Tracking R&D expenses via Project

Hi.

Not all the stuff we sell are in production and some will never be.

We need, on some big R&D projects, to order pieces that will be added to a project that is still in conception.
So no BOM yet, sometimes, not even a name yet. But we want to keep track of all the expenses made related to this project.

Is there an elegant way already known to do this in erp next?

Thanks

Charles Fl.

Hey Charles,
Yes, the Projects module allows you to keep a running total of expenses for something like what you describe. Nearly every aspect of the accounting module allows you to specify a Project, but only one. if you have some expenses that are spread with unknown or unknowable percentages across R&D, I suggest adding an R&D Cost Center as a way to catch those. The known R&D expenses would get booked to the R&D cost center and the project.

3 Likes

Thanks for the answer, but I don’t understand how it is possible to order an item that will be added to the project, I only get to order to a warehouse… How the purchase can be linked to the targeted project?

Thanks

Prod

Maybe I should add, I’m speaking about Items that will be billed to this project, not only timesheets.

Thanks for helping
Prod

In the Purchase Invoice Item, you can specify the project.

But if I understand your work flow correctly, this sounds like it’s a little late and should be specified at the time of Purchase Order, but maybe not.
To specific the project at the time of purchase order the buyer needs to know what project it is for, which may or not be accurate.
To specify the project at the time of invoicing, the accounts person needs to know the project (and account and cost center).
I think this should work just fine

Specifying the Project at the step of purchase order can be the best.

Can I specify a particular project per item in the PO?

I can’t even find the ‘‘accounting’’ section anywhere, where was this screen shot taken from?

Thanks for your help

You have to go into the detail of the item to set it, so it only available per-item

Perfect, I figured that out at the time… Id REALLY like to be able to specify the project un the table itself…

I’ve been able to add Supplier Numer but adding Project Link doesn’t seem to work at all…

I guess I’m missing the obvious…

Thanks if you can help

Charles Fl.

I don’t understand where you’re hung up. Can you share a screen shot?

Could be much quicker to simply add the field like so in the table…

I don’t get why It’s harder to show in this view.

Mr Prod

There’s a limit amount of space available in the table, you can add it with a customization.
Customize Form → Purchase Invoice Item - > Project, click “In Grid View”

You may need to change the width of another field.

I guess you mean ‘‘In List View’’ am I right?

We set up a global project for purchase invoices which would probably work for POs also. We do not want to edit each item for project.

  1. Add a field to Purchase Invoices form called Project (link field). We make this field mandatory.
  2. Customize the Purchase Invoice Item form by adding this code to the Project field in the Fetch From section:
    cur_frm.project.project_name

The item projects will default to the Project field on the Purchase Invoice form. Have not tested outcome if trying to set separate projects for each item.