Full Sail Partners Blog | Scott Gailhouse

With Vantagepoint Multicurrency, transactions like employee expenses or accounts payable vouchers can be entered in any selected currency regardless of the company’s functional currency. Your firm can provide invoices to clients in foreign currencies as well. In a multicompany database, any company in the enterprise can be maintained in any currency. Deltek Vantagepoint holds the key to simplifying this process for your firm.

Vantagepoint Multicurrency allows you to:

• Manage multiple currencies for transactions, accounting, and financial reporting
• Enter and manage exchange rates, which can be done manually or can be automated to update daily exchange rates using an auto-feed subscription provided by XE.com.
• Support daily, period, and period-end exchange rate changes
• Revalue foreign currency accounts and automatically identify realized and unrealized gains or losses due to currency fluctuations

Considerations when Using Deltek Vantagepoint Multicurrency

With any changes to your standard accounting practices, there are always some items that need to be taken into consideration:

Revenue Considerations: Revenue generation will now use the billing currency fields in the project hub.

Project Considerations: Once you set a project’s currency and the project has transactions posted to it, the currency code cannot be changed on the project. It is very important to set the project to the correct currency upon initial setup. All lower levels of the work breakdown structure (WBS) will follow the currency codes set at the project level. A project’s currency can be set up to manage the project in one currency and a different billing currency can be used to invoice your client.

General Ledger Account Considerations: In Vantagepoint Multicurrency accounts can be left without a specific currency or set to a single currency. For example, a company with a functional currency of USD may have a checking account in Canadian dollars (CAD). In this example, the chart of account numbers associated with the Canadian Bank Code would need to be set up with a currency code of CAD. Once an account is set up in a currency that is different than the functional currency of the company, it is then considered a foreign-denominated account and will be included in the revaluation process.

Unit Considerations: You must specify both a project and billing currency.

Vendor Considerations: Vendor records are stored in the functional currency of the active company. There are several details to note for vendor records:

• Functional Currency – the home currency or the currency in which the company operates
• Transactional Currency – the currency in which a transaction is entered into Vantagepoint
• Presentation Currency - used in reporting to generate a report with all amounts expressed in a single currency
• Billing Currency - the currency used to generate invoices and billing reports for specific projects and their WBS
• Project Currency – the currency in which the project is managed which can be different than the functional currency when needed (this currency should be used for all project management purposes including reporting)
• Payment Currency – the currency in which the payments are made
• Consolidated Reporting Currency – only available in a Multicompany environment and is used to create consolidated financial statements for multiple companies that are using different functional currencies currency directly through the account setup of the GL (if you specify an account currency that is different from the company’s functional currency, the account is then considered a foreign-denominated account)
• Account Currencies – each account set for use as a bank account and mapped to a GL code can be set to a specific
• Tax Currency – if tax auditing is enabled then a currency must be set for each tax code (this is generally the currency in which you report and pay the tax amounts to the proper tax authority)

Generally Accepted Accounting Practices in Deltek Vantagepoint Multicurrency

Deltek Vantagepoint Multicurrency complies with the Accounting Standards Codification (ASC) sections ASC-830-10-55-10 and 11. In section 55-10, the guideline states that it is acceptable to use averages or other methods of approximation. Accordingly, it is recommended to use a weighted average of the exchange rate for a period rather than applying actual day-to-day fluctuations.

Furthermore, section 55-11 states that the average rates used shall be appropriately weighted by the volume of functional currency transactions occurring during an accounting period. In other words, to translate revenue and expense accounts for an annual period, individual revenue and expense accounts for each quarter or month may be translated at that quarter's or that month's average rate. The translated amounts for each quarter or month should then be combined with the annual totals.

Why Use Multicurrency in Deltek Vantagepoint?

Multicurrency can be used for tracking currency exchange gains and losses. Having foreign-denominated accounts creates the need to track gains and losses based on fluctuating exchange rates. For example, if a European company has a bank account denominated in United States dollars and the value of the euro rises against the United States dollar, the value in euros of that bank account balance drops. This results in an unrealized loss to the European company. Using Multicurrency allows you to use the Gains/Losses and Revaluations process in Vantagepoint to calculate and post these currency exchange gains and losses. As a result, they appear on your financial statements per the generally accepted accounting practices under which you operate.

As we approach the end of 2023, there is no time like the present to prepare for the year-end close which marks the final accounting process to wrap up the fiscal year. Advanced planning and organization can significantly ease this process for your accounting team, assuring a seamless transition into the new year. In this blog, let’s go over some of the most important items to help ensure a smooth transition to the new fiscal year in Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision.  

