Business Use Case: Often there are team members who share the need of getting allocated on schedule board in PSA directly as soon as they book an appointment or have a meeting invite. One of the reasons for the same is for the team or anyone concerned about allocation to understand that the said team member is either having a meeting with someone or has an appointment. Hence, they do consume some time of the day. This is one of the reasons that I get when I think aloud. Since there is a lot of argument and justification the team needs to provide for these additional non-billable time that they spend. There can be many other reasons as to why this is needed by other organizations. Mitigation: Though there is an (Out of the Box) OOB solution for marking an appointment in Outlook calendar from Schedule Board, vice-versa is not provided OOB. MS Flows helped me here. I created a flow between Bookable Resource Booking entity and Outlookentity in Flows. I have explained the steps as to how to do the same: Steps: Step 1: Login to https://portal.office.com with your credentials. Step 2: Click on Flows as shown in below image Step 3: This will take you to the portal where you can manage and create all your Flows: Step 4: Click on +New Step 5: Click on Create from Blank Step 6: Click again on Create from Blank Step 7: Select the Outlook connector by searching the Outlook 365 Connector from the search box as shown in the image below. Also, select the Triggering event on when the flow should be triggered. So we selected When a new event is created (v2) Step 8: Select Calendar id as Calendar Step 9: click on next step Step 10: Select the target connector i.e. Dynamics 365 by searching in the connectors. Step 11: Click on create new records Step 12: Select the Organisation and the Entity where you want to create a record. Since the booking that shows up on the schedule board comes from Bookable Resource Booking, we shall select Bookable Resource Booking. Step 13: Add the mappings to the fields as shown below, by searching them from the right pane. Step 14: Once done, click on save and your flow is ready. Step 15: Once created do not forget to Turn it On. Test it by creating an event in the calendar and see in the event history of the flow whether it is successful or not. The End. This blog reflects my personal findings and based solely on my experience of using PSA for the last 3 years. For those who are looking for a platform that can track and manage the entire procedures of sales and project management, I would highly recommend them to try Microsoft dynamics 365 for project service automation. According to my opinion, the implementation of Microsoft dynamics 365 for project service automation is one of the best things that we did in Cloud Front Technologies. We have gained a lot with this implementation because we save time and money due to easy access resources and ability to manage them.

Introduction: There have been instances where we feel the need of deleting some records in bulk. I was looking at options of doing advanced search and saw that there were 500+ records showing up. Also, at a time Advanced Find allows to delete 50 records in one go. We definitely needed a better option and Data Management provided that option to delete records in bulk. Use Case: I created a Project Task in a project. This was the only task in the project on which I booked all the resources in my company for 8 hours per day until dec-2022 from June-2018. There were around more then 500+ allocations done for all the Resources. Somewhere, I figured out that this was not the task I wanted to allocate and then I tried many ways deleting the allocations. Below is what all I tried. Option 1: I tried to open the schedule board and delete the allocations from there from month view. But. Deleting it from schedule board takes lot of time to delete the allocations even for one month and imagine we have so many months allocation to delete. Hence, this was not a feasible option. Option 2: I tried deleting the allocations from Advanced find by selecting the criteria as shown below in the screen shot. But, it allowed me to delete only 50 records in a go which was again an issue. After trying above 2 methods and doing some research we came across Bulk Delete option in Data Management Module. Below is the solution to the issue. Solution: Step 1: login on CRM and navigate to Settings module and Data Management in there as shown below. Step 2: Click on Bulk Record Deletion option. Step 3: Bulk deletion wizard opens Step 4: Define your search criteria that selects the records to be deleted. It is similar to the Advanced Find tool. Step 5: Name the Bulk deletion job and schedule the same. You  can also tick the check box to notify via email when the job is completed successfully. You are done with the process and it will take some time for the process to delete the records. Conclusion: This blog reflects my personal findings and based solely on my experience of using PSA for last 3 years. For those who are looking for a platform that can track and manage the entire procedures of sales and project managements, I would highly recommend them to try Microsoft dynamics 365 for project services automation. According to my opinion, implementation of Microsoft dynamics 365 for project services automation is one of the best things that we did in CloudFronts Technologies. We have gained a lot with this implementation because we save time and money due to easy access resources and ability to manage them.

