Import Master Labor Categories

This feature allows for the importing of Master Labor Category information into the Unanet system.

Roles

This screen is available to users having any of the following roles: Administrator and P&R Administrator

License

This feature is available with any Unanet edition.

Performance Tip Note: Depending on the number of users in your installation and other factors such as the overall performance of your platform, the activity of importing one or many files may take up to several minutes. Should this be the case with your installation, you may want to consider running these processes at non-peak times to minimize database contention.

Topics covered on this help page include:

Import File Record Layout (field by field descriptions)
Import File Format (note about csv layout and option to import a subset of columns using header values)
Excel Template (spreadsheet template containing column headings)
Import Screen (invoking the import via the user interface)

Import File Record Layout

IMPORTANT: Note that there are multiple places within this documentation that say you MUST use double quotes for the strings in your import. If you are working in Excel, Excel will provide the double quotes and thus you do not need to add them in manually. Manually adding double quotes within Excel would result in multiple sets of double quotes in the resulting .csv file and thus cause an error (should you attempt to import that resulting file). Please see Excel Tips for more information.

		Field Header Name	Required/Comments
1	A	Labor_Category	ALWAYS REQUIRED. Unique labor category name. You can use the Labor Category import to change a labor category name for an existing labor category by supplying the following syntax in this field. "!RENAME!,old_labor_category,new_labor_category" -- this entire string must be enclosed in double quotes. For example, if you were attempting to change: 1) Existing Labor Category "LaborCat_1" to "LaborCat_One", the import file would include: "!RENAME!,LaborCat_1,LaborCat_One" See Labor Category Changing for important information about potential impacts of renaming a Labor Category. See the Excel Tips regarding the use of double quotes and more. Maximum Length: 50 characters
2	B	Delete	This field can be used to trigger the system to delete a labor category entry entirely (including all of its rate entries) or it can be used to delete a single rate entry for a labor category. To delete a labor category and all of its rate entries, you must include the following text string !DELETE! in this field. To delete a single labor category rate entry, you must include the following text string !DELETE_RATE! in this field. When deleting a single rate entry, you must supply the Effective_Date in order to identify the specific rate to be removed. You will not be permitted to delete a master labor category that has been referenced elsewhere in the system.
3	C	Description	This field is used to supply a description of the Labor Category being imported. You can use the special tag !BLANK! to remove an existing entry in this field. Maximum Length: 2000 characters
4	D	Bill_Rate	This is the numeric bill rate that you would like to associate with this labor category. A labor category can have many rate entries differentiated by effective date. When adding a new Labor Category, this field will be defaulted to 0 if no value is provided. This field accepts a numeric value up to 10 positions to the left of the decimal and 5 positions to the right.
5	E	Cost_Rate	This is the numeric cost rate that you would like to associate with this labor category. A labor category can have many rate entries differentiated by effective date. When adding a new Labor Category, this field will be defaulted to 0 if no value is provided. This field accepts a numeric value up to 10 positions to the left of the decimal and 5 positions to the right.
6	F	External_System_Code	This field allows you to specify a particular value for a labor category. You can use the special tag !BLANK! to remove an existing entry in this field. Maximum Length: 50 characters Note: This field used to be named Account_Number. Beginning with v10.0, the account number functionality has been altered and the fields previously referred to as account_number have been changed to external_system_code. While the import column header Account_Number will continue to be a recognized alias for some time, you may want to take measures to update any automated imports to use the new name.
7	G	Active	This field allows you to specify whether this Labor Category will be available for use on new project level labor category lists and in user's drop-down lists on their timesheets. The valid values for this field include "Y" for yes, and "N" for no. If you do not supply a value, the field will default to "Y".
8	H	Effective_Date	CONDITIONALLY REQUIRED. Required on Update - This field is required if the Bill_Rate or Cost_Rate fields are populated in the import file and you are updating an existing entry. If you only have a single rate entry for this labor category, you would use the "BOT" value when updating. If you provide an Effective_Date you must provide either a bill or cost rate value. Optional on Add - This field will be defaulted to BOT if not provided when adding a new Labor Category. Required on Delete - This field is required if you are attempting to delete a specific entry. This field represents the date a particular rate is to become effective. If this is an update to, or a deletion of, an existing labor category entry, then this value must match the value of an existing entry. Recommended date format: yyyy-MM-dd See Allowable Date Formats for more options. You can also use the value "BOT" (beginning of time).
9	I	Occupation_Code	This value must match an existing occupation code in your system. If it does not already exist in the system, this record will be rejected.

Note: Check out the Unanet Data Model for specific field data types, lengths, and other attributes. Navigate to Unanet Support and search for "Data Model".

Import File Format

The file to import must be saved in a comma delimited format. The fields can be enclosed in double quotes -- which would be particularly necessary should the data being imported contain commas.

Importing a Sub-Set of Columns using a Field Header Record

If you are not using the default column layout sequence as defined above, you must include a header record (prefixed with an asterisk *), containing the column Header Names for those columns you are including in the import file (to indicate what data is contained in each column). The specific Header Names for each column are listed in the table above.

Example:

*Labor_Category,Delete
labor_cat1,!DELETE!

Excel Template

You can create the comma delimited import file with any number of tools. For those interested in using an Excel spreadsheet to create the file, you can download an Excel Template with predefined headers.

See the Excel Tips regarding the use of double quotes and more.

Import Screen

The Import Master Labor Categories screen simply looks like:

Field Descriptions:

Field	Description
Type of Import	Select the appropriate import type from the list of available types of imports.
File to Import	Enter (or browse for) the file that you would like to import.
Output Options	Specify the level of detail included in the output.

The import process is triggered by pressing the Import button. All Warnings and Error messages are written to the screen and can then be saved if desired. While some line items may be found invalid and rejected, the remaining line items will be successfully imported and saved in the database. The rejected line items will be written out to a file on the Unanet server as well as displayed at the bottom of the Import results page. The rejected record file name will be the import name (from the Type of Import drop-down on the Admin>> Import page) , concatenated with a space and "Errors.csv" (e.g., Item - Master Errors.csv, Alternate.csv, etc.). The file will be placed in the Unanet temporary directory (which is defined by the Temp Directory (Fully Qualified Directory Name) (unanet.temp_directory) Unanet property). You can also click on the Download the error file link at the bottom of the Import results page (sample image follows).