In Administration under Projects, you define the foundations of your project work in ZEP: defaults, visibility, permissions, activities, statuses, mail templates, categories, keywords and additional attributes.

Which sub-menu items are visible depends on the active add-on modules. Each section indicates its availability as a note.

The sub-menu Settings consolidates all system-wide defaults for project work: planned-hours warning, display options in the task and project info-popover, permissions, billing defaults, display-name formats, signature block, email to project employees, project-number sequence and project-plan visibility.

You globally define the percentage of Planned hours at which ZEP sends an email to the project manager with budget responsibility. Optionally, only billable hours are counted toward the threshold.

Via the radio selection Percent for escalation mail to project manager you choose between two modes:

If only one value is entered, only one email is sent. Up to three different thresholds can therefore be defined.

With the billable only checkbox you limit the threshold logic to billable-booked hours. Internal or non-billable hours then do not count toward the threshold. Use case: only billable hours should affect the budget limit.

You can override the global thresholds at the individual project under Data & Plan. Three options are available per project:

For ZEP to generate a warning email, several conditions must be met:

If no project manager with budget responsibility can be determined, all project managers without budget responsibility are informed. If there are no project managers either, with active module Departments the department managers are notified. If this also fails, the emails are sent to all administrators.

Each time entry is checked against the percentage of Planned hours on task or project level. Up to two emails can be sent per booking: one related to the booked task (or its parent task) and one related to the overall project.

Eight checkboxes control which detail information appears in the info-popover of a task. Employees open the popover via the i-icon in the task selection of time tracking.

When active, the task info-popover is extended by the stored Planned hours. The task table then contains the following columns:

When active, employees only see tasks with a bookable status whose run-time lies in the recording period. Use case: reducing the selection list in projects with many tasks.

Hides all tasks to which the logged-in person is not assigned as a task employee. Use case: personal view in large projects with clear task assignment.

Activates the display of the task remark in the info-popover. Use case: contextual information such as briefing notes is visible directly during booking.

Displays the planned start and end date of the task in the info-popover. Use case: employees see the planned time-frame before booking.

Displays linked tickets and sub-tasks of the task in the info-popover. Use case: support-oriented teams with customer tickets as drivers of task planning.

Activates the display of all employees assigned to the task with their email addresses stored in ZEP. Use case: quick contact from within the time tracking.

Three checkboxes control which detail information appears in the info-popover of a project.

Shows the project remark in the info-popover. Use case: overview of project context directly from the time tracking.

Displays the billing type (fixed price, time and material, internal) in the info-popover. Use case: quick information whether bookings are billable.

Activates the display of all project employees with their function (e.g. project manager) and their email address. Use case: stakeholder list for project coordination.

Three checkboxes control extended action rights for users with the role User with additional rights or Controller as well as project managers.

When active, users with the role User with additional rights or Controller can create projects themselves — a right otherwise reserved for administrators. Use case: decentralized project creation in larger organizations.

Allows project managers to create their own keywords within a project and assign them, without opening the master-data area. New keywords are added directly to the keyword master.

Same logic for administrators and department managers (with module Departments). Use case: quick keyword maintenance during running project work.

Projects without customer assignment are internal projects. Since you cannot invoice them to a customer, it is reasonable to book only non-billable hours on them.

If this setting is active:

No automatic rebooking between internal and external projects takes place.

You determine how projects and tasks are displayed in selection lists and reports. There are four independent settings for internal and external views:

Each setting offers three formats:

Determines whether the Time Report by default includes a signature block when printed. Use case: printed hour reports with a signature field for customer approval, without users having to enable the option manually before each print. The default can still be changed at the individual print job.

In a project under Project employees you can send collective emails via the link Send email to project employees. Two settings control the behavior:

When active, the email is sent in the project language (set in the project under Format > Billing settings). Otherwise the ZEP language (Administration > My Company > General) is used.

When active, only the sender is listed in the To field; all other recipients are placed in the BCC field and do not see each other. Otherwise all recipients are listed openly in the To field. Use case: data protection for collective emails to external project employees.

You define how project numbers are generated automatically. The number consists of a prefix, a sequential counter and a suffix.

Static start of every project number. You combine fixed characters with the following placeholders:

Number of digits of the sequential counter between prefix and suffix. The number is padded with leading zeros if needed (a length of 4 leads to numbers such as 0001, 0002, and so on).

Static end of every project number. The same placeholders as in the prefix can be used (%YYYY%, %YY%, %MM%, %DD%).

Controls whether project employees see the Project plan menu item and which detail values are displayed to them. When active, all employees see the Projects tab with the projects assigned to them and the corresponding project plan.

When visibility is enabled, three sub-options can additionally be set:

Makes the stored Planned hours visible in the project plan. Without this option, employees see the plan itself but no target numbers.

Makes the stored Planned amounts (in the project currency) visible in the project plan. Use case: financial transparency at project-management level.

Makes the Actual hours booked so far visible in the project plan. Use case: up-to-the-day progress view for project employees.

Activities are labels for different work types independent of the project. Each time entry references one activity. Via the price tables you can store specific hourly rates per activity (from ZEP Compact with the Revenue & Costs add-on module). Distinguishing activities supports later reporting.

Each activity has an Abbreviation as a technical key and a Description as a speaking plain text. Both fields are mandatory. The abbreviation appears in reports and exports, while the description is what employees see in the booking dialog of the time recording.

