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Release Notes Summary 2024

Updated: 2024-12-06

Inspections and Service Issues Improvements

  1. You can now compress pictures taken by the camera. Each user can set their preferred compression percentage on the "My HomeBuilder Settings" page (Entering 10 (%) takes a 3MB picture and reduces it to about 100K. This applies to:
  • Construction Items
  • Item Variants
  • Service Issues
  • Construction Diary Entries
  1. The following fields are now available (using personalization) on the page "Service Issue Card":
  • "Resolved by User Id"
  • "Date Resolved"
  • "Completion Confirmed"
  • "Completed by User Id"
  1. The following buttons are now available on the "Service Issue Card":
  • "Create Work Order"
  • "Resolve"
  • "Un-resolve"
  1. On the pages "Service Issues" and "Inspection Service Issues".
  • Button "Un-Resolve"
  • "No. of Pictures"
  1. You can now print "Checklist" and "Issues" reports on inspections (used to have to pick one). Defined in the Inspections Types.
  2. New actions on the "Inspections" and "Inspection Card"
  • "Print – Checklist"
  • "Print – Issues"
  • "Send by Email – Checklist,"
  • "Send by Email – Issues."
  • Note that "Print – Checklist" and "Send by Email – Checklist" will only be visible if the Inspection Type requires a checklist.
  1. The inspection report for a checklist can still be printed even if the inspection is incomplete.
  2. In Service Issues, upon "Create Work Orders", not only do we create a Work Order, but this Work Order also gets immediately displayed on the page "Vendor Work Order Card".
  3. You can now change "Vendor No." and "Vendor Contract No." directly in the "Vendor Work Order Card" page if the Work Order status is "New." This new vendor is updated everywhere.
  4. Upon deleting a Service Issue associated with a Checklist Entry, the outcome of that Checklist Entry will be updated.
  • It will change to 'OK' if the checkbox labeled "Default OK for Checklist" is set to 'Yes' on that Inspection Type.
  • Otherwise, it will change to "(undefined)".
  1. When a Service Issue is deleted, any attached pictures will also be removed.
  2. When you update "Comments" or "Note to Vendor" in a Service Issue, the Work Order Line will also be updated.
  3. When a user presses "Cancel" on the "Complete Vendor Work Order" page, there will be no message indicating the work order count.
  4. On changing fields "Vendor No.", "Vendor Contract No.", "Note to Vendor", "Vendor Work Order No.", "Completion Confirmed" in a Service Issue, the Service Issue is pushed to the HomeBuilder Portal for display to the corresponding contractor.

Cost to Complete Implementation:

  • Introduced the "Cost to Complete" metric for lot budgets, calculated as the Budget Amount minus Actual Amount for cost details only. This allows for better financial forecasting in construction projects.
  • Added the "Cost to Complete" field to various pages and reports, including Lot Budget, Lot Card, and API for PowerBI.

Purchase Orders for Work Orders:

  • Enabled the creation of Purchase Orders alongside Work Orders, enhancing workflow efficiency.
  • Introduced actions to create Purchase Orders directly from Lot Planning Lines and Vendor Work Orders, with references to Work Order Lines for better tracking.

New Features and Improvements:

  • Added a flow-field "No. of Service Issues" to Inspections and Inspection Cards for better issue tracking.
  • Updated Global Vendors pages with a new "Search Name" field and deprecated the obsolete "IRS 1099 Form-Box".
  • Enhanced Lot Installments with new fields for "Posted Amount" and "Amount Diff. Pre/Post Posting" to improve financial tracking.
  • Improved Document Management performance by adding keys to relevant tables.
  • Introduced new reports for Purchase Orders for Extras, allowing for better item tracking.
  • Expanded Email Scenarios to include Construction Work Orders, Service Work Orders, and Purchase Orders for Extras.
  • Made the "Comment" field in Lot Budget Line Entries editable for better documentation.
  • Added new columns to Checklist Issues for better vendor tracking.

User Experience Enhancements:

  • Redesigned the Lot Card for improved navigation and usability.
  • Enabled the removal of filters in Lot Workflows for more flexible data management.
  • Improved the handling of blocked vendors during Work Order creation and completion, ensuring compliance and reducing errors.

Performance Improvements:

  • Enhanced performance for Document Management and Portal Integration.
  • Streamlined actions related to Work Orders and Lot Management for faster processing.

Corrections and Bug Fixes:

  • Addressed various bugs related to document attachments, service issues, and data integrity, ensuring a smoother user experience.

The Functionality of Trade Notifications

If you want to inform some vendors about an extra or upgrade chosen by a homebuyer, then define the set of trade types that should receive notification under the construction item representing this extra or upgrade. You may define notification trade types for color chart items with the designation "Single Item" or "Bundle". You should assign the appropriate "Task No." for each of the trade types listed under the item.

For example, for the extra item Additional Basement Window you may want to notify vendors of trade types Concrete, Framing, and Drywall. To define which vendor (or vendors) represent each trade type in a phase, run the action "Trade Type Vendors" for this phase. For each trade type, at least one record should be marked as default (in other words, you should define the default vendor for each trade type).

Upon releasing a Lot Selection Package, the system will generate a Planning Line for a choice and additional notification Planning Lines for each vendor that should be notified. The notification Planning Lines will have the prefix "Notification: " in the Description field, zero Unit Cost, "Vendor No." defined in the "Trade Type Vendors" as default, and "Task No." defined for the trade type under the item.

The notification Planning Lines will be included in the POEs and Work Orders in the same way as regular Planning Lines.

Details here.

Locking/Unlocking Budget

With this release we introduced the functionality for locking and unlocking a lot budget. Once the lot budget is locked, the following operations get disabled:

  • Editing amounts such as "Anchored Amount", "Estimated Amount", and "New Amendment" in Lot Budget lines
  • Modifying "Unit Cost", "Unit Price", and "Quantity" in the Planning Lines of the lot.
  • Anchoring and Un-anchoring Lot Budget
  • Adding or removing Lot Budget Revision

Only a user with Functional Permission "CAN LOCK BUDGET" can lock the lot budget. Only a user with Functional Permission "CAN UNLOCK BUDGET" can un-lock the lot budget.

Sales Statuses for Lots

Sales Statuses for lots can be defined by a user.

To maintain the list of Sales Statuses, go to the main menu HomeBuilder, find Setup, and select Sales Statuses or find the page "Sales Statuses" through the Search. In the page "Sales Statuses", you have the ability to define how Sales Status can be changed by specifying a list of "next" statuses for each status.

Other Improvements:

  1. A card view (not just a list) has been added to the "Lot Selection Choices".
  2. The fact boxes of pages "Lot Selection Choices" and "Lot Selection Choice Card" now show the picture of the selected item or item variant.