Project budgeting

A project is temporary and creates a unique product: not a routine. For that reason, having a plan is essential: "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail."

In Industrial Equipment Manufacturing, a budget is the baseline that ensures the project is calculated accurately. It supports the right quote, correct material planning in the right quantities, and availability of your people:

• Quoting: the cost of the project. A ProjectQuote calculation can be made in the ProjectBudget lines at different levels of detail:

  • General, for example an amount for all resources or all items.

  • Group, for example an amount for a particular resource group.

  • Number, for example an amount for a named resource.

• Tracking: tracking actual numbers against the budget. Once a budget is created, you can compare the actual numbers against that budget with forecasting.

• Comparing: budget versions and forecasts. You can create different versions of budgets based on progressive insights. Forecasts estimate the future development of the project.

Budgets provide the following functions:

• Breakdown: breaks down estimates at group level into specific resources or items.

• Apply Surcharges: adds percentage-based costs to the budget based on a surcharge model.

• Calculate Forecast: determines an estimate to completion based on either budgeted costs or actual numbers.

• Copy to Planning: copies budget lines for specific resources or items to either item planning lines or resource planning lines.

The following table describes a sequence of tasks, with links to the topics that describe them.