Project queries

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This manual describes the different functionalities in the Project Queries' program, which is a comprehensive project management (project accounting) program. Here you can enter new clients, projects, analyse projects, price them, create cost estimates (budgets), handle fees, purchases and other, create invoices, print out lists and much more.

Queries

This module contains information of all your clients and projects. It is found in Projects: Queries. On the first page you can see a list of all clients in the left part. When you click on a client, all its projects are shown on the right screen side.

In the tab All projects, you will see a list of all projects, irrespective of clients.

Only active On both client and project sides you can select a list with only active.
Only own Own clients/projects are ones where you are project-/product manager.
Export Exports the list to Excel. Select which columns you want in the export.
To be closed Indicates to the accounting department that the project is ready to close.
Due projects By clicking Due projects you will see projects that have reached deadline. Also projects with an invoice date where no invoice has been printed out. This is only shown for project- and production managers of a project.

Columns in the client list:

Favourites Possibility to select only the most frequent clients.
Code A unique identity for the client.
Client Client name.
CM The employee code of the person in charge of the client (Client manager) in your own company.
A lock A lock means that the client is closed (inactive). This means that the client does not save any active projects and that new projects not can be opened to it.
Group/Group name Group code/name

Columns in the project list:

Favourites Possibility to select the most frequent projects only.
Code A unique identity for the project. The code consists of the client code + a running number.
Project The project name.
Registered Date when the project was opened (registered).
PM Employee code of the project manager.
$ Shows that there is WIP on the project.
A lock A project with a lock is closed.
Due Overdue client invoices on the project are shown in red. (one symbol if the invoice is due more than 8 days, two symbols if more than 31 days)
Inv text created If this is marked, somebody has started to create an invoice text on the Invoice- tab.
Inv text ready If this is marked, somebody has created an invoice text and marked it as ready.
Production manager Employee code of the production manager
WIP Shows the amount in the project’s WIP.
Currency Shows the base currency of the project. (Used only in multiple agency handling)
Project type Shows project types: external (E), within group or externaal within group (G), internal (I), project for internal work (9) and speculation- or pitch projects (J).
Estimate Shows if the project has a cost estimate.
To be closed Indicates to the accounting department that the project is ready to close.
WIP Fees Shows amount in WIP Fees
WIP Purchases Shows amount in WIP Purchases
WIP Other Shows amount in WIP Other
Fixed price Shows the fixed price of the project, if that has been set in advance
Deadline Shows the project’s deadline date, if set (System: Base registers/Pro/Client & Project)
Inv date Shows the project’s invoice date, if set (Base registers/Pro/Client & Project)
Invoiced Shows what has been invoiced on the project (including pre-inv.)
Marathon Time Marked, if the project is reportable in Marathon Tid.
Local name Shows a local project name, if set
Reference no Shows possible reference number.
End date Shows closing date of the project, if it is closed.
Start date Shows the project’s start date, if stated.

If you wish to see the columns in a different order, you can drag and drop them where you want with the mouse indicator. Click in the heading field in the column that shall control the sorting.

Enter new clients and projects

New clients and projects can be entered directly in the list. New entries require authorisation. If new projects only can be entered from the accounting department, the button New is deactivated. The fields to be shown were selected at the time of your Marathon installation in the system parameters and can be changed in System: Base registers/Pro/Parameters, tab Clients and Projects.

New client

Click Newin the client list. Fill in the field Client ID and press OK.

Client ID The client’s unique identity. Maximum four (4) digits
Name The complete name of the client, shown on invoices etc.
Internal name The internal name can be used to identify the client with another, internal, name. The name is shown as client name in Marathon, but the client’s real name will be printed on invoices.
Client manager Marathon suggests you as client manager, but you can of course change name.
Client contact Contact person at the client.
Collective client You can use Collective clients to tie together different clients, e.g. different branches of a client. E.g. Volvo can be collective client for Volvo Göteborg and Volvo Stockholm. (Collective clients are set in Base registers/Pro).
Category You can divide clients in to categories and use for statistics
VAT Enter what type of VAT the client represents.
Domestic Ordinary VAT for domestic clients.
EU VAT free for clients within the EU.
Other countries VAT free for clients outside of the EU.
VAT number Non-domestic clients must be completed with a VAT number.You can copy previously entered information from another client. Click the button Copy from and select the client you want to copy from. The function copies all information and writes it in the fields (it writes over possible earlier text); you can then edit the data before you save.