Document and Organize Your Procedures

Start by meticulously documenting your year-end procedures, encompassing not only tasks performed in Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision but all accounting functions. This comprehensive reference guide will not only assist your team this year but also in the years to come. Additionally, when creating your accounting calendar, ensure that it covers a wide spectrum of financial activities, not just limited to year-end tasks. This holistic approach is key to ensuring that all aspects of your financial management are well organized. It is also essential to share the accounting calendar with the entire staff so that they understand expectations. This is particularly necessary, especially surrounding timesheet and expense report deadlines.

Common Year-End Tasks

Year-end tasks are crucial for maintaining financial integrity. Here are some common practices among professional services firms:

• Reconcile All Cash Accounts: This crucial task ensures that your financial records accurately match your bank statements. It's a good practice to not only verify transactions but also check for any unusual or unexpected entries that might need adjustments.
• Credit Card Reconciliations: In the digital age, credit card transactions are commonplace. Ensure that you capture all credit card transactions, making expense reporting a priority. An accurate representation of these expenses is vital for your financial health.
• File Reconciliation Report: Regular monitoring is the key to catching discrepancies between your general ledger and subledger reports. A monthly check helps in identifying issues early, making year-end reconciliation smoother.
• Final Invoicing: Efficiently processing all client invoices ensures that you're not leaving any revenue on the table. It's the last opportunity to capture income for the fiscal year.
• Review Outstanding Accounts Receivables: Diligently following up with clients who have outstanding accounts receivable beyond 30 days can improve your cash flow. Sending past-due statements and making personal contact can expedite collection efforts.
• Review Unbilled Detail: Properly addressing time and expense transactions that cannot be invoiced helps in accurately reflecting your financial position. Writing off these unbillable expenses is an important step to keep your records accurate.
• Fixed Assets: Beyond the regular tasks, don't overlook the assessment of fixed assets. Verify their ownership and depreciation, making necessary adjustments. This action ensures that your balance sheet reflects the current state of your assets.
• Employee Expenses and Accounts Payable: Ensuring that all accounts payable vouchers are recorded accurately is vital. Making contributions to retirement plans and paying vendors and employee expense reports promptly is also a best practice for year-end.
• Notes Payable: Maintaining alignment between your balance sheet and lender statements is essential. This step can prevent errors or discrepancies in your financial statements.
• 1099 Forms: Ordering 1099 forms is just the beginning. Make certain that you have collected W-9 forms from vendors or contractors who met the $600 threshold during the year. Timely mailing of 1099 forms is important for compliance with tax regulations.
• W-2s: If you handle payroll, don't forget to order and mail W-2 forms by the January 31st deadline. Timely distribution of these forms ensures that employees can file their taxes without delays.
• Budget for Next Year: Setting up your general ledger budget for the upcoming year is a crucial financial planning step. It helps in aligning your financial goals with your operational strategy.

Deltek Customer Care Access

Each year Deltek puts together a year-end guide and checklist. Authorized users would log into Customer Care. Under the section "Learn", click on the option called Year-End Resources. You will then select your product, Vision or Vantagepoint and press "Go". There are Year-End Documentation and Year-End Videos. These complimentary, informative year-end videos are available on-demand viewing 24/7. The training sessions will guide you on how to perform year-end closing for general ledger, accounts payable and payroll, troubleshoot any issues that may arise during the year-end close process, and answer frequently asked questions. 

Be Prepared to Close Out the Year

Ensuring a smooth transition to the new fiscal year in Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision is an important part of the process. When opening the first period of your fiscal year, you're simultaneously launching the new fiscal year.

Several initialization utilities are required based on your professional services firm’s accounting calendar including Open New Period, Open New Benefit Year, 1099 Initialization, and Open a New W-2 Quarter/year. It's important to follow through with these utilities meticulously. If your firm’s database is configured for Multicompany, these utilities would have to be performed in each active company.

Be on the lookout for Deltek's Year-End update at the end of December, which contains tax updates for payroll users. Additionally, refer to Deltek's Vision and Vantagepoint Year-End guide for more detailed information on the year-end closing process. Planning and organization are key to ensuring a smooth year-end close and preparing for a successful start to the new fiscal year. With these additional tasks and tips, you'll be well-prepared for a seamless year-end transition and can confidently set your sights on the financial year ahead.

Within Deltek Vantagepoint lies an extremely useful tool that, when enabled and configured, allows a professional services firm to manage multiple companies within a single Deltek Vantagepoint database. However, the benefits of multicompany functionality seem to elude many professional services firms that would gain the most from its capabilities. So, in this blog, let’s delve into this multicompany functionality and discuss why, when, and how firms should use this fantastic feature.

