Phases

Every job has at least one phase. When a new job is created it automatically has a phase. More phases can be added and phases (including the original one) can be deleted, but one must always remain.

If a job is simple, then there is no need to add an additional phase. However, they can be used to represent different elements or stages of a job or to represent months of an annual job.

Phases can be accessed from within the job or directly via the left hand navigation panel.

A new phase can be added via the phases tab of the job header:

• New phase adds a single phase using default settings.
• Phase wizard allows one or more phases to be added using input data for description, phase type, dates etc.
• Copy from another template / copy from another job allows one or more phases to be copied from another job (or template jobs) using a very similar interface to the 'New job' based on template or copy job options - select which phases to copy, then select what to include on the copied phases.
• Creating a set of monthly phases does just that.  You must have set up phase types to represent months in file maintenance first, but having done so, you can create a monthly set of phases dated according to calendar months for either the current year, last year or next year.
• By default phases nwill appear in the order they are created using the phase suffix to order them (001, 002, 003 etc).  You can assign your own order on phases by entering your index into the Display order field:
• The same effect can be achieved from the phases list on a job by dragging and dropping phases into the required order - as soon as this is done all phases will be automatically assigned a display order value.  This order is used on things like quotations and invoices to define the order that elements appear in.

Phases can also be added via the job or job and phase number control for switching between job / phases:

If you have any fields at phase level that you have set to be mandatory, then you will only be able to add phases via the wizard.

Every phase has a series of tabs. Information on this, or a link to more details, is given below:

Details:
This is the initial screen you are prompted to fill in when creating a new phase. It may contain some mandatory fields, such as phase type, handler, due date etc. and contains all the specific information about this phase. Some fields here are optional, such as stage. Any custom fields that have been set up also appear on this tab.

Dashboard:
All the live financial information for the phase is displayed on this tab along with any estimated and quoted values.
There are various views by which the information here can be displayed.
For full information on this tab, please see the article dedicated to the dashboard tab.

Stages:
Stages can be created at job or phase level, but not both. On a 2 tier job they can only be created at phase level. This tab shows the stages that are only related to this phase. More detail of this can be found on phase level schedules in our schedules section.  The schedule of stages can be re-ordered freely via drag & drop.  Just click on the dots icon that appears to the right of the selection box when you mouse over a stage.

Estimate:
Estimates are generated at phase level only. This tab allows you to create and / or edit estimates from the information that has been entered into your system at setup. The estimate tab show a variety of information on the estimated figures as well as any actuals that have been added. Information on phase level estimating can be found in our estimating section.

A time and bookings view of the estimate provides a simple in-line edit mode and also a view of estimated time vs bookings and timesheets.  Read more about it here.

Quote:
If your system is set up for job level quoting only, then you will not see this tab here. This tab is where a quote for this phase can be generated and then rolled up at job level.
Further information on quoting can be found on phase level quoting in our quoting section.

Billing plan:
Billing plans are an option that can be switched on within company settings, so may not be displayed on all systems. It is also possible to have job only billing plans. Here, you can map out what and when you intend to invoice on this phase. For further information on this, please see the phase level billing plans section.

Invoices:
Here you will see all the existing invoices for this phase, including drafts, credit notes and write offs. New invoices can be created for this phase from this screen as well as deleted draft invoices.

Tasks:
Any tasks that have been filed against this phase can be found here. New tasks can also be generated here. For full details please see the tasks section.

Purch & exp.:
Both actual purchases and expenses are shown here by default, but that can be deselected. An option to include any estimates is also available. New purchases and expenses can also be created here along with existing ones edited.

Time:
This shows a summary of the timesheets entered along with an option to included what has been estimated. The default view is to show time as a list of estimates, other options are to see time as a list of individual timesheets, and also to see any pending timesheets present on the phase.

Materials:
Here you will see all actual materials that have been entered along with an option to include any material estimates.  Similar to the time, you can view this as a list of estimates or individual materials along with an option to display pending materials.

Pending:
Any pending costs, which would be blocking the phase from being final invoiced, can be found here.

Attachments:
Any existing attachments to this phase can be viewed, downloaded or deleted from here. New attachments can also be created here.

Contacts:

Additional client and / or supplier contacts attached to this phase can be viewed here.  There are also controld for adding and removing.  The primary client contact set on the details tab is not displayed here, these are in addition.