New project

Select client in the client list, thereafter click New in the project part.

If you enter project numbers manually, start with filling in a number. If you use automatic project numbering, this field is not shown and the project is assigned a number when you save it.

Client-ID The selected client. Comes automatically.
Name Project name.
Project manager Project manager. Marathon suggests you (the logged in).
Production manager Production manager. Marathon suggests you (the logged in)
Project description An optional description of the project
Type The different project types are:
External Projects for external clients, chargeable
Speculation Speculation/competition projects. This can be changed to external projects later (at the accounting department]
Internal Internal, not chargeable project
Group External project within the company group.
Job type Defines the type of job. You can select up to three different job types per project.
Client contact The contact person at the client.
Master Similarly to Collective clients, also projects can be tied together with a Master project definition. That gives opportunity to analyse projects in a broader perspective, as well as they can be analysed separately.
Special invoice text This text will come as a suggestion on each invoice sent within this project, e.g. reference number. When invoicing, you can choose if you want to include the text or not.
Our ref on invoice Fill in, if someone else than the project manager shall be referred to on the invoice.
Time reporting Tick this box if you want the project to be in the time reporting program.
Group Enter project group.
Cost centre If the project revenue shall be redirected to a certain cost centre
Fixed price If the project has a fixed price, it can be stated here. In the project analysis and in reports, you can later compare what has been registered and the fixed price.
Deadline Possibility to fill in deadline for the project. Overdue projects create a notification on the start page. Deadline can also be shown in reports.
VAT State the VAT type for the project, so that the system can handle taxes on the project.
Invoice date If you fill in the invoice date of the project, it will be shown when due as a notification on the start page.
Copy from You can copy previously entered information from another project. Select the project you want to copy from. The function copies all information and writes over earlier entered information.

Analysis

This tab shows the current status of the project. You can deepen into any underlined heading.

Currency Marathon supports handling of multiple currencies. It is possible to use other that your base currency; the amounts will then be recalculated with the currency rate stated in System: Base registers/General/Currencies.
Fees/Purchases/Other In these menus you can choose how you want the information on fees/purchases/other to be shown when deepening.If you choose e.g. Cat/Code/Employee in Fees, Marathon shows you first the information divided per job category. If you click on a certain category, you will see the information divided in job codes. Click on a job code to see the employees that have been reporting time on the code. Finally, by clicking on an employee code, you can see her/his complete time report row including the comments.
Show only updated hours If you tick this box Marathon shows only the hours that have been updated by the Accounting Department. If not, all reported hours on the project are shown.
Total master project If you tick this, Marathon shows statistics for all projects that are tied to different master projects. The master projects are defined in the project registration or in the General information tab at each of the separate projects.
Show period The analysis tab shows normally the current status of the project, but it is possible to write a certain period here, to see only that period’s data. Note that Invoiced shows what has been invoiced of registered during that period.
Fixed price Fixed price can be stated here or in the tab General information, provided that the field is active.
Budget This column shows the total sums of the estimate divided on fees, purchases and other. (If the parameter "Include only confirmed estimates" is checked, only confirmed estimates will be shown here.)
Quantity Number of reported hours, number of purchases and number of other records
Registered This column calculates the monetary value of actual fees, purchases and other. Concerning fees the value is based on the number of hours multiplied with the hourly rate/code price entered in Marathon. Concerning purchases the purchase price (cost) added to the mark-up defined for the purchase code.
Adjusted Adjustments are normally made in connection with invoicing or when closing project. Click on the underlining to see adjustment details.
Invoiced Shows what have been invoiced so far on the project. Read more about invoiced below.
WIP Amount to be invoiced. The WIP is the sum of registered amount plus possible adjustments minus the invoiced amount.
Pre-inv. Shows if there is any pre-invoices on the project (i.e. not invoiced from WIP) that not yet have been deducted from the WIP. When the deduction is done, the amount shows in the column Invoiced.