Why Use Deltek Vantagepoint Multicompany?

Basically, the need for a multicompany environment comes down to the ability to track entities with separate tax ID numbers in a single Deltek Vantagepoint database. Some of the scenarios that require multicompany management include:

• Banking relationships
• Investments and/or holding company requirements
• Tax reporting
• Professional licensing requirements
• Foreign country reporting requirements

Additionally, the need for intercompany billing can occur when two or more related companies make payments on behalf of the other companies. The most common reason for intercompany billing is the sharing of labor resources between companies that have separate payrolls and/or vendor payments for another related company.

When a professional services firm decides to utilize multicompany functionality, it is recommended that sub-ledgers be enabled to track the due to and due from, and clear intercompany balances. With multicompany enabled, users can use both the Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable aging reports for intercompany balances.

First Determine the Internal Pricing Structure

Upon implementing multicompany functionality in Deltek Vantagepoint, professional services firms must first determine what internal pricing structure to adopt. The options are:

• Re-class only - moves the transaction to intercompany Accounts Receivable/Accounts Payable at cost
• Project Centric - leaves the transaction on the books of the project’s company with some amount of compensation also moving to keep the loaning organization whole
• Employee Centric - moves the transaction back to the employee’s company with some amount of revenue moving back as well
• High Accountability – which uses a work breakdown structure (WBS) to manage transactions and point directly to the company that owns the transaction

Keep in mind that there is considerable flexibility within the options above. Different methods can be configured for different transaction types. Also, by order of operation, the distinct options can be overwritten at the individual company level or by the project at the lowest WBS level.

Intercompany billing makes accounting’s job easier regarding multicompany transactions. When transactions are made to projects not in the home company (the company where the transaction is being posted), invoices and vouchers are created through a series of postings that are reflected in the general ledgers (GLs) of the respective companies. These invoices and vouchers also appear on the Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable aging reports noted above. The Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable balances can then be cleared by using the standard check processing and cash receipt routines.

More Benefits of Multicompany

Using Deltek Vantagepoint’s multicompany functionality provides another benefit to firms with consolidated reporting. Consolidated reporting allows a view of the performance of all the companies within the database. Consolidated groupings can represent all companies or a cross-section of companies depending on the needs of company leadership. The consolidation process incorporates standard eliminations of configured control accounts and client-defined accounts, such as capital investments in related companies. Consolidations are “memo” entries and are not posted to the GL.

A multicompany database permits each company to maintain a unique GL while still only creating one set of shared GL account numbers. Furthermore, professional services firms can restrict GL account numbers, and other master records can be shared and/or restricted as well. Vendors (managed in the Vantagepoint Firms Hub) can be shared across the enterprise. However, the accounting tab is company-specific for account number and 1099 purposes.

In addition to the benefits mentioned above, the multi-currency application works in tandem with multicompany to allow companies to have a unique functional currency – the currency the company does business in. This is an excellent feature for professional services firms that work internationally. Lastly, the consolidation process can include Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) compliant currency translations and gains/losses entries.

Take Advantage of Deltek Vantagepoint Multicompany Functionality

Is the multicompany functionality in Deltek Vantagepoint the right fit for your professional services firm? Don't leave it to guesswork. Schedule a Navigational Analysis with Full Sail Partners today. We'll help you assess your firm's unique needs and guide you in determining if the multicompany feature is the best solution for you. Dive deeper, make informed decisions, and ensure your firm sails smoothly towards success. Contact us now and let's chart the best course for your business!

The Labor Cross Charge utility of Deltek Vantagepoint is often an underused accounting feature by project-based firms. It is simply not being utilized because users are not quite familiar with the concept and how it could be of benefit. So, first off, the labor cross charge capabilities in Vantagepoint are based on similar theories as multi-company but are focused on the interaction within a project-based company and its organizational breakdown structure (OBS) and only focuses on labor. Before we dive deeper, here are some links to some resources about multi-company functionality and OBS in case you are unfamiliar with these topics.  

High-Level Insight into Cross Charge in Deltek Vantagepoint 

To those unfamiliar with the concept, cross charging is a financial tool that only impacts the general ledger. It does not change project reporting since the time charged to a project remains on the project for billing and reporting purposes. Cross charge is labor-focused and occurs after the timesheet is posted.  

Since Deltek Vantagepoint is project-based, this simply means that time is entered to a project number whether time is spent on a regular, revenue-producing project or an overhead effort. By default, the labor cost follows the project’s organization. If the cross charge process is not configured or run, the labor cost will remain on the income statement of that organization.  

Why Use Cross Charge?  

