Elements Costs

Costs are the counterpart to the budget and can be assigned or modified for each Element. There are no limitations to the number of cost positions you can assign in Merlin. We will cover all costs issues related to Elements.

Merlin uses the same cost information for all of its elements

Cost Functions

Incorporating costs will be advantageous to the project only when they can be evaluated. For this reason we provide you with several basis functions in Merlin to manage your Element cost.

  • The costs for projects and activities are calculated in the Inspector against the budget.
  • With the switch "billable", you can find all costs requiring an individual invoice.

Cost Fields

Cost Title is a description of the cost.
Amount is the planned cost and can be entered as an entire value with or without fractions. The currency symbol will be added automatically.
Actual is the actual cost the entry cost.

For each cost item, you can choose the accrual you are expecting each entry to have. Your choices for accrual are:

  • At Start
  • Prorated
  • At End
  • Immediate

Billable is a flag you can use to mark each cost entry to help you decide what gets invoiced and what doesn't.

The invoicing of a project can become very complicated. For this reason, Merlin has a very simple method for managing the types and accounts. The cost types can be modified in the Project Settings according to your requirements. For each cost position you can allocate an individual account. In this way the invoicing can be carried out over the costs types, as well as over the cost accounts.

Additional information regarding the current status of the cost position can be found in the field Status. The contents of this list can also be modified in the Project Settings.

Finally, select a member from your project team or choose a new resource, who will be responsible for the cost position and the Status.

How to add cost

  1. In the Element list select the relevant Element, to which you would like to allocate cost to.
  2. Select the "Cost" tab in the Inspector.
  3. To enter a new cost position click on the "+" symbol or double click in a field in the empty table.
  4. Enter a title and an amount for the cost position.
  5. Enter any additional information required for the cost position.

How to modify cost

  1. In the Element list select the relevant Element, to which you would like to allocate a cost position to.
  2. Select the tab "Cost" in the Inspector.
  3. Double click on the relevant cost position.
  4. Modify the required details.

How to delete cost

  1. In the Element list select the relevant Element, to which you would like to allocate a cost position to.
  2. Select the tab "Cost" in the Inspector.
  3. Click on the relevant cost position.
  4. Press the Delete or Backspace key.

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