Time & Labor

PeopleSoft Time and Labor solution automates the time reporting and processing of payable time and shares payable time information with PNA/GP to compensate time reporters for their payable time. Once pay run is complete in payroll application, the labor costs are sent back to T&L where these are distributed across payable time, a further integration with Financials may consume the costs for project costing.

Time Reporting & Time Administration

Important T&L buisness processes are -
- Report Time,
- Approve Time,
- Manage Reported Time,
- Process Payable Time.


Time Reporting

There are a number of ways that time can be reported in T&L. 

Time Sheet,
Mass Time - actual or lump sum according to schedules.
Rapid Time
TCD Interface

Oracle Validated data collection subsystems which collects and transfers Time and Labor data from various time collection devices to and from PeopleSoft system (e.g. TimeLink, KABA). The TCD Interface uses the Integration Broker to send and receive data from the TCD system. Data in T&L and the TCD system is synchronized by either a full data replication or an incremental approach (changes only).


Time Collection Devices


The peoplesoft system collects and sends time data to and from third-party time-collection devices through Integration Broker. Punched time and elapsed time data is collected from TCD in T&L using PUNCHED_TIME_ADD and ELAPSED_TIME_ADD service operations.
There are two options available whether to use a flat file integration or XML data integration. If you use XML integration then the TCD time is automatically transferred to reported time tables through these service operations while in flat file integration, reported time is written to a flat file (CSV- comma separated value format) stored in a common directory. The file is then picked up by T&L and converted to a message and is then processed through the service operations.


TCD Setup in T&L

Define TCD on TCD Setup page, TCD type and Message Node name are required, other fields on page are - TRC Program ID, Terminal ID, Network ID etc. TCD Taskgroup page sets TCD physical settings and TCD taskgroups. TCD Supervisor page defines supervisor ID and their password (PIN) who can access and override a punch. TCD Restriction Profile page specifies settings and controls for different options to restrict a punch provided punch schedules have been setup. TCD Groups are associated to time reporters and TCD Group page groups together TCDs, restriction profiles and TCD supervisors. 

Send Setup to TCD page is used to send the setup data from T&L to TCD.  The publish process is scheduled to run once or multiple times a day. One set of published messages replaces the previously information. The page is also used to generate the TCD Usage report enlisting elements transmitted to TCD. 

Peoplesoft Subscribe process receives time data from TCD into T&L, validated for errors and data directly is sent to Reported time tables if no errors are observed. There are a set of pages used to view and rectify the TCD errors. While validating data from TCD, badge IDs are translated to employee IDs and format edits are performed.


TL_ST_LOADER: The handler for the service operation PUNCHED_TIME_ADD triggers the application engine process TL_ST_LOADER which initiates the validation process (validations are defined on  TL_INSTALLATION page) and inserts rows in reported time table for valid records. To view the TCD errors, Review TCD Errors page is located on Setup HRMS >System Administration>Utilities>Analyze Time and Labor>Review TCD Errors.


Time Administration Process: The application engine TL_TIMEADMIN is the core process which creates payable time that is passed to PNA/GP.  It performs initialization tasks and calls other AE processes for various tasks and performs finalization tasks. The process only processes the records that are yet to be processed. 

Important Tables updated/accessed during TL_TIMEADMIN run-

• TL_INSTALLATION - table contains Batch Size,
• TL_TA_TRLISTxx - lists time reporters to be processed,
• TL_TR_STATUS - This is the control table for time administration process, the process run sets TA_STATUS to X for all time reporters being processed. This also prevents the same employee being processed in another timeadmin concurrent instance,
• TL_RPTD_TIME - contains punch time entries,
• TL_ATTEND_HIST - contains attendance history data,
• TL_ATTENDANCE - contains current attendance data,
• TL_IPT1 - contains intermediate payable time data for all time reporters in current batch.
• TL_EXCEPTION - contains exceptions,
• TL_PAYABLE_TIME - contains payable time.