Click on the column heading to see information of what has been invoiced. The following image will be displayed.

The picture shows the invoices behind the amounts. Click on an invoice to see more information about it. If there is a red sign in the DUE column, the invoice is overdue. Click on the sheet on the right to see the scanned invoice in Pdf format.

General information

This tab shows all project information entered at the time of registration or transferred from the client. If you want to change something, click Edit. The window is the same as when entering a new project. If nothing is registered on the project you can, if you want, delete it.

Authorised

This tab tells who the project manager and client manager are. If the project has limited access you can see here which ones of the employees have access.

Price

The price tab contains information of how the project is priced divided into fees, purchases and other.

First Marathon tells if there is a fixed price for fees, purchases and/or other.

Then you can see if there are any exceptions from the ordinary rates. The special prices cannot be changed in this tab (They have to be edited by an administrator). ****/*** means that the special pricing concerns all employees and job codes.

The example above shows that all employees, except Carl Eriksson, cost 1 500 on all codes. Carl Eriksson costs normally 1 200, but on code 010 his rate is 1 000.

If you use pricing per job code, you can’t use special hourly rate. In those cases Marathon says that he price is fetched from the code.

Purchases have defined mark-ups per code for different kinds of purchases. Concerning Other in the example above, Marathon tells that there is a fixed price and that the unit prices are fetched from the codes.

Cost estimate

The tab can be used not only to create estimates, but also for writing quotations.

Confirm You can mark an estimate as Confirmed. The estimate will be marked with a confirmation date and user name of the confirmer. A parameter in the system(Base registers/Pro/Parameters/Project estimate) defines whether an estimate must be confirmed or not in order to be included in calculations.
Delete confirmation You can also cancel a confirmation- if you must do changes in the estimate. If you confirm the budget again after the cancellation, new date and user name will show on it.
Activate Possibility to activate a deactivated estimate
Deactivate If a project has many estimates you can deactivate the revisions you want to exclude from the project analysis, reports, etc.

Click New to create a new estimate. The estimate has separate tabs for Fees, Purchases, Other and Text & Currency. There are no specific rules of what it must include, you can choose to budget on optional detail leve

In the tab Fees, the prices are suggested from the project's price list, provided that there are enough information for stating the price. In the tab Purchases the prices are fetched from the project's price list.

Write headings and texts in Text & currency. If you want some text to be printed out after the estimated values, write it in the field Estimate text After.

Copy from You can use existing templates or previous estimates in new estimates.
Templates Select template. Templates are registered in Projects: Estimate templates.
Update prices If you set an estimate on employee level, and the employee's prices change, you can update the price in order to get the new one into the estimate.
Import team Imports all employee from the project’s team to the estimate.

When the estimate is saved, you can print it out. There are a few printout selections to do

Special invoice text Text written as special invoice text on the project (e.g. reference number that you want on the client’s invoice).
Estimate text before Text that has been written in the Estimate text before-field in the texttab.
Page break after heading Tick the box if you want a leaf with project information separately from the actual budget.
Fee/Purchases/Other Select detail level in the drop-down menus. If you e.g. select Code/description, the estimate will be divided in codes and you can see comments for each code. If you have just set fixed amounts for fees/purchases/other, Description is the best printing alternative. Note, that even if you have created a very detailed budget, you can still print out one more compressed, e.g. on category level.
Estimate text after The text that has been written in the field Estimate text after in the tab Text.
Show hours Select if you want to see number of hours for the fee.
Subtotals Select on what level you want to see the subtotals. The higher numbers you choose, the more detailed the subtotals will be.
Show 0-lines Select if you want to see lines with zero- amounts
Show amounts on… When you select this, the amount will not be specified by detail for each record; only the total sum will be shown for fees, purchases and other.
Print out VAT All values in the estimate are exclusive of VAT. If you want to see the amounts with VAT, tick this alternative.
Language You can select between different languages (Provided that you have translated your fee-, purchase- and other codes). Otherwise they will show in your company’s basic language.
PDF/Spreadsheet The destination of the printout; either in Pdf format or as an export to Excel.
Printout template If your company is using different templates for printouts, select one in the menu.

