Why:

When a vehicle order is added in GDS an outline plan is created automatically.  The outline includes the milestones DAC and CDC, and creates a framework within which all other tasks can be scheduled.

For new vehicles, and additional milestone is created automatically when the confirmed vehicle order is downloaded in the TDS Enquiry routine.  This creates milestone LCD in the plan based on the Build Date indicated by the factory, and the default number of weeks.

Other tasks should be scheduled manually by the vehicle administrator in the Planning Detail routine.

 

Where:

Planning Detail can be accessed in several different ways.

•      Highlight a vehicle order in the workbench, right-click and select Planning Detail.

•      Highlight a vehicle order in the workbench and choose Planning Detail from the Vehicle Order menu at the top of the screen.

•      Select the Planning icon from the vehicle order maintenance screen.  This route is particularly useful if you have just created new items in the Extras tab, because you can then switch immediately to the planning function to plan them in the schedule.

•      In the Planning Overview function, right-click a vehicle order in the timeline and select Planning Detail.

 

How to Work With Vehicle Order Plannig:

The Planning Detail screen contains a task list showing planned and actual start and completion dates for milestones and tasks.  It also includes a visual representation of this schedule as a timeline, and analysis of the overall lead times form order to DAC and from DAC to CDC.

 

File Menu - Select File-New then choose External Work, General Task or Internal Work to create a new entry in the plan.  Alternatively, click on the drop-down arrow next to the New icon to choose a task type to create.

 

Edit Menu - Highlight an existing task record, either in the task list , or in the timeline. Select Edit-Open or the Open icon to open the task record. Select Edit-Start to insert today’s date as the Actual Start Date on the chosen task. Select Edit-Complete to insert today’s date as the Actual Completion Date on the chosen task. Select Edit-Delete to delete an external, internal or general task from the plan.

The Edit menu may also be accessed by right-clicking on a task record in the task list or the timeline.

Delete is not available for any milestone but may be selected for internal, external and general tasks. Deletion of internal task will also delete the associated workshop requistion.

 

View Menu - Choose the option Show/Hide Statistics to hide or reveal the statistical analysis at the bottom of the screen. Alternatively choose the Show/Hide Statistics icon.  Hiding statistics allows you to view more tasks in the task list.

 

Reports Menu - Select the option Print Planning to print a summary of the vehicle’s plan. Alternatively click on the Print icon.

 

Tracking Status - Tracking Status may be amended in the Planning Detail screen.  It is the only place that is may be amended if the required Tracking status is set-up in the Tracking Status table to insist on the entry of Actual DAC Date.

 

Part Planned Field - Check the Part Planned checkbox if you have stated to set-up the plan for this vehicle order, but have not yet completed it.  You can search for part planned vehicles using her Vehicle Order filter in the workbench, and the Alert column in the workbench will also highlight part planned vehicles.

 

Timeline - The timeline displays a graphical representation of the vehicle plan.  Tasks are shown in different colours depending on their status: red means overdue, green means completed and yellow indicates that the task is still on schedule.

Milestones are represented as diamonds marking the planned or actual date of completion.  Other tasks are shown as blocks marking the stat and completion (planned or actual, depending on the status of the task).  Use the mouse to move over the timeline an view the hover-over text for each task.

In the timeline today’s date is highlighted (25) and weekend dates are shown in red text. You may scroll backwards and forwards in the timeline up to two years.  Clicking on a task in the task list will reposition the timeline automatically to that task.

In some cases, task may overlap, particularly where a general administrative task is scheduled concurrently with external or internal work.  In that case the area of overlap will show as a hatched block.  In this case the hover-over tool text will show the description of each overlapping task.

When hovering over an overlap area the dominant task is highlighted in bold.  The dominant task is the one the action will be performed against should you select an option from the right-click menu.  It is also the task that may be selected for drag-and-drop, where applicable.

 

Drag-and-Drop - You can change the planned dates for a task by using the mouse cursor to drag-and –drop the item.

•      Drag-and-drop is possible on milestones provided actual completion date is not present.

•      On all other task types drag-and-drop is possible provided neither actual start nor actual completion is present.

Additionally, for external, internal and general tasks it is possible to resize the task by extending the task’s right-hand border using the mouse.  Resize is not possible on completed tasks.

 

Auto-Rescheduling - When you change the planned completion date of a task, either in the timeline or  in the task maintenance screen, you have the option to reschedule automatically any subsequent tasks.

•      Click No to leave subsequent tasks unchanged.

•      Click Cancel to leave both subsequent tasks and the instigator task itself unchanged.

•      Click Yes to confirm the planned completion date change on the instigator task, and reschedule any subsequent tasks.

If automatic rescheduling is chosen, the system will re-plan tasks with a planned start date greater than the planned completion date of the instigator task, provided those tasks are yet to be started.  Rescheduled tasks retain their relative positions to one another.

When rescheduling, the system takes into account non-working days.  For example, if Saturday and Sunday are non-working days, and a two-day task starting on Thursday is moved to start Friday, the task block will extend to cover Friday-Saturday-Sunday-Monday.  In other words, the same number of working days is always retained in the task.

The only exception to this rule is when a task occupying zero working days is moved, for example you may deliberately have scheduled a task to start and finish on a weekend.  In such cases the task is automatically rescheduled to last one day, otherwise it would disappear from the timeline completely.

