An Authorization Package (Auth Package) is a report with daily entry records submitted for approval. Approved auth packages are then grouped into billing packages for vendor invoicing.
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To prepare an authorization package, click Daily Entries > Packaging > Authorization.
Once the "Authorization Packages" screen is loaded, use the checkboxes in the “Filters" section (collapsed by default) to determine what packages are displayed in the grid below. You can choose to show only active records or all records as well as display records for all companies or only your assigned companies.
You can also use the "Add" button to set filters that limit what data is included in the auth package. In this example, the data in the auth package will be for company: 24-Carat Construction and PO: D123Test. All other records that do not match both conditions will be omitted from the package.
To the right of the the “Filters" box is a refresh button that refreshes authorization packages after changes are made. For example, if ten (10) reports are packaged, and four (4) of those reports are now marked approved, after clicking refresh, the value in the "Sent" box will change from "Sent - 10" to "Sent - 6" as there are now only six (6) 'unapproved' packages remaining.
Let’s now explore the steps involved in creating and generating auth packages.
Create
To create an auth package click “From Daily Entries” in the “Create” box.
This opens the “Create authorization packages” form and allows you to set the date range, shift, cost sources, purchase order grouping and package details for the auth package. Be sure to uncheck "Separate by timesheet" if you don't wish to have the package separated in that manner and "Only retrieve closed/verified records" if the records are not flagged as 'closed'. You can also add additional filters if needed.
After setting the underlying details, click “Create packages” to create the authorization package.
If there are no matching records for the outlined settings you will get a pop-up notification that there are no records available to package matching the filter.
If there are matching records, you will be prompted to review the created package(s) and click OK after verifying the details are correct.
After reviewing the created package, confirm that you'd like to close the records in the auth package.
You will then be notified that the package was successfully created.
The package will now transition to an "Unsent" status.
Unsent
In the "Unsent" box, after selecting a report or group of reports in the grid above, you can preview reports, package reports and mark reports as sent. There is also a count of all unsent packages (packages created but not yet approved) in the title bar.
Preview Reports
When you preview the report, you can preview the cover page as is, or include the extra reports (all reports in the _AuthorizationPackage report set, noted below) in the preview.
Package Reports
When you click “Package Reports” the “Authorization package reports” dialog will open with the settings on what to print and where to store the reports. This interface has a section for "Reports" and one for "Packages".
The "Reports" section basically lets you preview, print, and store reports. To set a storage location, click on the ellipsis and set the desired path to save PDFs to dated folder. It includes a package list, which is a brief synopsis of all the auth packages, in the "Packages" section, to be printed. The authorization packages box governs the selected auth package(s) in the list of packages. This is where you choose to include extra reports in the stored and printed packages. The "Order" box simply dictates if the packages in the list are ordered by identifier or by responsibility then company. Be sure to flag the “Use these settings as default” checkbox if you modify the settings and would like to keep your newly modified settings for future use. Afterwards, click “Execute print run” to print the auth packages in the "Packages" section.
The "Packages" section simply displays the list of reports to be packaged. From the list, you can preview reports or omit reports from being packaged by unchecking the 'include' (flagged by default) checkbox. The omitted reports will not be packaged in the current print run, but will be available for packaging in future print runs.
After the reports are packaged, a dialog box will open, showing the packages created, to which you can open the file or folder for each.
The next step is to mark the packages as printed. Be vigilant to not select "No", as, even though the PDFs have already been created, the data could be changed in the software and the PDFs could be created again. However, once the packages are marked as printed, they will transition from unsent to sent status.
Mark Sent
If you choose to skip the option to package reports, and instead just use the mark sent option, you will be prompted to confirm the transition, but with a warning message instead of an approval message. The reports will transition from unsent to sent status but will not be packaged, hence no PDFs. These reports can be packaged afterwards, by following the preceding steps.
Sent
After packaging your reports, once they're approved by the client, the next step is to mark them approved so they can be grouped into billing packages for vendor invoicing. To mark your auth package(s) approved, select each approved package from the list of created package, then click “Mark approved”.
Confirm the approval.
The approved package(s) will transition from sent to approve status. No further action is required to group the approved package(s) into billing packages.
Approved
After an Auth Package is marked approved, you can perform a client export or mark it complete.
A client export is basically exporting the raw data in the auth package to a csv file. The client export dropdown lets you choose between exporting all approved and unexported packages, all sent and unexported packages, or the selection made in the grid. Once the export is completed, you can choose to open the folder with the exported file(s) in the context menu. Upon closing the context menu, you will be prompted to confirm the export. If you click Yes the status changes to include "- Exported" (i.e. Approved - Exported). If you click No the exported files will remain but there will be no change in the status of the exported packages.
If you choose to not group the auth packages into a billing package but instead mark them as complete, you will be prompted to confirm the transition, but with a warning message, similar to the mark sent option above.
Any
In the “Any” box you can revoke auth packages and create a reports database for the selected auth packages.
If you choose to revoke an auth package, you will get a message to confirm revocation.
Once the package is revoked, the affiliated daily entries records will reopen.
If you choose to “Create Report DB,” you will get a message advising that the Reports DB has been created.
This basically sets up a prepared database that can be used for any of the prepared reports screens (i.e. Reports > Accounting > Summary).
Once it is set up you can run reports and export raw data from the auth package into Excel.
Notes
The "Notes" box is basically a utility to set notes on an auth package. This should not be confused with the "Notes" column in the analysis, import or reports screen that is used to add notes to daily entries.
When you click the set notes button, it opens a window for you to type the notes for the selected auth package. You can also apply fixed-width settings to the notes as well.
The typed notes will then be displayed in the notes box for that package.
Modifying Authorization Package Reports
The reports in an authorization package can be easily customized in the report generator. If you’d like to add/remove/modify the settings of a report in the auth package, do the following:
Navigate to Reports > Report Generator.
Click the “Report set:” dropdown and select "_ AuthorizationPackage".
Make your modifications in the “Reports” section. Be sure to click "Save" afterwards.
See the Report Generator article for further details.