Fee

The fee tab has two “sub-tabs”; Reconciliation and Resource planning.The reconciliation module is the same that is shown in Time reporting. You can follow the employees’ reported hours either per project or total.

The resource planning tab shows how the time has been planned in Projects: Resource planning. You can select a period and sort the list per employee, code or date.

Only planned time Shows only the time that has been planned for the project.
Dates You can select a period.
Employee Shows the planned time per employee.
Code Shows the planned time per job code.
Date Shows the time per date.
Detailed Shows a detailed list.

Purchases

This tab contains both Quotation queries and Purchase orders. Quotation queries can be sent to suppliers and later be used as a framework for purchase orders. Purchase orders may be created directly from the query, or from the Purchase order tab.

Create a new query. Click NEW.

Purchase of Text that will be shown in the field Text in the purchase order. It will also be shown in Accounting: Approval
Purchase code Type of purchase.
Our reference Employee in the own company that is in charge of the purchase. Marathon suggests the logged-in employee.
Quoted price Can be filled in when the query has been replied to. It can later be seen as a column in the overview list which can be used as overview of purchase order recipients and also for follow-ups on price developments regarding previous queries.
Company Company, into which the purchase goes.
Supplier If the supplier has been registered with address and terms of payment, this information will automatically be pasted to the fields below.
Delivery address Address, where the purchase shall be delivered. Select between own address, client’s address or write an address manually.
Goods label The delivery label (e.g. project-ID)
Description text Text field for notes to the supplier. A purchase order text may be connected to each purchase code. If selected, it will show automatically.
Copy from Information on queries may be copied from an already existing query.
Print When a query has been saved it can be printed out to Pdf or be sent to the supplier either as fax or email. When a query has been printed out, it turns inactive.
New purchase order If a query shall be used as a purchase order, select the query and press New purchase order. The purchase order gets a running number.
Open purchase order Select open purchase order to make complementary additions to the order.
Print purchase order The purchase order can be printed out or sent to the supplier by fax or e-mail.

Creating a purchase order for a purchase facilitates the work of the accounting department and approvers, as it is possible to match the purchase order with the invoice later.

If the box "Only active" is checked, the list shows only those purchase orders that have not yet been matched with an invoice. Select a line and click Open in order to see more details about a specific order.

All of the company’s queries and purchase orders are shown in Accounting: Suppliers' invoices.

Printout tab

You can print out project status in this tab. Start with Printout. If you click Save selection, your selection will be saved and suggested to you next time you are in the program. Note that only updated hours are shown in the printout.

General information Main information about the project, e.g. project manager, start date, client manager, etc. Contains also information about parameters set for the project.
Total Shows total project status, i.e. the same information that you can find in the Analysis tab.
Details fee Shows hours divided according to your selection.
List fee Shows what each employee has reported. The list can be reduced to a certain period.
Hide amounts Possibility to hide amounts in printout.
Details purch Shows purchases according to your selection.
List purch Detailed list of all purchases.
Summarise purchases… Summarises purchases whose WIP: s are invoiced or adjusted away.
Mark accumulated… Marks the time reported as accumulated project time.
List orders A list of all orders on the project. You can choose to exclude the matched orders; select Do not show binding purchase orders in the menu.
Details others Shows other records according to your selection.
List others A detailed list of other registered costs.
Summarise others… Summarises other-records whose WIP: s are invoiced or adjusted away.
List invoices A list of all invoices on the project.
Invoice draft Shows the current amount in WIP to be invoiced. The detail level is according to settings on the project. The numerical codes will not be visible on the real invoice.

