Workbench Release Notes

Beta Release 4.5.39.1

Scheduled Release - 03 October 2022

New Features

Sharperlight

A New Sharperlight Data Model is being released with lots of enhancements to allow for detailed financial reporting and some other exciting improvements:

• New GLAccounts table

• BaseGLCode has been added to vwJobFinancialDataView and linked to GLAccounts table

• Activities and SalesCodes links to GLAccounts table

• New Audit table

• New StockTransactions view

• Hyperlinks to Workbench have been added to the following document tables. This will allow the display of a hyperlink on Sharperlight to open a new browser tab with the document in Workbench:

  • Budgets

  • Companies

  • Contracts

  • Job Invoices

  • Jobs

  • Logs

  • Plant Items

  • Subcontracts

  • Work Orders

• Links to PeriodEnds table

• In the period ends table, a new field has been added that displays the month and year of the period end date (MMM YY format)

• Added the description field on the following tables so that when that field is being used in a drop-down box on a report, the description field is displayed too:

  • Job Code / Description

  • Company Name

  • Person

  • Plant code / description

  • Stock item / description

  • Stock Locations

Our data model now uses a default database name, called Default, which allows to save queries that will run on whatever database the current user has access to. This also enables us to have dashboards that can switch databases like a filter, without having to duplicate the reports for each database name.

Jobs

• Contract Claim Schedule sequence:
  

  

  
  

  

A new Sequence Number option has been added to Claim Schedules to allow users to determine the order in which they are presented, especially in billing and on claim schedules, and any custom reports in Sharperlight.
Our standard Contract Claim reports will incorporate this change from next release 4.5.40. Custom Contract Claim reports will require to be updated by one of our developers.

Feature Revisions

Jobs

• Job Maintenance -Docket Schedule picker:
  When having multiple Docket Schedules to select on the Docket Schedule picker, the user could not navigate out of the first page to select a Schedule. This has been rectified.
  

• Job Enquiry - Expense Claim transactions:
  On the Job Transactions tab when a Supplier is the same for more than one person’s Expense Claims Company, the lines were duplicating. This has been rectified.

Purchasing

• Payment Due Date validation:
  On AP Vouchers and AP Invoices, the Payment Due Date is automatically populated based on the Supplier's Payment Terms. This information is imported from the Financial system. However, some Suppliers do not have this info populated leaving the Payment Due date blank. This date is a required value when exporting a batch to the financial system. To handle the scenarios where a Supplier does not have this populated, Workbench now warns users that the Payment Due date is empty and it does not allow an AP Invoice or Voucher to be approved without this date.
  
  To streamline your AP process, we recommend all Suppliers have their Payment details populated on the Financial System, so they can be automatically imported/updated in Workbench. This will ensure that the Payment Due date is populated automatically as well.
  

• Partial Inwards Goods receipting from AP Vouchers:
  When processing an AP Voucher for part of a PO Line, the system was completing the whole PO line when creating the Inwards Goods Receipt for it, however the receipting should have been only partial. This has been rectified.

Stock

• Making a Stock Item inactive:
  When lagging a Stock Item as inactive, the system will now automatically flag the line corresponding to this Stock Item on Workbench System Stock Catalogue, as inactive, so it cannot be used when creating POs.

Subcontracts

• Work Order List - Status:
  To cater for both types of WO approvals in Workbench, Standard and Workflow, we have updated the Work Order List to display the correct Status and the person the document is assigned to (if it is).
  
  Deprecated columns: Approved By and Assigned Approver
  New columns: Status and Assigned

  Refer to control parameter ‘WO Approval Process’ for the approval method being used.

Timesheets

• Job Manager Approval allows editing of Timesheets:
  A new permission has been created that allows Job Managers to modify or delete lines on the Job Manager Approval screen (Start, End, Break, Log No, Delete), without having to navigate back and forth to the Timesheet Administrator screen or having to request each employee to modify their timesheets before being able to approve.
  Permission ‘Job Manager Approval Allow Edit and Delete’. Use this new permission with caution and advise your employees that you might be updating their original timesheets.
  

  

• Removing features related to the deprecated Daily Diary module:
  The Schedule field has been removed from Timesheet Groups, as this was only used by Daily Diary functionality and is not required anymore. Daily Diary has been replaced by Daysheets and Upvise Daily Diary.
  

  

Service Logs

• Billing ‘Small Jobs' Logs:
  When billing Service Logs (using the Invoice button on the Log screen), the invoice will be created for the Client on the Service Log, rather than the Client on the Job on the Service Log.
  
  These two can be different, and a common scenario would be in those cases where there are very small jobs done that do not have a specific Job setup in Workbench for it, but rather a generic/cath-all Job for Small Jobs, where the Client could be the Internal company. This Job can be used on the Logs, and typically once the work is done is billed right away, selecting the correct Client that work has been done for.
  
  For now, the integration with Upvise Jobs will still be using the Project’s Company/Client, and the correct client will have to be selected/updated in the Workbench Log. An enhancement to the Client’s selection on Upvise Jobs will be done soon to support this type of scenario with different Project Client vs Upvise Job Client.
  
  Warning: Bulk Invoice Creation functionality cannot be used to bill these Logs, because the Invoice created will for the Job’s Client which is the internal company, and it will have a mix of Transactions done for different clients on different Logs.
  

• Mobile Logs - Arrived on Site mandatory:
  When using Mobile Logs, the On-Site Date and Time can be made mandatory based on Asset Task settings. This can only be done from Scaffold and can only work when using Assets on Service Logs.

Integrations

Upvise

• Daily Scan:
  A new function has been developed to record Daily Attendance for factory/yard workers. The suggested set-up is to run an android tablet device in your factory, where employees scan in and out of the factory as they come and go throughout the day. This "attendance" time can be used in conjunction with timesheet data to cross-check timesheet data. Engage your Workbench consultant or Workbench support to discuss this solution.

• Bulk Equipment Returns:
  New functionality has been introduced to Upvise to allow Equipment Returns to be processed in bulk against a project, where multiple pieces of equipment can be recorded in one return form. The return end date will update the respective plant assignment in Workbench. Clients interested in this function please engage our Workbench Support Team.

• Leave Request Form:
  Leave can now be recorded in days and hours. Leave time will appear in the Jobs calendar where an employee has submitted a leave request. Also, a display issue for the Leave request on the Jobs calendar has been solved. Clients wanting to receive this update, please request so from our Workbench Support Team.

• Upvise Job/ Workbench Log number auto-sequencing:
  An enhancement was introduced to immediately generate a log number on the log no field in Upvise with the click of a button. The log number will also auto-populate as the Upvise Job name. The integration caters for log sequencing to be split by finco. Clients wanting to utilise this feature please engage with our Workbench Support Team or your Consultant.

MYOB Advanced

• A new integration with financials has been added to the extended list of Workbench integrations with financial systems.
  In addition to the existing API integration with MYOB Advanced, we have now developed the option for File-based exports to MYOB Advanced.

• The 'Tenant' field has been added on the MYOB Advanced integration screen.

• Due to changes made by MYOB Advanced on their API, Fixed FC on AP Vouchers and POs were not reflected when AP Invoices were exported. We have made changes to handle the new changes.

Xero

• Reversed Payment import:
  Those AP Payments that are ‘deleted' or ‘unbatched’ in Xero are now imported to Workbench as reversed payments.

  Note: in Xero, if a payment is unbatched, it gets flagged as ‘deleted’ and a new payment is created. These ‘deleted’ payments need to be imported into Workbench to cancel out the authorized payment.