You maintain the description in several languages. In the Description field click on the respective language flag and enter the translation. ZEP supports seven languages: German, English, French, Spanish, Polish, Slovak and Turkish. Depending on the language of the employee or project, the matching description is displayed.

You mark an activity as not relevant for working time. A typical example is on-call duty — it is recorded but does not count as regular working time. For such activities the following applies:

You mark an activity so that non-billable bookings remain visible in reports. A typical example is goodwill — work performed that is not invoiced but should remain transparent to the customer.

Properties:

In daily-rate projects, activities marked as goodwill only contribute to the daily-rate share when booked billable. Non-billable bookings still generate a daily-rate share, which appears in the time report and is shown in project revenue and invoice appendix with price 0.00.

You store a wage type per activity, which is used in the wage export. This way, bookings can be automatically assigned to the correct wage type in the payroll system, eliminating manual rework.

A special case is the travel activity (typical short form: re). It defines start and end of business trips. Together with the stored work location, ZEP automatically calculates the subsistence costs for travel-expense accounting — unless you set the field Calculation method for subsistence costs to no calculation.

Via Change Travel Activity you define which of your activities is the travel activity. Through the checkboxes may overlap with other activities and not relevant for working time you determine whether travel time counts as working time in your organization.

For a travel activity the following applies:

Besides activities, work can be structured by tasks. The choice between activity and task follows these criteria:

A work step is an activity if …

A task, in contrast …

In the sub-menu Project status you define the status values a project can go through.

You create a new status with Abbreviation and Description. You can maintain the description in multiple languages (German / English / French / Spanish). Optionally, you assign a color to the status, which is shown in the project table. Use case: visual recognition of typical workflow phases such as Requested, In Progress, Completed.

You move statuses up or down via the arrow icons. The sorting determines the display in selection lists throughout the application. A newly created status is always appended at the end — move it to the desired position afterwards. A newly created or copied project always starts in the first status of the list.

Per status you indicate whether it is bookable. Only projects assigned to a bookable status appear in the project-time and expense entry selection lists. Bookable statuses are displayed in bold in the table. Use case: effectively exclude completed or locked project phases from time tracking without deleting the status itself.

The project status can be used as a filter criterion in project reports and project planning. This lets you narrow reports to specific workflow phases (e.g. only active projects) and prevents completed or archived projects from distorting the numbers.

In the sub-menu Task status you define the status values a task can go through.

You create a task status with Abbreviation and Description. The description can be maintained in multiple languages. Optionally, you assign a color shown in the task table. Use case: representing the working state of individual work packages (To Do, In Review, Accepted) independently of the overall project status.

Order and moving work analogously to the project status via the arrow icons. A well thought-out sequence helps project managers and employees find the right next value when booking or changing status.

The bookability of a task behaves analogously to the description for the project status: only bookable task statuses accept time bookings. Bookable statuses are displayed in bold in the table.

The task status can be used as a filter criterion in task reports and project planning. Practical example: in project planning you hide all already accepted tasks to highlight the remaining work still to be planned.

In the sub-menu Mail templates you adapt the standardized texts of emails sent from ZEP — for example the project mail templates for To all project employees or To a single project employee.

Per template you define subject and body of the email. The templates are used automatically for each matching dispatch event, so you do not have to formulate manually for each email. For some templates you can additionally store CC and BCC recipients.

You use general placeholders to dynamically insert project and employee data into the text. The placeholder Actual hours (%ISTSTUNDEN%) always returns the current billable-booked Actual hours of the project — not the total hours.

You can attach files to each template that are sent along with every dispatch — for example terms and conditions, privacy notes, or instructions. Limits: maximum 5 files of 20 MB each, in total a maximum of 50 MB.

You can send each mail template as a test email (preview) to your own address. In the Test send (to your own email address) column click the flag of the desired language — available are German, English, French, Spanish, Polish, Slovak and Turkish. This lets you verify content and formatting in every maintained language before productive use.

In the sub-menu Categories you define categories to which you can assign your projects. This categorization serves as a search and selection criterion in reports.

Each category has a Abbreviation as a technical key and a Description as a speaking plain text. You can maintain the description in seven languages (German, English, French, Spanish, Polish, Slovak, Turkish), so that users and reports each see the matching name.

In the sub-menu Keywords you maintain a shared keyword world for projects, customers and other data objects. Entering keywords helps you use the search function to find and open projects more quickly.

Each keyword has an Abbreviation as a technical key and a Description. A central place for maintenance prevents sprawl due to differently spelled variants and ensures that keyword-filtered reports deliver consistent results across the whole tenant.

Via the two permission checkboxes Project manager may add keywords and Administrator/department manager may add keywords (in the Settings sub-menu) you allow keywords to be added directly within a project — the new entries are automatically added to the keyword master.

In the sub-menu Additional attributes you define individual fields for projects. A project additional attribute is an extra input field that appears on the data page of every project and can be maintained through the entry mask — suitable for classifications ZEP does not provide by default.

When creating a project additional attribute, you maintain the following data:

Project additional attributes are displayed on the data page of the project and can be edited in edit mode. They are also available in the following places:

In the sub-menu Task additional attributes you define individual attributes on the task level. The field logic matches that of project additional attributes — the attributes apply per task in the task entry mask.

You maintain the same fields as for the project additional attributes:

Use case: detail data points on the task level such as order numbers, cost centers or sub-classifications that are not maintained on the project level.

Settings in the project administration affect many other areas: