Define Scheduling Activity Type
Explanation
This activity is used to define activity types for Scheduling. To do this, the work types or activity types
defined in IFS/Service Management/Service Management Basic Data/Request Task Basic Data/Work
Types or IFS/Service Management/Service Management Basic Data/Request Task Basic
Data/Activity Types should be set up as scheduling activity types. The following scheduling
information can be defined per activity type:
- Activity Category - The Activity Category that is to be used as an Activity Type or
Work Type in scheduling.
- Type - The work type or activity type that is to be used as an activity type in
scheduling. Entering a value in this field is required and cannot be changed once the record is saved. Use the
Drop down to select a suitable value. The Drop Down will display all work types/activity types defined in the
Service Management Basic Data/Request Task Basic Data/Work Types or Service Management Basic Data/Request Task
Basic Data/Activity Types page.
- Description - Description of the Work Type or Activity Type.
- Duration (Hours): The duration in hours for the Default Primary Scheduling SLA Type and/or
Default Secondary Scheduling SLA Type for the Work Tasks defined with the Work Type. If a Work Task is missing
the Primary or Secondary Scheduling SLA Type, the Default Primary or Secondary Scheduling SLA Type which is
defined per Dataset will be assigned to the Work Task. For such Work Tasks, or when the Scheduling SLA Type
duration cannot be calculated from the current work task dates, the duration entered for the Default Primary
Scheduling SLA Type or the Default Secondary Scheduling SLA Type will be used to calculate the duration of the
primary or secondary scheduling SLA window.
- Appointment Template ID:Default Appointment Template ID when performing appointment booking
for Work Tasks with this Activity Type. The Appointment Template ID will be loaded into the Appointment Booking
client by default.
- Initial Base Value: If the initial base value is provided for an Activity Type this value
will be added to set the total base value for the activity. The total base value will then be calculated as
((Initial Base Value + (Base Value per Hour)) multiplied by the activity
duration) multiplied by any relevant weightings. It is optional to define an Initial Base Value
for an Activity Type.
- Base Value Per Hour: A scheduling value per hour. This value will be used in the activity
base value calculation, i.e., the base value per hour will be multiplied by the default duration and any relevant
weightings, to set the base value for the activity. Note: If the base value is set to zero, work tasks
defined with the work type will not be scheduled in the Scheduling Engine.
- Buffer Time Hours/Percentage: A default buffer time in hours and/or as a percentage. The
default buffer time is added to the execution time when calculating the available time window. Buffer time can be
used to create a buffer towards the end time of the activity’s scheduling window. If the primary scheduling
window ends at 3pm/15.00 and the activity duration is 1 hour, the activity can be planned to start at 2pm/14.00
to meet the SLA. However, when adding a buffer of 1 hour, PSO will no longer plan the activity at 2pm/14.00 as a
buffer was added and the activity must be planned latest at 1pm/13.00 to make sure that there is a buffer to meet
the SLA. The default buffer time is added to the execution time when calculating the available time window, for
work tasks for which a latest finish, SLA latest finish or planned finish date is specified. The buffer is
calculated as buffer time or the buffer percentage multiplied by the work task duration, whichever is higher
- Scheduling SLA Type (Primary/Secondary) Duration Hours: The duration in hours for the
Default Primary Scheduling SLA Type and/or Default Secondary Scheduling SLA Type for Work Tasks with this Work
Type. If a Work Task is missing the Primary or Secondary Scheduling SLA Type, the Default Primary or Secondary
Scheduling SLA Type is assigned from the Dataset settings.
- Appointment Template ID: The default Appointment Template used when booking appointments of
this Activity Type.
- Maximum Displaceable Priority: When appointment booking for Work Tasks of this type, the
Appointment Booking Engine (ABE) will attempt to displace any other activities of this priority or less.
Displacement means that the appointment booking engine effectively ignores certain activities when making
appointment offers. This is done based on the priority of the work task, and on the Maximum Displaceable
Priority. The default value sent for this parameter is -1, which means that no work tasks will be removed before
appointment booking is attempted. Setting it to a different value (e.g. 2) will mean that work tasks of priority
1 and 2 will be removed before the ABE tries to suggest appointments.
- Allow Multiple Visits: The default setting for the Allow Multiple Visits field will be used
on the Work Task for the defined Activity Type. If this checkbox is selected, the Activities with this Activity
type should be allowed to be split into multiple visits. If the activity spans over a longer duration it can be
split up between break-type activities and shifts in the resource schedule.