As financial and operational managers, we know that revenue can only be earned when a cost is incurred. For this reason, cross charge allows project-based businesses to move these elements in and out of various “buckets” within their organization. When a combined income statement is run, all cross charge entries will zero out and the original revenue and cost will remain.  

The cross charge process is used when project-based firms loan and borrow resources at the lowest level of the OBS, which could be:  

• Office - OBS is organized based on the physical locations of your offices  
• Department/Discipline - OBS is structured around different functional areas or departments within your organization 
• Market Sector - OBS is focused on your firm's market sectors   

A good situation for using cross charge would be with a civil engineering firm where projects will be needed for various disciplines. For instance, the survey department would loan their staff to the engineering projects and cross charge would be the financial component to drive and manage the accounting for the labor.  

There are two internal pricing options to choose from when configuring cross charge:  

1. Project Centric – This is when labor remains on the income statement of the organization where the project resides. A multiplier is then used to move some portion of operational/overhead (OH) costs from the loaning organization to the borrowing organization. This factor could be limited to a fringe benefit rate or represent a breakeven OH rate or even include some profit. The purpose is to ensure that the loaning organization has an incentive to keep their staff busy, but they also need to be mindful not to over-extend their resources. 
2. Employee Centric – This works by sending labor back to the employee’s organization. Using typical billing rates, although a multiplier can be used, the revenue is moved from the project’s to the employee’s organization. The purpose again is to ensure the loaning organization doesn’t lose the ability to show a profit by sharing their staff.  

Real-life Application of Cross Charge in Deltek Vantagepoint 

Here is a success story where the operational process and projects are built on the premise that fee and scope drive work breakdown structure (WBS) in a client’s Deltek Vantagepoint database. Under this model, high accountability becomes the first option where phases and tasks within a project are assigned to different organizations based on the portion of the work. Employees charge the phase/task that is assigned to the organization they “live” in. This results in more closely managed projects because the profit accountability is shifted back to the organization supplying the labor. This process eliminates the need for cross charge. 

 However, realizing that in order to run successful projects, there is a necessity to anticipate unplanned needs. This means that the project-based firm must have the ability to borrow an employee from another department for a short-term assignment or a last-minute need. For example, the base building studio decides it needs input from the interior design studio. In this scenario, the client falls back on the project-centric method noted above as a mechanism to facilitate resource sharing and not impede project progress. Furthermore, this is a prime example of a need for cross charge.  

Gain Control of Resources with Cross Charge  

The Labor Cross Charge utility in Deltek Vantagepoint can provide the functionality required to ensure an open and smooth process of resource sharing for your project-based firm. With a thorough understanding and effective implementation, cross charge can provide another dimension in managing your business.  

Interested in more information about using cross charge and how it can help unlock the full potential of Deltek Vantagepoint? Want to learn other ways of ensuring your project-based firm is running as efficiently as possible? If so, Full Sail Partners is happy to offer your firm a Navigational Analysis. 

Year-end is the final accounting process to close “the books” at the end of each year. With 2023 just around the corner, it is never too early to plan for your year-end close. Planning and organization on your part can make the year-end process less challenging for the entire accounting staff.   

Take the Time to Document and Get Organized 

As always, you should take the time to document your year-end procedures. Not only the tasks performed in Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision, but all accounting tasks you perform should be documented so that you have a comprehensive guide that you can refer to every year. It is also vital that you create an accounting calendar.  

The accounting calendar is not just for year-end, but for month-end and quarter-end tasks as well. This calendar is a schedule of anticipated dates for financial activities. You should also develop a year-end checklist to make sure you don’t miss anything. One other tip to make this process go smoothly is to make sure that you are performing your month end reconciliations on a timely basis. 

Common Year-End Tasks 

Some of the more common year-end tasks for most companies are: 

• Reconcile All Cash Accounts - Verify all transactions have been posted into Deltek Vantagepoint/Vision to ensure your general ledger balances match your bank statements. Make adjustments as required. 
• Credit Card Reconciliations – In order to ensure all credit card transactions are captured, make sure all expense reports are entered and posted. 
• File Reconciliation Report – This report should be run at month-end and at year-end. This report identifies discrepancies between the GL and the subledger reports. 

