An important part of work order planning, execution and follow-up is the time aspect. There are several ways of indicating when a work order should be started, when it has to be completed and also other uses described briefly below.
When registering a fault report, the current date and time appear automatically for the entry date. This value can be adjusted up until the record is saved, after which it is a read-only field used for follow up. You can enter the late start and requested finish dates to indicate when the work is to start and finish respectively.
If a valid service contract which matches the information entered on the service request exists, the SLA (service level agreement) identity, description, SLA Requested Start date and SLA Requested Finish date will be retrieved on the service request.
Apart from this, the different date fields which are found on the service request (in the Prepare tab) are also found on the work orders and are described in the next section.
In IFS/Work Order Management, there are different windows with special functionality to facilitate the planning and execution of work. Though different in look and feel they share common functionality and fields. How these fields are used can differ depending on work processes, configuration and if the Mobile Workforce Management Integration is used. Following work order dates are available in most of these windows.
| Work Order Date | Description |
| Planned start | The date/time when the work order is planned to be started. This could either be set manually or be the result from a scheduling engine. |
| Planned Finish | The date/time the work order is planned to be finished. This could either be set manually or be the result from a scheduling engine. |
| Requested Start | The date/time the work order is requested to be started. This is a constraining date, that is, it is the first date at which the work order can start. This could be according to an agreement with the customer, or that the object to be worked on is not available until this point in time. |
| Fixed start | The fixed date and time the work order or service request is set to start. This is a constraining date, and a value in this field overrides the Requested Start date/time as the first possible starting point for the work order or service request. The value entered will be transferred as fixed in time to the Dynamic Scheduling Engine in case it is used. |
| Late Start | The latest date and time by which the work order must start in order to meet the date/time indicated in Requested Finish. This can either be a calculated value or manually entered. |
| Requested Finish | The date/time the work order is requested to be finished. This is a soft constraining date, for instance a wanted delivery date for a service from a customer. |
| SLA Requested Start | The latest time the work order or service request can be started without missing its SLA (Service Level Agreement). This value is calculated from the response time for the SLA in the SLA ID field. This field is only applicable for work orders or service requests that have originated from a service contract. |
| SLA Requested Finish | The latest time for the work order or service request to be completed in order to meet its SLA. This value is calculated from the resolution time for the SLA in the SLA ID field. This field is only applicable for work orders or service requests that have originated from a service contract. |