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Assistance Required - Units% doesn't actually update the actual units

5 replies [Last post]
Thomas Nicholson
User offline. Last seen 2 weeks 11 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 4 Oct 2006
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Morning all, 

This may be normal but it strikes me as odd.  The first time I update my resources using the Units% complete column (resources tab) it updates as I'd expect.  So someone with 100 units I update 10% actual becomes 10 units.  However as the project progresses I update again this time 25% only this time it updates the remaining but not the actual meaning you have to manually calculate all the acutals and update them as such.

I saw an ex colleague use global change to correct this problem but I just can't quite seem to find any global change allowing actual units to be updated. 

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

 

Kind regards, 

Thom

Replies

Zoltan Palffy
User offline. Last seen 13 hours 3 min ago. Offline
Joined: 13 Jul 2009
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duration % complete triggers the actual units.

change the % complete type to duration % complete and it wil update 

also duration type to fixed duration & units 

Thomas Nicholson
User offline. Last seen 2 weeks 11 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 4 Oct 2006
Posts: 82
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Hi Rodel, 

Thanks for that, I figured earlier that if I zeroed it then the units % complete would work.  I've been trying it on some test projects and thank you for confirming I wasn't chasing rainbows with that method.

Kind regards, 

 

Thom

Rodel Marasigan
User offline. Last seen 2 hours 13 min ago. Offline
Joined: 25 Oct 2006
Posts: 1670

Hi Thomas,

Unit % complete formula is "Actua Unit / At Completion Units * 100". Therefore when you used Unit % complete calculate actual units you have to follow the correct process. See sample below:

Say:
100 = Budgeted Labor Unit
100 = At Completion Labor Unit
0 = Actual Unit

 1) If Actual Unit = 0 and you enter Unit % Complete = 20 then P6 will Calculate Unit % Complete  = 20/100*100 = 20 Actual Unit
2) Now for the next update, Actual Unit already have 20 therefore the calculation of Units % Complete is always ""Actua Unit / At Completion Units * 100" . If you enter 30 Unit % Complete, the Actual unit will not change and will remain 20 units and P6 will calculate Unit % Complete using the formula which equivalent to 20*100/30 = 66.6667 At completion Unit = 30 Unit % Complete = 20 Acutal Units/ 66.6667 At completion Unit * 100.

Therefore Unit % complete is not the correct way of updating Actual Unit and it's the other way around. In order to update the Actual unit based on Unit % Complete once there is already have Actual Units you have to return to 0 out the Actual Unit to used Unit % Complete as basis of Actual Unit.

The simple step if Actual Unit is already have actuals is:
1) make sure Budgeted Unit = At Completion Unit (labor or non-labor which ever is you are using)
2) Zero out the Actual unit by entering 0 to Actual Unit or zero out Unit % Complete in Columns on Activity Level and not on the resource tab - not recommended if using multiple resources as other resources will be zero out also)
3) Enter the correct Unit % Complete once Actual Units is already zero and your Actual Unit will have Actual Units based on Unit % Complete * At Completion Unit.

Thomas Nicholson
User offline. Last seen 2 weeks 11 hours ago. Offline
Joined: 4 Oct 2006
Posts: 82
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Hi Zoltan, 

Tried different things like that, but it only ever changes the remaining duration and doesn't touch the actuals. 

I'm going through the resources on an activity to update them and the "units % complete" does nothing to the actuals. 

Am I missing something fundamental?  If my budgeted units are 180 then my putting 50% in the units % complete should give me an actual of 90 and a remaining of 90, it correctly changes the remaining but leaves the actual at zero.  So I have to go through each resource manually correcting the actual units. 

Zoltan Palffy
User offline. Last seen 13 hours 3 min ago. Offline
Joined: 13 Jul 2009
Posts: 3026
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My quess is that you are using physical % complete you need to use duration % complete to update the actual units

make a global change

where physical % complete is greather than 0

then duration % complete = physical % complete