 

TL_TIMEADMIN Processing steps-

1. While creating Payable Time, process selects Time Reporters based on TL_TR_STATUS.TA_STATUS=Y OR EARLIEST_CHGDT (earliest change date)  <= current date or process date.  After selection, TL_TA_TRLIST table is populated with a final list of time reporters to be processed. The process now determines the Initial Period of Interest - the minimum amount of time that need to be processed for each time reporter on list; TL_TA_TRLIST.START_DT and END_DT.
2.  Time reporters are organized into Batches by their workgroup (all employees in a workgroup sharing a same common rule program) for efficient processing. To reduce the size of batches, update Max Employees in Rules Run field on TL Installation page.
3. Validation program section process pending/unresolved exceptions, clears exceptions if  not recreated and recreates exceptions if they are still unresolved.
4. Build Rule Map process now generates the output table TL_RULE_MAP identifying the rules to process for each batch. Final period of interest is calculated and intermediate payable time tables are now populated with correct amount of time.
5. TL_PROF_WRK table is loaded with time reporter data from multiple HCM tables for each batch of time reporters.
6. Step checks if reported punch time exists.
7. Punch matching process selects all appropriate punches for processing and applies pre-rules rounding. Rounding options, if specified, on Workgroup page determine whether to round the punches. The three options for rounding the punches are - 1) Round Punches Before Rules, 2) Segment Rounding and 3) Day Rounding. Apply Daybreaker subprocess is initiated (only if Split By Day Breaker option is selected on Workgroup page). The process now calculates the duration of punches (TL_QUANTITY) 
8. Create_IPT process loads all reported and scheduled time data into Intermediate Payable Time table (TL_IPT1). For elapsed time reporters, data from TL_RPTD_TIME  is taken and for punch time reporters, it takes data created in Rounding Punches process. For PNA/GP/Absence installations, absence rows are now inserted to TL_IPT1. Approved absences from GP_ABS_EVENT table is loaded into TL_AM_WRK table. 
9. Action on attendance violations as defined on Attendance Action page are caught by the Track Attendance process.
10. Rule Processing - during rule processing, this time data is moved back and forth between TL_IPT1 and other IPT tables (TL_IPT2, TL_IPT3, TL_IPT4 and TL_IPT5).
11. Lave Balance and Comp Time Balance (Compensatory off) checks are processed and appropriate tables (TL_EXCEPTIONS or TL_RPTD_TIME) are updated with balance time hours. System now applies Post Rule rounding.
12. Post Rule Validation - several validations are now run against the data generated during rule processing, the exceptions are updated/inserted in TL_EXCEPTIONS table
13. Adjustment Process - Record-only adjustments does not create payable time and so not processed by TL_TIMEADMIN process. The frozen flag associated with a payable time entry determines the adjustment process, if it is set then offset time entries.
14. Payable Time Table (TL_PAYABLE_TIME) is now updated with final results from TL_IPT1. This is now available to Payroll system. 
15. As the final step, Time Reporter Status is updated in TL_TR_STATUS. For all fully positive time reporters, TA_STATUS is set to N and EARLIEST_CHGDT to the latest date of payable time in the TL_PAYABLE_TIME table.  For exception reporters, TA_STATUS is set to Y and EARLIEST_CHGDT to the beginning of the next processing period.  

TIMEADMIN Runtime statistics

There are a number of options that can be used to generate the TIMEADMIN runtime statistics, batch data and rule information during each process run. The pages are-

Time Administration Options Page - to specify what to track.
Time Administration Statistics Page - to view the generated statistics.
Program Statistics Page - to view AE statistics.
Batch Statistics Page - to view the run time, start and end dates of the period of interest covered by the batch, and the number of time reporters in the batch.
Rule Statistics Page - to view the archived rule maps details.


Payable Time

Payable time created by the TL_TIMEADMIN process is the end product that represents -
- Quantity of work performed.
- Time Reporting Code controlling how time reporter is paid. In PNA/GP, TRC is mapped with an Earning Code.
-the tasks to which time was reported if task profile is appropriately set to track.

The attributes that determine when payable time is other applications and how adjustments to payable time are to be processed in T&L are-

• Payable Status,
• Reason Code,
• Frozen Flag, and
• Frozen Date.

Background Processing & Referential Integrity-

There are several batch processes to make sure data is error free when information is changed online or during batch processing. RI process ensures that a change in one area of application does not adversely impact another area of the application. RI and Time Validation processes creates or resolve/removes exceptions during time administration.

Time Administration Issues & Troubleshooting