Project management is the foundation for every service delivery in ZEP. This article shows how you create projects, maintain their data, deactivate a project, or, if necessary, remove it completely from the system.
Which fields on the project are available in detail depends on your product line and the licensed modules. A full field reference with all availability hints is provided in the article Project data.
Note: Project and customer management is included in ZEP Track, ZEP Control, ZEP Operations, and ZEP Business. You reach the project list via the main menu Projects. How the list is configured is described in the article Project overview.
Permissions for project management
Who may create, edit, or remove projects results from the role of the logged-in employee. This overview summarises which role can perform which action. The full permission matrix is described in the article My Company – Administration in the section Roles & Permissions.
Action | Who is authorised |
Create projects | Administrators. Other people via the Create projects row under Administration > My Company > Roles & Permissions, department managers for their departments via the same row on the Department Manager tab. |
Edit project data | Administrators. Other people via the Project Organization row in the Projects area, project managers, department managers and customer managers via the same row on their tab. For project managers, the matrix distinguishes between project managers with and without budget responsibility, see Project managers with and without budget responsibility. |
Change project status | Administrators. Project managers within the allowed status transitions of the workflow. |
Deactivate project | Administrators. Project managers can set the project status to a non-bookable status, provided the workflow allows the transition. |
Delete project | Delete projects permission. Prerequisite is that no dependent data are attached to the project (no project times, receipts, documents, tickets, proposals, or invoice items). CRM-linked projects cannot be deleted. |
Creating projects
Projects are created directly from the project list. The button is shown to anyone with the Create projects permission.
To create a new project:
Open Projects in the main menu.
Click Create New Project above the project list.
Enter the Abbreviation in the General tab. It is the only system-side mandatory field and system-wide unique.
Add as needed: Description, Run time, Project status, Department, Categories, Tags, and a Remark in the General tab. The project status is preset to the configured default.
In the Customer & Invoicing tab, choose the Customer (preset to internal as long as you do not select an external customer). For external projects, additionally store the Type of accounting, optionally Cost Center, Cost Unit, and Currency.
Confirm with Save. ZEP automatically forwards you to the detail page of the new project.
On the detail page, the submenu items of the project open. Here, you store all sub-areas needed for ongoing use: Project team members, Tasks, Project activities, Billability defaults, with Project Planning also the Project Plan, as well as the Price tables and Price groups. A complete overview of all submenu items with their maintenance options is provided in the article Project administration.
Warning: For employees to be able to book project times against the project, all of the following conditions must be met:
The Project status is configured as bookable (maintained under Administration > Projects > Project status).
The booking date lies within the Run time of the project (start date to end date).
At least one Project team member is stored with a valid assignment period.
At least one Task is created on the project.
For external projects, the matching Type of accounting is stored so that invoicing processes the times correctly.
If one of the prerequisites is missing, the project does not appear in the selection list of time and receipt entry. The maintenance of the sub-areas is described in the article Project administration.
Creating a project from a template
Instead of creating each project from scratch, you take over all recurring master and configuration data from an existing project. To do so, you click the copy icon in the row of the template project in the project list. The exact procedure from the table view is described in the article Project overview.
When copying, ZEP automatically takes the following content of the template project into the copy:
Project team members including their function (optionally also with the stored assignment periods).
Tasks including assigned task members (optionally also with the task periods).
Project activities, daily rate portions, Price tables, and Project price groups.
Receipt settings including project-specific receipt types.
Project additional fields, project locations, and locations with a different amount for the arrival lump sum.
With the Document Management area optionally the folder structure, with the add-on module Ticketing System optionally the tickets.
For multi-customer projects, additionally the project customer assignment with shares and addresses.
The Project status and the Task status are deliberately not copied along. The copy always starts with the first status of the sequence, so that every new project is led freshly through the defined workflow.
Tip: For recurring project types, create a template project or a dummy project with complete master data, typical tasks, default team members, and price tables. For every new assignment, you copy the template project and then adjust the abbreviation, description, run time, and customer-specific fields. This saves time and ensures a consistent project structure across all assignments.
Editing projects
Project data can be updated at any time. Anyone with edit access in the Project Organization permission for the project may edit it, see the permissions overview above.
To edit a project:
Open Projects in the main menu.
Click the description of the project in the list. The detail page of the project opens.
Change the desired fields via the menu bar of the project detail page. For the master data, open General > Data (with Project Planning Data & Plan) and click Edit; further settings are in the Project settings, Account Settings, and Billing menus.
Save the changes with Save.
Which fields you maintain in detail, from project number through duration to price group, is fully described in the article Project data. There you also find all availability hints per product line and module.
Deactivating projects
Deactivating a project is the same as archiving or closing it. The historical data is fully retained. A project is deactivated when it should not be deleted but locked for further bookings. The deactivation is done via a non-bookable project status or by setting a project end date in the duration. Both ways preserve the historical data completely and close the project for new bookings.
Via the project status: Set the status to a status that is configured as non-bookable (for example Closed or Paused).
Via the duration: Set the end date of the Run time to the last bookable day. After that, no new project times or receipts can be recorded.
The full list of non-bookable project statuses is maintained by administrators under Administration > Projects > Project status. An overview of the effect per status is provided in the article Project administration.
Deleting projects
The final deletion removes a project completely from ZEP. This requires the Delete projects permission under Roles & Permissions. Before the execution, ZEP automatically checks whether no data is attached to the project that would prevent a deletion.
Prerequisites for the deletion:
No project times and no receipts may be booked on the project.
No project documents, tickets, or proposals may be attached to the project.
No invoice items, payment documentations, or open invoicing transactions, and no project-time-generation entries may exist.
CRM-linked projects (HubSpot, Salesforce) cannot be deleted.
For every dependent object, ZEP shows a concrete error message with a hint to the blocking record.
If the project end lies further back than the number of years set in the administration, ZEP offers on the same page to delete the project completely and irreversibly, including all booked times and receipts. In addition, a month-end closing must exist after the project end, and the project must not appear on an invoice that covers several projects.
To delete a project:
Open the project via the project list.
In the submenu group Actions, open the item Delete project.
Confirm the deletion hint. ZEP shows beforehand which dependent data stands in the way of the deletion.
Warning: ZEP removes plannings from Resource Planning together with the project, without a separate confirmation. The same applies to the work items of the project and the column order of its board if you work with work items. Before deleting, check whether plannings you still need are attached to the project.
Note: You pseudonymize personal data on a project, such as contact persons, via the respective employee or customer record.