The system does not recognise personal, local or national holidays, or the working arrangements in force at internal and external suppliers, so if you do choose automatic rescheduling always review the plan afterwards to ensure that it still meets your requirements.

 

Analysis - The statistics at the bottom of the screen measure total lead times from order to DAC, from DAC to CDC and from Order to CDC.  Variance shows the difference between Plan Days and Actual Days.

 

Maintain Task – External Work - A Separate task should be planned for each externally-fitted item in the vehicle maintenance Extras tab.

Choose New – External Work to create an external task.

 

Description - Select the description from the list of available external extras in the drop-down list. The list excludes items that have already been scheduled in the plan.

 

Purchase Details - If required enter supplier and purchase order details.  Retrieve the supplier name and e-mail address by inputting a known number from the GDS supplier file, or search for the required supplier using the Supplier Selector.

If the supplier has an e-mail address on the supplier file and the user has and e-mail address on the GDS Name Identity table, an e-mail may be generated form directly within this function.  Clicking on the e-mail icon to display the input screen.

 

Planned Start Date - When creating a new task Planned Start Date defaults automatically to the next free date after DSC completion, taking into account non-working days.  General tasks already in the plan are ignored fore the purposes of calculating the next free date.

Planned Start Date may be overridden with another date, but it may not be before the order date.

 

Working Days/Calculate/Planned Completion Date - Planned completion Date may be entered manually or calculated by the system.  To calculate the date automatically enter the number of working days required for the task and click on the calculate button.  If the task is due to start and finish on the same day enter the planned start date then simply click on Calculate with ‘0’ as the Working Days value to set planned completion to the same date.

 

Original Planned Completion Date - If the planned completion date changes at any point in the future, Original Planned Completion Date is populated automatically provided it does not already contain a date.

 

Actual Start Date/Actual Completion Date - For the planning module to work effectively actual start and completion dates should be entered at the appropriate time.  These fields do not accept future deals.

If you enter actual completion date without actual start date present, the system will set actual start date to a default value.  Normally this is the planned start date unless the task had been completed ahead of schedule, in which case the actual start date will be set to the same date has actual completion date.  Obviously it will give a more accurate picture if start dates are entered by the administrator rather than by default.

 

 

Alert - The alert fields store the person designated to receive e-mail alerts relating to the start and / or completion of each task.  Choose from Administrator, Salesperson, Both or Neither.

Default values are defined in the parameter file for theses fields for each different task type, but the user may override these defaults as required.

 

Additional Alert E-mail - If required an additional e-mail address may be entered for start and completion alerts.  These fields are completely free-format.

 

Notes - General notes may be entered as required.

 

Maintain Task – General Task - The Planning Detail screen for general tasks is similar to that for external tasks, except there are no purchase or supplier details.  The Description field is free-text or, when adding a new task, you may select from a list of descriptions, as set up the general task table in the GDS Control File.

 

Maintain Task – Internal Work - Planning internal work is different to other task types because creation of a new internal work task links directly to the Add Workshop Requisition routine and, at the same time the requisition is added, a task is scheduled automatically in the vehicles plan.

Internal tasks may also be planned in the Workshop Requisition function, accessed from the Actions menu or the Vehicle Order menu in the workbench.

To create an internal task from the Planning Detail screen, select New – Internal work

Enter the required workshop branch, planned start and completion date.  Alternatively you can calculate the planned completion date by entering the required number of working days and clicking on the Calculate button.  When you click OK, you will be taken to the normal workshop requisitions screen where you may select internal extras from the vehicle record.

The Release to Workshop checkbox is available in this screen, and may be checked immediately if you are ready to release this requisitions to the GDS Workshop application.  On clicking OK to complete the requisition, you will be returned to the Planning Detail screen and the internal task will be shown in the schedule.

Once internal work has been created in the plan, the task can be opened from the Planning Detail screen and maintained in the normal way.  Use the Workshop Requisition icon or take Actions-Workshop Requisition to view the details of the linked requisition if required.

Actual start and completion dates for internal tasks may be maintained in the Maintain Task screen, or in the Workshop Requisition routine.  Where the workshop requisition interface is enabled between GDS Vehicle Order and Workshop applications, invoicing the order in Workshop will automatically insert Actual Completion Date the requisition and the task.

Deletion of a requisition via the Workshop Requisition routine will delete the associated task. Re- opening a requisition will remove the actual completion date from the associated task; note, however that removal of actual completion dare from the internal talks in the Maintain Task Routine will not open the associated requisition.

 

Maintain Task- Milestones - Milestones are created automatically when the vehicle order is added in the case of DAC and CDC, or when the vehicle order is downloaded from the TDS in the case of LCD.

Milestones may be maintained via the Planning Detail screen like any other task, but certain restrictions apply.

On milestone CDC, start dates may not be amended: start CDC is always the same as completion of DAC, therefore planned and actual start dates for CDC are always updated automatically by the system to match the completion dates on DAC.

On milestone LCD, the only amendable date is actual completion date.  Planned and actual start and planned completion are inserted automatically when order details are downloaded form TDA.  LCD is calculated based on the factory build date retrieved form TDS and a default number of weeks.

 

Related Topics:

Planning Overview.

Planning E-mail Alerts