Anyone who uses a CRM on a regular basis hopes that it will work seamlessly without errors. But from time to time, when creating and qualifying a lead, confusing error messages popup and leave users wondering about a resolution.  A very common error in Dynamics 365 Project Service Automation comes up when trying to qualify a lead using the Project Information form when the lead is type is set as “Work Based.” The popup below shows the error message: This error cropped up after I did the following steps: Step 1: Create a lead with the basic required details Step 2: Ensure the form selected is Project Information form Step 3: The Type of lead field should have the value Work Based Step 4: Save the lead Step 5: Try Qualifying the lead. This will lead to the above error shown in the screen shot. The best way to resolve this issue is to check the parameter settings, shown in the screenshot below. Upon researching the issue, I found that there is an important parameter setting that is missing, which needs to be changed in order to get to a resolution. When the lead is created, even though we do not have a customer specific price list, PSA asks for a default price list, inferring that this could be a potential customer. The go to place where PSA checks the global parameter setting is Project Service–> Parameters. Click on the default organization unit. In my case, CloudFronts Mumbai. Click on the price list tab (shown in the screen shot below) and then click on the add new project parameter Price List button on the grid. A pop-up opens that asks for the price list. Select the price list and save. Now, when you create your lead in the Work Based type and qualify it, the error will not reappear. With these changes, the price list for the organization unit is updated in PSA. Whenever we use the organization unit again for a quote, contract, or project, this price list will be the default setting. Most importantly, the parameter helps to qualify the lead successfully. This process reflects my personal findings, based on my experience using PSA for the last five years. We have benefited a lot from the implementation of PSA, because we save time and money due to easy access to resources and the ability to manage them.

I was trying to explore the Extend Booking functionality in Dynamics 365 Project Service Automation (PSA) and saw that the users were getting allocated for the entire 24 hours in a day. Immediately, I realized that the issue was coming up because the work hour template was not set properly. When the new work hour template was created, the work hour parameters for the resources were not set back to eight hours. To check the work hours of a resource, navigate to Project Service–>Resources–>Select a Resource. Click on the button “show work hours” as highlighted in the screenshot below. A popup opens. The screenshot shows that the work hours are not defined for the resource as of now. As a result, the resource will be allocated for 24 hours if they are selected for a project unless there working hours are defined.    I selected the resource in the Default Work Hour Template and then created the work hours for that resource (eight hours a day and Monday-Friday working). I assigned these work hours to all the resources in the navigation shown below. Select all resources and click on the ‘Set calendar’ button from the Ribbon Control. I assumed that the new work hours will be set for all the resources selected. I then tried to allocate via extend booking and saw that the resource was still not reflecting the new work hours set. Upon further research I worked out a solution that follows the proper way to define the work hour template of the resources. I created a new work hours template by navigating to Project Service Work Hour Templates. This new work hour template was created to define the following: Working hours per day of the resource. Working days in a week. Holidays in a year. The resource selected should have the proper work hours defined. Select all the resources and assign the newly created work hour template. Because Kuldeep Gupta is a template resource in this example, all the resources will get assigned from Kuldeep Gupta. As a result, it’s not possible to select more than one resource. Now while creating the project select this newly created Work Hour Template  and the project will respect the new work hours. A word of caution: You will not be able to change the work hour template for the old projects as the field is locked and you are not allowed to change it in the midst of the project. I hope that these steps help you to create and assign the work hour template effectively.

