Relevance: All users
Version release: Aluminium 9.04 (including from 8.07)
Release to staging: 26/02/2024
Release to production: 28/02/2024
Summary of functionality
Aluminium 9.00 introduces key changes to assist in the management of the assignment of work-orders synced from Authority ERP systems, however, the changes can also be utilised by users with other Chart of Account systems. It also introduces tags into elementTIME allowing tags to be assigned and then used as a mechanism for assignments and building relationships between data
This is a change to existing functionality and is pretty cool.
The version also includes the ability to split FTE adjustment of leave requests from full-day and part-day requests (previously if a leave type was FTE adjusted it would apply to all requests of that type regardless of if it was full-day or part-day). Payroll can now set whether FTE adjustments should just apply to full-day, part-day or both types of requests.
Plus there is the general collection of features and fixes (I so badly wanted to write fixtures there – can this be our new thing?).
Timesheets and timecards
[FIX] Fix issue with breaks not saving to time blocks and resetting to match the schedule if the day also has leave. Which came first, the break or the break? In this case the break definitely did. But we figured it out and now the break does not cause a break.
[FIX] Fix error with breaks resetting after timesheet recalculation, leave requested and other calculations. There was a definite whole break thing going on. Personally, I liked it more when we just focused on when people worked: Are you working? yes/no. Simple. Nowadays it is all so personal: Were you working? Oh, were you on break? Oh, when was that then?
Reports
[FEAT] Create new report called “Plant items export”. It turns out that being able to get a list of the current status of plant items can be super handy.
[FEAT] Build costing by employee status type by department report.
[FEAT] Create new report for costing by employee by department.
[FIX] Fix issue with missing leave data on the work patterns by department report if time span is greater than one payrun. Sometimes people that leave that is longer than a payrun and if they do, reports should show that. I am not sure I believe it though – we struggle to convince the team to take a long weekend.
[FIX] Fix error where on reports page the “end payrun” selection label shows as “first payrun”. After all, the last payrun is not the first payrun, unless it is the only payrun. Actually, I think the plural of payruns should be payruni – like octopus/octopi. This feels like a petition coming on.
Allowances and penalties
[FIX] Fix error when removing all ad hoc allowances related to time records and the line can’t be removed from timesheet. This didn’t really stop anyone from doing anything but it did look messy having blank allowance lines in a timesheet. When you make a mess it is good to clean it up. So we did.
[FIX] Fix error when calculating auto-allowances, if an allowance is calculated on the day and the user takes leave on that day. As much as we would love it if you get an allowance for working, but don’t work cause you take the day off to binge-watch Netflix, you would still get the allowance. That is unfortunately not how the world works though that could be a good election platform. #allowancesforall
[FIX] Apply fix on penalty for offset hours when doing period excess-time calculation. It was getting the total hours for the penalty on the whole time block instead of only what triggered that penalty. Look can I explain this? Probably, but between us, this was just not doing what it should. Now it is.
Excess-time
[FIX] Fix error on calculating excess-time when time has breaks, and it’s split with multiple work-orders. We want the excess-time to cost to the right work-order, break or no break. In this case, the break was causing a break so we fixed the break without requiring anyone to remove the break.
[FIX] Fix issue where sometimes when amending excess-time, changes don’t show unless the page is refreshed. Refreshing pages can be annoying, so we just update the data now.
Workflows and notifications
[FIX] Fix issue where managers have the “Send submission reminder to all” and “Send approval reminder to all” options on the “My team timesheets” page. We know some managers love the power, but by having access to these buttons some managers had power go to their heads, so we took the power away.
[CHORE] Update command that rebuilds workflows to clear history after rebuilding the workflows – you can choose what you want keep or remove.
[FIX] Fix issue with workflows that have invalid relationship with related model that we stopping user terminations. Terminations can be stressful at the best of times, without putting a random modal relationship in the way. So we took that out of the picture. Terminations can still be stressful though, sorry we didn’t solve that one.
Leave and public holidays and RDO
[FIX] Fix relationship error on schedules when making updates on public holiday hours. Sometimes relationships can be so damaged you just need to let them go, but we think it is always better to try to save them. So when schedules and public holidays stopped talking, we sat them down and hugged it out, and now that relationship is awesome. Go hugs.
[FIX] Fix error on RDO accrued calculation and total hours to be paid when timesheet includes leave that has been FTE adjusted. FTE adjusted leave is special but not so special it should be allowed to break someone’s timesheet or their RDO accruals. We had a chat and an agreement was reached to amend this behaviour.
[FIX] Fix calculation error on RDO earnt in a timesheet when there is also unpaid excess-time. If a user had unpaid excess time let’s just say the whole RDO accrual was not doing what it should. Not saying we went so deep as to recreate Pavlov’s dog but we did sit down and make sure the behaviour here is the one we want to happen automatically when the RDO bell rings.
API
FEAT] Create new service `/api/v3/leave/clashes` to list all clashes with leave request that is about to be made
Integration
[CHORE] Update payroll integrations to pass plant hours and km as 0 (zero) if no value was added. For Authority users, if multiple data collection fields exist for a plant item but none are compulsory and therefore users didn’t add anything in any of them, Authority didn’t like that. So now we have fixed it because as my Playcentre teacher once said, playing nice is more fun than crying in the corner, but it is up to you which of those you want to do. She was old school plus it was the 80’s.
[CHORE] Update leave integrations so when leave type is set in a way that balances are realised on accrual, then all balances become available. If you can take the leave the balance is available, and if you cannot then it is not. Woah, simple right?
[FEAT] Create new integration rule to offset leave hours based on conditions; and
[FEAT] Create new integration rule to apply penalty as additional to leave taken based on conditions. Sometimes we need exceptions and therefore we built some exceptions. Exceptional I agree.
[FIX] Fix rule that makes excess-time rows to become positive and negative that was miscalculating the ordinary hours hour code and preventing the integration from working properly. Yep the ole fix one thing and break another and then need to fix that card played out here. Luckily, I think we kept it secret. I won’t even mention it if you don’t.
[FEAT] Create means to integrate to Authority Cloud version (download data); and
[FEAT] Create means to integrate to Authority Cloud version (payrun posting). Yay. it’s always fun to integrate with something new and to get it working. Win.
[FIX] Fix issue on integration for some payroll systems when user has multiple HD requests with different pay codes and time is recorded against the same project/work-order.