• Final Invoicing – Process all client invoices for the fiscal year. 
• Review Outstanding Accounts Receivables - Follow up with clients who have outstanding accounts receivable beyond 30 days. Send past due statements and/or simply give them a call. Enter the results of your collection efforts in the comments section of Vision Invoice Review. Year-end is an excellent time to collect your outstanding receivables. If you determine there is uncollectable AR, be sure to write those invoices off. 
• Review Unbilled Detail - Time and expense transactions that cannot be invoiced to clients should be written off at this time. 
• Fixed Assets – Fixed Assets are larger purchases that are made throughout the year (i.e., equipment, automobiles, furniture, computers, etc.). Check to see if all fixed assets reported on the balance sheet are still owned. If not, record the sale or disposal of these fixed assets. Verify the depreciation on your fixed assets as well. Then make any necessary adjustments. 
• Employee Expenses and Accounts Payable - Verify that all accounts payable vouchers have been recorded in Deltek Vision/Vantagepoint. Make your 401(k), SEP IRA, and Simple IRA contributions, if you have not done so. Try and pay all your vendors and employee expense reports by year-end. 

• Notes Payable - Verify notes payable (i.e., loans) amounts on your balance sheet match the statements from your lenders. Then make adjustments if necessary. 
• 1099 Forms – Order 1099 forms. Make sure all W-9 forms from your vendors and/or contractors that are paid $600 or more throughout the year are on file in the Firms Hub in Vantagepoint or the Vendor Info Center. Don’t forget 1099s should be mailed by January 31st. 
• W-2s – Order W-2 forms if you run payroll in Vantagepoint/Vision. W-2s should be mailed by January 31st. 
• Budget for Next Year - Create your GL budget for the new year. 

Be Prepared to Close Out the Year 

In Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision, opening the 1st period of your fiscal year also opens the new fiscal year. Depending on your security rights, you can still process in the prior fiscal year if needed. 

There are several initialization utilities that need to be performed. For example, Open New Period (fiscal year), Open New Benefit Year, 1099 Initialization and Open a New W-2 Quarter/year if you are using the payroll module. Deltek Vantagepoint and Vision will generate a posting log for the initialization utilities. If your Vantagepoint or Vision database is configured for Multicompany, the initialization utilities need to be run in each company. The only exception is the Open New Period utility, which opens for all companies at once. 

Deltek will issue a Year-End update at the end of December containing tax updates for payroll users. Also, be on the lookout for Deltek’s Vision and Vantagepoint Year-End guide for more detailed information on year-end closing. 

With each new version of Deltek Vantagepoint, professional services firms are given more tools and features to deliver profitable projects. While version 4.0 mainly focused on supporting accounting functions, 4.5 addressed all the roles that support the success of project-based firms. Here are some of the top new enhancements and features Vantagepoint users can now begin to use.

Edit and Save with Ease in Deltek Vantagepoint

Editing and saving updates have been simplified. In Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5, the two saving modes, implicit saving (autosave) and explicit saving, have been combined. With this update, a “Save” and “Cancel” button will appear whenever a change or edit has been made to a field

Speaking of edits, Vantagepoint users will no longer need to click on a pencil icon in a field to make a change. Simply click anywhere in a field that needs to be updated to make the required changes.

Create Winning Proposals and Better Track Clients

In Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5, enhancements to proposal automation will help marketing professionals create formatted documents more easily. First, Deltek has added the ability to link text elements, so text continues to flow from one page to the next similar to the functionality Adobe InDesign users are accustomed to. Additionally, Vantagepoint can now export proposals to PDFs and Word, and the proposal will retain the formatting established in Vantagepoint while creating the document.

Vantagepoint 4.5 now allows a contact to be associated with a project with a different firm that is linked to a contact in the Contacts hub. This is helpful when a contact is a consultant for more than one firm or needs to be associated with a joint venture for a project.

A small but very helpful change also got added to the Mobile CRM. Before 4.5, when a user wanted to edit and open a text field in the Mobile CRM app, it would take them to another screen that enlarged the text and the field. Now users can stay on the original screen to make changes without having to go to a new screen to make the changes, and then select Done to return the entire record. This is helpful for saving time.

Plan and Track Profitable Projects with Deltek Vantagepoint

Projects don’t always go to plan and Deltek realizes this issue. With the release of Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5, project managers can now go back and replace planned time with actual time, spread the difference if needed, or change planned hours altogether. While some firms may not want employees to be able to do this, it is an option available in the security settings and can be turned on at the discretion of firm leadership.

Estimate at completion (EAC) values are critical in planning because they help predict what a firm is going to spend at the end of a project. The problem today is that planning is the job to date (JTD) as of today and the estimate to completion (ETC) starts tomorrow. If one or more people have not updated their timesheet for any days before today, those hours are missing from the EAC. In Vantagepoint 4.5, JTD can be changed to pull from a specific day. For instance, the standard setting in Vantagepoint is to pull JTD from today, but now firms have the option to choose from yesterday or even the end of the week from the previous week.

