is there any glaring issues I should be aware of that would prevent us from doing this (might it break something?)
- Has anyone done this before or have advice on what controls that actual hours update (I can't find the exact script that does it, or if there are multiple scripts, etc)

Example, in the first image, you'll notice RPLN0009533 has actual hours, but RPLN0009537 does not, even though both of them have submitted timecards.  The only difference is 9537 is in confirmed state, not allocated.

[PaulaaO]

Hi,

It would be interesting to see how you managed to submit time cards against a plan which is in Confirmed as I didn't think OOTB this would be allowed.

I would challenge this use case and the need to allow actuals to populate when a RP is Confirmed. The idea of a Confirmed RP is being an interim state until a resource (user) is firmly allocated onto the plan which only after that time sheeting should happen.

I don't know all the intricacies of RPs and time cards, but I would test this extremely well if I'd go ahead with such a change; just from the top of my head:

- how is the system behaving if a time card is recalled for example?

- if you use a Rate model and it's based on User, if you change the resource from the Soft allocation, would the calculations still take place correctly?

Also, given that the new Resourcing functionality is now available which uses Resource Assignments, not sure if it's worth the time and effort to manipulate the behaviour of RPs, but that's just my personal opinion 🙂

[Staxed]

Thanks for the comment.  I'm trying to figure out as much as I can regarding this question so I can take it back to leadership to give a recommendation on if we should do it or not (and from the start I've been leaning towards no...that mention of recalling time cards is a good example I didn't think of).

Our PMs tend to use confirmed much more than allocated because they like to change things.  Not saying it's correct, just the way it is currently...which is what brought this question on in the first place.  Thanks again, gave me even more to think about.

The intricacy of this process definitely has me leaning very heavily to telling them I don't recommend trying to change this.

[PaulaaO]

Do you have any examples around what changes do PMs like to do on a Confirmed RP they cannot do in Allocated?

Just in case I might have come across some and I can provide some advice on how we approached a certain situation 🙂