Introduction: There is no limit to what D365 PSA can do. However, it has undergone some significant upgrades. since PSA v3 is a major shift from its previous version, some processes have changed which has greatly enriched the experience of using D365 PSA V3. Let’s quickly look at how you can assign resources and then book them on the Project in PSA v3 using a perfect example. Project I have a sample Project called Grand Chocolatiers Inc. whose schedule looks like this (the WBS is now Schedule in PSA v3) – I will now Assign and Book a Resource to show you how this is done in PSA v3. Assigning Resources: Now, you don’t have any resources Assigned to the Project you just created, so let’s go to the Schedule in the Project and add a new Resource, say, Alicia Baker. I’ve added Alicia Baker without booking her. Coming to the Team and refreshing the grid, I’ll see Alicia being assigned the 12 Hours. Booking Resource: Now, I’ll come to the Resource Reconciliation section and see how I can book Alicia on the task. I’ll select the Previous Difference in order for me to see the distribution I want to book Alicia on. After I double click on the Hours denoted (1), I’ll see an expanded view (2). Now, if I only select the below highlighted days, I’ll be booking Alicia for those hours on the 3 selected days only. Then, I’ll click on Extend Booking. Once I confirm the 3 days that I see, the resource will be booked for that time. And I’ll see the updated Reconciliation View after I book the resource. Now, if you check the Team or the Schedule Board, you’ll be able to see that Alicia is now Booked for the selected duration. Conclusion: Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Project Service Automation enables companies to deliver projects more productively and profitably with higher client satisfaction and this is my personal experience. Today, being a project-based organization, we deliver end to end projects on time and this has helped us achieve an enhanced reputation as a service company. To check out more on the core functionalities and features, please see Kuldeep’s blog below: https://community.dynamics.com/365/projectserviceautomation/b/kuldeepsblog/archive/2018/10/16/reconciliation-view-amp-scheduling-a-resource-in-psa-v3

Introduction: All these years, I was calculating ‘Actuals’ as the billable hours on the project with the chargeable role. It was a myth that I continued to believe until I stumbled upon the solution that potentially demystifies this myth in PSA itself. Description: Below is how PSA helped to resolve this complex situation and this is how I cleared my understanding towards Actuals vs Estimated in PSA. In the project, I observed that the project was estimated to be a short project of 22 hours and the ‘Actuals’ were of 24 hours. Thereafter, I decided to dig deeper into it to understand the issue of these 2 additional hours, as this was not a big project and getting the additional 2 hours mistake would be very easy. To fix this, below are the actions that I followed: I accessed the Actuals from Project–> Project Name–> Actuals, as shown in the screen shot below. In the grid there, I sorted the “cost” aspect and calculated the number of hours which turned out to be 24. This was strange for me. Then I looked at the “Resource Role” column in the grid and found a 2-hour entry under the Non-Billable role. I pondered why these 2 hours Non-Billable hours are getting summed up in the actuals. But, if thought correctly, even the Non-Billable hours spent by the Resource is an Actual cost to the company. Conclusion: In this way, I could clear the air of confusion surrounding this and for my project budget calculations, I got another field created in the form named billable hours and calculated the sum of all the chargeable roles hours in that field. This now gave me all the three i. e Actuals, Estimated and billed hours in one go. Microsoft Dynamics 365 PSA is the next generation of cloud-based systems which provides an overview of business processes from Sales, Project Management, Customer Service and Fields Service.

Introduction: In recent deployments of Dynamics 365 Project Service Automation (PSA) V2 for customers, I’ve come to rely on the chargeability view as a way to modify a quotation and reach the appropriate pricing for a project. In V3, PSA has abandoned the chargeability view. But no need to worry, I will show you how to accomplish the same thing with customer pricing in PSA V3! Steps: Let’s take the example of a quotation I have prepared for the Rotary Club. They need CRM to be implemented. By default, the price list that gets tagged comes from the opportunity that we create or the one that we tag with the quotation. Let’s check the price of a developer in the default price list in the screenshot below. Here, the default price that it shows is $1,250. I built a quotation to the customer based on my default sales price list. Below is what it looks like. The quote now is $12,500 ($1250 x 10 quantity) for 10 hours of requirement gathering. After submitting the quotation to the customer, they came back with a request to reduce the pricing. Now how do we achieve this in V3 which lacks the chargeability view of V2? In V3 we will need to follow these steps: 1. Open the quote 2. Click on “Project Price Lists” as shown in the below image: 3. Click on Create Custom Pricing and PSA creates a custom price list for the quote where you can store the negotiated price like you used to do in chargeability view. 4. Open the price list by clicking on it. There you can navigate to role prices. Select the line on which you want to update the price and click on the edit button that comes up in the header of the grid. Then you can proceed to update the prices based on what you have negotiated. To post the updated prices, click on the activate button. The sequence is shown in the image below. Overall, the process tends to be pretty intuitive. 5. Navigate back the Quote line and follow one more final step: If you open the Quote line details to see if the prices have been updated, you will see that the prices are still the same as the old entries. In order to reflect the new updated roll prices, open the line, go to remove the roll, and re-enter the roll to fetch the updated price. The updated quote with the updated price looks like this: And with that, you have achieved the functionality. Conclusion: Microsoft Dynamics 365 for Project Service Automation enables companies to deliver projects more productively and profitably with higher client satisfaction. Even though PSA V3 has eliminated the chargeability view, it is still possible to access the view in a much simpler way.