Invoicing

Determine in this tab what to invoice and the appearance of the invoice. There are different ways of preparing an invoice. Here is three methods.

1. New invoice – only text

Prepare the invoice text in Projects: Queries. The actual invoicing is later performed by the accounting department, who is using the text that is prepared and the instructions that have been given. Select New to create an invoice. You can create several invoices on one project.

Text

Create text in the Text tab.

Create text Click Create Text if you want to use the project's WIP or to invoice from the cost estimate. Select first if the amounts shall be based on estimated values (and in that case select estimate) or on the project's actual wip.
Detail level Select level of details for fees, purchases and other.
Subtotals Select how you want the subtotals.

The suggestion can be changed. You can add own rows and subtotals and write a new text and amounts. Down right you can see a summary of the amounts and possible pre-invoices waiting for deduction.

Instructions If the amounts are changed, it is very important to instruct the accounting department what shall be adjusted and what shall be left in WIP, etc. Use the field Instruction; it will not be shown on the invoice. The instructions are shown in the Analysis tab, under Invoiced, for each invoice.
Import text If the invoice is similar to a previously created one, you can import text from old invoices and adjust the text to fit the actual one.
Invoice text ready When the invoice is ready, tick the box "Invoice text ready".
Invoicing fee If invoicing fee is set, click the box if you want invoicing fee on this specific invoice.
Planned inv.date Write a date.
Printout When the invoice is saved you can print a test invoice. Select printout template.

2. New invoice – text and content

Prepare invoice text and content in Projects: Queries. The actual invoicing is later performed by the accounting department. Select New to create an invoice. You can create several invoices on one project.

Create text by following instructions in the chapter above (1. New invoice- only text).

Create content; please request a separate invoicing manual for instructions.

3. New invoice – collective invoice

Collective invoicing means invoicing several projects for a client on the same invoice. It is requested that:

  • The projects have the same client code
  • The projects have the same client number
  • Collective invoicing is allowed on the projects.
  • That the projects have the same invoicing currency at the time of printout.

Open one of the invoices and select Invoice Type: Collective Invoice. Go to the tab Collective Invoice and fetch all the projects that shall be included, also the one you currently have open. In the Content tab you now see the WIP from all projects. Select what to invoice.

Invoice client

If the project has another invoicing address than the client, use a invoicing client on it. Fetch invoice client from the tab Parameters.

Notes

You can gather all notes about the project in this tab so that all colleagues can read it and also fill in their notes. A note is automatically marked with name and time.

If you want to write a note, click New to open a box, fill in heading and the note - you can also copy from a previous note, then Save.

Documents

Here you can make a connection to your ordinary file server. That means that you can quickly get access to documents that are connected to the project. The files are stored in one folder per project. Contact Kalin Setterberg for more information.

Project printouts

In this module you can print out different kinds of statistics about several projects at the same time. Select projects in the left part of the screen and the information you wish to include in the right part. The right part is similar to the printout tab in the separate projects.

Hits If you want to check the number of projects found.
Print Print selection
Save selection You can save your selection
Master If you use Master projects for grouping projects, you can select to sort by master here
Status If you want to see projects with a certain status, select:
  • Active - Projects open for transactions
  • Deactivated - Projects temporarily closed for transactions. Deactivated projects can have WIP.
  • Closed - Closed projects with no WIP.
Min WIP amount You can select projects that have WIP exceeding a certain amount.
Time reporting proj only The list shows only projects that are available for time reporting in Time reporting
Sort A menu to select sort order of the projects, e.g. project name, project manager or start date.

Reports

This is a module where you can print out and create reports. There are a few standard reports in the module but you can also create own reports. Please request separate manual fo creating reports.

Print out report

Select a report and click Printout. A selection window opens.

Make the selection on the left side. The selection possibilities may vary from onereport to another. The columns are already in the report template

Subtotal Subtotals determine how the report shall be presented.
Sort order Sort order for summation levels. Click Reversed if you want the biggest amounts to be presented on top.
Print to The report can be printed to Pdf or Spreadsheet.
No sums Printout without cubtotals
Start Start printout