Financial Process Explanation

Price Details 

The whole financial process starts with the creation of ‘Price Details’.  Price details are essentially the template for both the budget for a project and the basis of the request for Quotation (or inquiry as we refer to it in the docking module).

Users should create a price detail entry for everything that they want to enter a price for. Each job can have as many price details as you wish, or you can just create one for ‘Total Price’ if you wish.

An example of a situation where you may wish to add several price details is if you want the price for a job specified in more detail such as separate prices for materials, labour and hire of tools/equipment.  

If a job doesn’t have a price detail then it will not be possible to enter a price for the job and there will not be a line created for the job in the excel inquiry sheet.  

In all cases, a price detail has a price multiplier which can have a basis in either project duration, job duration or a specified quantity.  So, if you wish to obtain a price per day for something that will last throughout the docking project (such as an electrical supply or water supply) then you should choose ‘Project duration as your price multiplier.  

It is also possible to create optional price details.  These are to be used when you wish to obtain prices for different grades/qualities of material or service.  

Optional prices, by default are not included in price totals.   However, within the single inquiry overview it is possible to change optional prices to ‘chosen options’.  

The prices will then be included in the totals.   Optional prices that are not chosen will also not be converted to costs when the contractor is chosen. 

Create Inquiry 

Creating an inquiry will take all price details (unless the user selects otherwise), and create inquiry lines in the database for them, for the relevant contractor.

 Inquiry lines are records for storing the prices that are offered by the contractor.  Creating an inquiry will also create an excel sheet where each line in the excel sheet is a price detail.  This is where the contractor can fill in their prices for the various jobs and return the excel sheet to you.  

Once an excel sheet is returned to you, you can import it and the inquiry lines will be updated accordingly.  However, you can type the prices in manually yourself and adjust them if necessary. 

Adjustments 

An adjustment can be made to each individual price in an inquiry.  It is logged when and who made the adjustment.  

These are to be used to adjust unrealistic prices, so that you can review what the original offer was as well as what adjustment was applied.   Adjustments are included in total prices. 

Select Contractor 

Selecting a contractor to carry out a job can be seen as acceptance of the price that the contractor has sent to you.  

When you select the contractor for a job, any inquiry prices for that job will be converted to costs (confirmation of an exchange rate is required in the event that the contractor is using a different currency than the standard for the vessel). 

Costs 

Costs can be added to a docking project job (or specification) in three ways 

1. Added manually to the job/specification by a user 
2. Selecting a contractor for the job/specification will convert inquiry prices into costs 
3. Any orders attached to docking jobs/specifications, will be represented as a cost for the docking job/specification as soon as they reach the status of ‘On Order’ 

Budget 

A budget value can be entered for each individual price detail for a job or specification.  This value can be edited at any time, however when a contractor has been chosen for a job/specification the current budget amount is stored as the ‘Budget Original’ value and it is not possible to edit this amount.  Total Budget figures can be seen in the price comparison overview, the Docking overview grid, the KPI bar and the cost comparison overview. 

Estimated Price 

Estimated price is a field that can be used to enter approximate costs for any price detail you wish, but is mainly intended for ‘Variation Order’ use.  When an unplanned job has to be created (a variation order), it is normally desirable to record an estimated price (given on site by the contractor), so that there is some sort or indication what it might cost.  Estimated prices are not used for any process within the Docking module, but they are shown in various overviews.