Two small but convenient features have also been added for project managers. The first is the sharable search feature. Previously, users could create and save searches for themselves only. Now, saved and custom searches can now be shared with coworkers. Secondly, purchase orders with approvals have been added to the browser version of Vantagepoint. This allows the majority of project managers to work exclusively in the browser version.

Improved Invoice Approvals to Increase Draft Turn Around and New AR Reporting Enhancements

Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5 now allows for tracking invoices by billing client when the billing client changes during the life of the project. In Vantagepoint versions 4.0 or earlier, when the billing client changed for a project on the Accounting tab in the Projects hub, the change was applied to all existing invoices, cash receipts, voided invoices, and credit memos. This can create some confusion. Now, the change only applies to new invoices, voids, and credit memos after the change takes place. Essentially allowing account receivables to track information separately for each billing client.

Draft invoice approvals also gained improved visibility into annotation and comment history when saved draft invoices were resubmitted. The process in 4.5 allows an approver to review a draft invoice, make changes, and add comments as necessary. Now the change will apply to invoices, voids, and credit memos when a new billing client has been assigned. Essentially allowing you to track accounts receivable information separately for each billing client on a given project.

Start Using More Features in Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5

Deltek Vantagepoint 4.5 is one of the biggest releases ever to roll out since its inception. With that said, there are more improvements and enhancements that weren’t discussed in this article. For more information, check out the Deltek Learning Zone and click the button link below to learn more about Vantagepoint.

What is better than a purpose-built modern ERP with functionality to streamline and consolidate business processes? More features! With the latest release of Vantagepoint 4.0, Deltek offers even more features to make it easier for firms to deliver better projects, analyze business performance, and create more accurate invoices. Let’s check out some of these new features and see how they will be beneficial to Vantagepoint users.

Digital Markup of Draft Invoices

Clients have been asking for the ability to markup draft invoices for some time. Now with the latest Vantagepoint release, draft invoices can be digitally marked up. This allows the biller to view and edit annotations within interactive billing and markups are saved for future reference. As a result, the digital markup feature allows for improved collaboration between project managers and accounting.

Expanded Interactive Billing Capabilities

This newest version of Vantagepoint continues enhancing the user experience and ease of use. With enhanced interactive billing, you can view marked-up drafts including comments from final invoices in prior periods. Also, when invoices are voided, Vantagepoint will keep a record of the void and the date the invoice was voided.

Store Final Invoices as PDFs in Vantagepoint

With Deltek Vantagepoint 4.0, final invoices can be stored as a PDF when they are accepted in interactive billing or final creation in batch billing. Since a PDF is created at the time of final invoice creation, you actually have a duplicate record of what you sent to the client originally. Now, with this enhancement, all invoices stored in Vantagepoint will exactly match the invoices that you sent to your client.

New Expense Report Screen Designer Capabilities

Deltek Vantagepoint 4.0 features now help with increasing expense report accuracy. Now, the Expense Report has a “lite” screen designer. This allows users to build in business rules within the expense report. Also, you can add additional columns or choose the columns you want to display on the expense report and change their descriptions. You can even make tooltips to help with accurate reporting by users. Additionally, screen designer changes apply to mobile expenses as well.

Expanded Expense Approval Features

The latest version of Vantagepoint focuses on increased usability. For expense report approvals, there is a new toggle to show all approval types or completed approvals. This gives the approver the ability to just see expense reports that need to be approved. Also, there is a new Print Lines Approval Report button for both timesheets and expense reports. This report gives the approver, at a glance, line items that still require approval.

Timesheet Status Update with Floor Checks

Vantagepoint 4.0 also helps with managing employee timesheet completion. If you are responsible for making sure employee time entry is completed on time, you can do a “floor check” to review the status of time entry for your employees for a specific timesheet period or day. This feature allows users to quickly see which employees still have outstanding timesheets and includes the ability to create a reminder email template to send to employees.

Mobile Enhancements Including Biometrics

In previous versions of Deltek Vantagepoint, users could upload receipts from a mobile device using Intelligent Character Recognition (ICR). With 4.0, users can now automatically match a line created from a receipt with a credit card charge. Biometric authentication has also been added to Time & Expense and CRM mobile capabilities. Using this new feature, users can now utilize fingerprint ID or face recognition to make it more convenient and more secure to access their Vantagepoint system. These new enhancements simplify the process making it easier for end users to complete their expense reports. Therefore, allowing for more accurate reports benefits accounting.

Dashboard Enhancements for Clearer Insights

With Vantagepoint 4.0, Deltek continues to provide more improvements to filters, dashparts, and dashboards for ease of use for the end user. The latest release provides further visibility into project details and labor planning. One of those enhancements to dashparts is the ability to drill down to the details to see unposted labor hours at cost and/or billing rates.

Always Looking Forward with Deltek Vantagepoint 4.0 

With each release of Vantagepoint, Deltek seeks to reimagine functionality and leverage innovation to provide usable and practical value for accounting. The latest release steps up with features that work on improving user experience, ease of use, and accuracy. As always, the newest Vantagepoint 4.0 enhancements make managing and delivering projects that much better for all users and there are many more to come.

It is amazing that so many people aren’t even aware of the numerous benefits of using the Deltek Vision Payroll module. For starters, the Payroll module in Vision is a robust application that gives you control over your payroll process that you otherwise wouldn’t have if you used an outside payroll company. It allows you to meet the increasingly complex regulatory requirements by defining taxable wages based on any withholding codes that you create. You can also define how other pay wages impact a withholding calculation. All of this can be done from Payroll Withholding Setup. 

How the Deltek Vision Payroll Module Works

If your firm is using the Payroll module to process your payroll, Deltek Vision will use information from the Employee Info Center, the Project Info Center, the Transaction Center, and Accounting Cost/Pay Rate tables to process payroll.

Some of the main features of the Vision Payroll module are:

• 2 overtime multipliers – There are some firms that are required to pay overtime (OT) to hourly employees. For example, you may have to pay time and a half for some OT hours worked and maybe double time for other OT hours worked. Vision can be configured to accomplish this. For added flexibility, you also have the option to bill these overtime hours at a higher billing rate in billing terms.
• User-defined other pay fields – In addition to an employee’s regular salary, you can also add payments for other items. Some firms will use these fields to record bonus payments, moving allowance payments, allowances for fitness club memberships, public transit passes, etc.
• Contribution codes – If you make payments on behalf of your employees, i.e. state unemployment or 401k matches, you can track those payments using contribution codes. Contribution codes can record those amounts by employee. Vision will also post the entry to the balance sheet liability account.
• Withholding codes – In addition to the standard federal, FICA, and state withholding codes, users can create their own user-defined withholding codes to suite your firm’s needs. You can create withholding codes for medical insurance, cafeteria plans, wage garnishments and Roth IRA plans to name a few.
• Direct deposit – Vision supports the direct deposit of funds directly into an employee’s bank account(s).
• Payroll types – Most payroll runs processed in Vision are for your regular weekly, biweekly or semimonthly or monthly payrolls. You can also process adjustment payrolls to make changes to a payroll that has already been processed. Furthermore, you can use this feature to adjust pay, withholdings, regular, overtime, and secondary overtime pay hours, and accrued benefit hours. A bonus payroll run automates the process of giving your employees bonuses.
• Payroll reporting – Using Vision payroll reporting, you can generate worksheets that help you fill out state unemployment insurance reports, quarterly state income tax reports, and federal Forms 940 and 941.
• W-2 forms - The Payroll module prints a W-2 for each employee who was paid during the calendar year. You can print W-2s on W-2 forms that are specially designed for use on computer printers.

Integrate with Outside Payroll Companies

If, however, you decide that your firm would rather use an outside payroll company to process payroll, despite the benefits of using the Deltek Vision Payroll Module, Vision offers an interface option that can export timesheet data to most large payroll companies including ADP, Paychex and Ceridian. With this integration, a third party will be able to manage the complex areas of payroll processing such as tax withholdings.

Do More with the Deltek Vision Payroll Module

It should now be evident to most people that the Deltek Vision Payroll module is an extremely flexible tool that can be used to help your firm streamline the payroll process. The Payroll module additionally provides a wide-range of detailed reports based on the information stored in your Vision database. So, start realizing the benefits of using the Vision Payroll module and improve your firm’s payroll process today.

Ready or not, here year-end comes. With some organization and planning, however, it doesn’t have to be stressful. Let’s look at some critical tasks your firm should complete as part of the year-end process.

Preparing to Close 2017

First off, the most important task is to document your year-end procedures. Not only those performed in your Deltek system, but all of them so that you have a comprehensive guide to refer to on a year to year basis. You should also create a calendar and develop a year-end checklist as part of your year-end procedures.

Some of the more common year-end tasks for most companies are:

• Reconcile all cash accounts - Verify all transactions have been posted into Vision/DPS to ensure your general ledger balance matches your bank statements adjusting as required.
• Final invoicing – Process all client invoices for the fiscal year.
• Review outstanding accounts receivable - Follow up with clients who have outstanding accounts receivable beyond 30 days. Send past due statements and give them a call. Enter the results of your collection efforts in the comments section of Deltek Vision or Deltek for Professional Services (DPS) invoice review. Year-end is an excellent time to collect your outstanding receivables. If you determine there is uncollectable accounts receivable, be sure to write those invoices off.
• Review unbilled detail - Time and expense transactions that cannot be invoiced to clients should be written off at this time.
• Fixed assets – Fixed assets are larger purchases that are made throughout the year (i.e. equipment, automobiles, furniture, computers, etc.). Are all fixed assets reported on the balance sheet still owned? If not, record the sale or disposal of these fixed assets. Additionally, verify the depreciation on your fixed assets and make any necessary adjustments.
• Employee expenses and accounts payable - Verify that all accounts payable vouchers have been recorded in Vision or DPS. Make your 401(k), SEP IRA, and simple IRA contributions, if you have not done so. Also, try to pay all your vendors and employee expense reports by year-end.
• Notes payable - Verify notes payable (i.e. loans) amounts on your balance sheet match the statements from your lenders adjusting if necessary.
• W-9s – Order 1099 forms and make sure all W-9s from your vendors and/or contractors that are paid $600 or more throughout the year are on file. Don’t forget, 1099s should be mailed on January 31st. 1099 forms can be purchased from most office supply stores or you can order them for free from the IRS (gov).
• W-2s –If you run payroll in Vision or DPS, you’ll need to order W-2 forms which can be purchased from most office supply stores. W-2s should be mailed by January 31st.
• Budget for next year - Create your general ledger budget for 2018.

As part of the year-end process, a new benefit year will need to be opened to roll over any PTO or vacation time into the next year and to start accruals for the new benefit year. 

Initialization Utilities in Deltek Vision and Deltek for Professional Services

There are numerous initialization utilities that need to be performed in Deltek Vision and DPS. Take note that these utilities need to be completed once per fiscal year. Vision and DPS will generate a posting log for the initialization utilities which is available in the transaction center under the posting review report. If your Vision or DPS database is set up with multi-company functionality, the initialization utilities need to run in each company. Make sure to watch this video for more information.

In Vision and DPS, opening the 1st period of your fiscal year also opens the new fiscal year. Depending on your security rights, you can still process in the prior fiscal year if needed.

Is Your Firm Ready for 2018?

Efficiently complete the tasks required for 2017 year-end, and you will be ready. If your firm is having any difficulties performing year-end tasks in Deltek Vision or DPS, Full Sail Partners can be of assistance! Also, remember to check out the new Deltek Customer Care portal for numerous resources available to you.

One of the main responsibilities of a project manager is managing the profitability of his projects. It is easy to look at hours charged to a project at billing rates minus the value of those hours at cost to see the gross profit of a project, but gross profit doesn’t give a true picture of profitability. Most firms prefer to look at net profit to measure the financial success of projects with net profit being hours at billing rates minus cost plus overhead.

Luckily, Deltek Vision has a utility to accomplish just that – calculating net profitability on projects.

Overhead at a Glance

What is overhead? Overhead is an accounting term that refers to ongoing general business expenses, not including direct labor or expenses that are reimbursed to firms by clients. For example, business expenses like rent, health insurance and indirect labor are types of overhead expenses.

Overhead allocation must be configured in Vision and the utility must be run on a timely basis – usually at month end. Overhead allocation can give a true understanding of a project’s profitability.

Preparing Deltek Vision for Overhead Allocation

There are several decisions that need to be made during the configuration phase of setting up overhead allocation in Deltek Vision depending on the current configuration. First, the allocation scope needs to be determined. If the firm uses profit centers, additional configuration decisions will have to be considered. For example, if the firm has a “corporate” profit center, overhead may need to be distributed from the corporate profit center to the revenue producing profit centers.

Next, Vision offers two choices for the basis of applying overhead to projects - direct labor or the proration method. The direct labor method applies a multiplier that is used to determine every dollar of direct labor spent on a project. Vision uses the total overhead expense divided by total direct labor to determine the multiplier used when overhead allocation is run.

The multiplier method remains consistent if the same multiplier is in effect. Firms generally prefer the multiplier method because of its consistency. Additionally, project managers always know how much overhead is being applied to their projects. On the other hand, the proration method uses the firm’s actual, year-to-date indirect expenses. Since this method is based on actual indirect expenses, it will change month to month.

The Benefit of Using Overhead Allocation in Deltek Vision

Once overhead allocation has been run, there are several reports, including the project progress, office earnings and project summary, that when run at cost, will display overhead. Running the overhead allocation process will return a report detailing the amount of overhead applied to projects and the actual overhead rate of the firm. Not only does overhead allocation provide a clear understanding of the profitability of the firm’s projects, it also gives an indication of the firm’s overhead costs and the tools needed to increase profits.