Have you been added as a Delegate for a fellow colleague but not able to Read, Create or Submit Time Entries on their behalf? Let us see what you are missing. Scenario: William Contoso wants to make Veronica Quek as his Delegate and let her enter time on his behalf. Let’s say William added Resource Veronica Quek as the Delegate above. Error for the Delegate Resource: Now, Veronica is attempting to do time entries for William by going to Time Entry Calendar view and switching the user to William. And when Veronica wants to enter time as William, she’d switch to the User on the Time Entries Calendar View like this – But, see this error and she don’t know what the issue might be. Even though she’s the Delegate! Missing Security Role: Yes, this is the first thing you should check. Veronica Quek is missing a Delegate Security Role in PSA to be able to make time entries on behalf of other users. Assign Delegate security role to the user to make them enter time on behalf of others. And thus, your Delegated User should be good to make time entries.

Background: One of the frequent requests we continuously get from our clients is for someone else to do Time entries on behalf of other resources. We know that this can be done using Delegations feature in Dynamics 365 PSA. You can read more about delegations here written by another D365 PSA Expert – Priyesh Wagh : Delegating Time Entries in D365 PSA Example: But if we want to do this for all the Resources, then it is tedious and not practical to ask each resource to create delegate. For example, on of our clients requested that HR should be able to enter Time entry on behalf of any resource in the organization. I also saw that many organizations need a feature like this. So I thought of creating a console application which will get all the Bookable resources of type User and create Delegations. Below is the code that you can use to create delegations for all users in the organization. You can use the same code to create a plugin if you want to automatically create delegate on creation of Bookable resource. Sample Code: You can get the entire code from my Github #region Create Delegations for all User Bookable Resources to Particular person foreach (Entity bookableResource in userBookableResources.Entities) { Entity TimeEntryDelegation = new Entity(“msdyn_delegation”); TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_delegationfrom”] = new EntityReference(“bookableresource”, bookableResource.Id); TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_delegationto”] = new EntityReference(“bookableresource”, DelegateToId); TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_startdate”] = new DateTime(2018, 10, 1); TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_enddate”] = new DateTime(2022, 12, 31); TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_type”] = new OptionSetValue(192350000); //Time Entry TimeEntryDelegation[“msdyn_name”] = string.Format(“Delegation to HR for {0}”, bookableResource.GetAttributeValue<string>(“name”)); try { Guid DelegationId = _client.Create(TimeEntryDelegation); } catch (FaultException<OrganizationServiceFault> ex) { Console.WriteLine(“Resource: ” + bookableResource.GetAttributeValue<string>(“name”) + ” Error: ” + ex.Message); } } #endregion Note: Please note that the “Delegate to” Resource/ User should also have Delegate role in order to be able to do time entry on behalf of others. If not, then you will face below error:

Stages of Invoice Schedules are changed behind the scenes as you perform actions on the Invoice of the Contract. Let’s see what we have got here – So, when an Invoice Schedule is Ready for Invoicing, it will be considered in the Invoice you’ll end up creating. Now, if you create the Invoice for that Contract (shown below) The status now changes to Customer invoice created. And, when you mark that Invoice as Confirm, shown below – The Invoice schedule record’s Invoice Status will be changed to ‘Customer invoice posted’ Pretty straight forward!