- Min. Visit Duration (Hours): Related to Allow Multiple Visits. This parameter specifies the
minimum duration for a visit. No visit in a multiple visit chain will be scheduled to a shorter duration than
this value. The value is entered by default on new work tasks with this activity type.
- Scheduling Cost of Split: Defines the cost incurred each time a work task activity of this
type is split into additional visits. Each time the activity is split this value is added to the cost. This can
be used to avoid unnecessary splitting of activities. E.g. if it is split into 3 segments the cost is applied
twice.
- Split Min Priority: Any splittable Work Task can be assigned a minimum split priority. It
will then only be split into a later shift, if the split priority of the shift is at least the minimum priority.
The split priority on the shift is set using a shift attribute called SPLIT_PRIORITY. Let's assume that
Monday shifts can all be assigned a split priority of 1, while the other weekday shifts have a split priority of
2. Work Tasks that must be completed within a single week are then given a minimum split priority of 2, which
means that they cannot be split over the weekend and into the Monday shift. Meanwhile the other splittable Work
Tasks have a split priority of 1, so can be split over the weekend. Similarly Work Tasks which are allowed to
interrupt can be given an interrupt priority, and will only be allowed to interrupt a split Work Task, if the
interrupt priority at least matches the minimum required split priority.
- Adjust Duration: The option Adjust Duration enables an archiving service to automatically
adjust the duration based on historical average durations. The archiving service calculate durations from
completed tasks of the same dataset, activity type and location. The calculated duration is then used when the
Adjust Duration option is enabled on tasks of the same dataset, location and work type. The Adjust Duration
option is found in Work Task pages. The duration field is found on tasks in the Scheduling
Information/Allocations tab. The value Yes or No in the field Adjusted Duration, in Scheduling
Information/Allocations indicates if the value has been adjusted or not.
- Interrupt: Defines whether Work Tasks or a breaks of this type are allowed to be used to
split an work task, where Allow Multiple Visits is set to Yes. When Allow Multiple Visits is set to Yes against a
Work Task, the scheduling is free to split the work task over consecutive shifts, or around activities marked as
interruptible.
- Interrupt Priority: Specifies the priority of a work task of this type when considering
whether to use it to interrupt a splittable work task. This only applies if Interrupt is set to Yes.
- Interrupt Multiplier: It is possible to exercise finer control on the cost that is applied
when an Work Task is interrupted by another Work Task. This is achieved using a multiplier on the cost of split
which depends on the interrupting Work Task. The value defaults to 1, but can be set to any value greater than or
equal to 0. For example, if we apply a Scheduling Cost of Split of 100, but we do not wish to apply any penalty
if the Work Task is interrupted by a break. We can set the split multiplier on the break to 0 to achieve this,
meaning that the split cost would be 0. Suppose we also have an appointment which is allowed to interrupt the
schedule, but we only want to do this if there is no other alternative. We can therefore set the split multiplier
on the appointment Work Task to perhaps 2.5 and a cost of 250 will be applied if the appointment Work Task is
scheduled to interrupt.
- Priority: Defines the priority of work tasks of this type and is used in the appointment
booking process, when displacing activities. The greater the number the greater the priority.
- Do in Locality Incentive: Do in Locality Incentive determines how work at the same locality
should be scheduled. The value can be set to -1 or anything between 1 and 2.
- Do on Location Incentive: Do on Location Incentive determines how work at the same location
should be scheduled. The value can be set to -1 or anything between 1 and 2.
- Ignore Old Days: Used to control whether or not to schedule work tasks that are older than
this number of days, calculated from the Work Task creation date.
- Reactive: Used together with the Schedule Distribution Service to indicate if Work Tasks of
this types are Reactive.
- Display Color: The Display Color setting is used to set specific colors for different
activity types and to be able to distinguish the different activity types in the Scheduling
Workbench by color. To use this it is required to select the option Colour activities by..
Activity type in the Scheduling Workbench - Workspace.
Prerequisites
- The company must have been set up in IFS/Enterprise.
- Work types must have been defined in the Request Task Basic Data/Work
Types page.
- Activity types must have been defined in the Request Task Basic Data/Activity
Types page.
System Effects
As a result of this activity, the activity types which are to be scheduled are defined.