Service Excellence Continuing Investments for Cost Management and Control

In this update, improvements are available in the following areas:

Descriptive Flexfield Investments

Descriptive Flexfields for Project Labor Schedule Distribution Rules: Gain granular control over your labor schedule data with Descriptive Flexfields (DFF). Enable and manage additional attributes tailored to your specific needs, directly within the management of labor schedules.
- You can manage the descriptive flexfield values when creating and maintaining distribution rules using REST operations, the file-based data interface (FBDI), and in the Manage Labor Schedules page in the "Additional Information" area illustrated below.

Create Distribution Rule Descriptive Flexfield Attributes

Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence (OTBI) Investments

Labor Schedule and Cost Analysis Using Payroll Costing Configuration Attributes in Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence (OTBI): The payroll costing configuration values associated with labor schedule definition are available for reporting on related schedules and costs to identify potential issues with future distributions and assess prior cost distribution trends. A "Payroll Costing Configuration" folder has been added to the Labor Schedules Details section in the following subject areas:
- Projects - Labor Distribution Cost Analysis Real Time
- Projects - Labor Schedule Analysis Real Time
Labor Schedule and Cost Analysis Using Time Card Distribution Attributes in Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence (OTBI): Identify labor schedules enabled for time card distribution and analyze payroll costs distributed to projects using the time card distribution method to identify trends and drill into details to resolve exceptions. Use the following attributes to build analyses required by your business:

Subject Area	Attribute
Projects - Labor Schedule Analysis Real Time	Time Card Distribution
Projects - Labor Distribution Cost Analysis Real Time	Time Card Distribution Time Card Distribution Basis Code Time Card Distribution Basis Summary Status Code Summary Status Status Reason Code Status Reason

Time Card Payroll Costing Status Analysis Using Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence (OTBI): Use the payroll costed attributes added for project costs, cost distributions, and unprocessed transactions to analyze time cards based on their payroll distribution eligibility and processing status to identify and resolve exceptions in the payroll distribution to projects process. For example, time cards that have a payroll costed value of Pending after payroll has been distributed to projects indicates an issue with payroll or labor schedule configurations. The payroll costed attributes have been added to the following subject areas:
- Project Costing – Actual Costs Real Time
- Project Costing – Expenditure Item Performance – Real Time
- Project Costing – Unprocessed Transactions Real Time

The business benefits of these features include:

Descriptive Flexfield Investments
- Enhanced Data Capture: Capture granular details relevant to your labor distributions, ensuring comprehensive data collection for informed decision-making.
- Increased Flexibility: Adapt your labor distribution data structure to accommodate evolving needs and unique program requirements.
- Standardized Data Collection: Ensure consistent data capture across your programs by defining standard flexfield attributes.
Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence Investments
- Additional attributes for analyzing trends and proactively preventing errors when distributing payroll costs to projects.

To deploy the descriptive flexfield for your labor schedule distribution rules:

Click the Edit icon to make any necessary changes to the flexfield based on your business needs. Refer to the Overview of Descriptive Flexfields topic in the Configuring and Extending Applications guide for detailed instructions on how you can manage flexfields.

Click Save & Close to finalize your changes. Then, click Deploy Flexfield to make the updated flexfield visible in both the user interface and the REST service.