Cost accounting for Per Diem and Rental Vehicles

[LTI]

As I manage projects, what is the best way to determine an estimated cost for
each person’s daily Per Diem (hotel cost + daily food allowance) and the cost
of an assigned rental vehicle? I have them listed on the resource sheet and
would like to add a column and associate a field name for the rental
vehicle’s daily cost and a column for each person’s daily per diem. I would
then like to have an estimated cost column on the gantt chart view that they
are added to. Is there a better way to calculate these daily fixed costs to
the job? How should I assign the rental vehicles for each portion or entire
project since the number can change at various stages?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

LTI --

If you are using Microsoft Project 2007, you could create two Expense Cost
resources in the Resource Sheet view for your project. You could name one
of them Per Diem and the other one Car Rental. You can then assign these
resources to each task in which the human resources will be traveling.
After assigning the Expense Cost resource to each tasks requiring travel,
you can enter the estimated Per Diem expenditure and Car Rental expenditure
for each assignment on a task by task basis. When you baseline your
project, the software will capture this additional cost information. When
you know the actual expenditure for Per Diem and Car Rental for a task, you
can enter that information for the assignment in the Actual Cost field.
Hope this helps.

 

[LTI]

Thanks, Dale. I am currently running Project Professional 2003; My IT Dept
won't let me migrate to 2007 since we are currently using Project Server
2003. We do have a few test licenses in the office, If I load one of these
licenses, will it still work with Project Server 2003 if I save it in the
2003 format?

 

[Dale Howard [MVP]]

LTI --

Microsoft Project Professional 2007 cannot connect with Project Server 2003,
so you are out of luck on my solution. Sorry.

 

[LTI]

Anyone have another solution for Project 2003?

LTI --

Microsoft Project Professional 2007 cannot connect with Project Server 2003,
so you are out of luck on my solution. Sorry.

 

[Dave]

I suspect I may have misunderstood, but why cannot you use material
resources in 2003 where Dale used expense resources?