One of the most important tasks of time evaluation is to alert time administrators to errors or situations that require their attention. System administrators also need to be informed if there are errors in Customizing or technical errors.
Time evaluation performs the following tasks:
Checking the consistency of the time data evaluated
Time evaluation checks whether the time data has been entered correctly and is plausible in relation to working time provisions and other recorded time data
Checking working time provisions, company working time regulations, and time accounts
Pointing out technical errors that prevent time data from being evaluated.
Possible causes for such errors may be errors in pair formation or in Customizing.
You can use report RPTERL00 (Display Time Evaluation Messages) to perform statistical evaluations on the messages.
Time evaluation can create messages at various stages of processing. Messages to be output are specified in the SAP system in the form of message types. The category of the message type indicates what triggered the messages.
1 - Customer-defined message generated by time evaluation
3 - Technical error from pair formation
4 - Technical error from time evaluation
5 - Warnings and notes generated by time evaluation
For more information, see the Implementation Guide for Personnel Time Management and choose Time Evaluation→Time Evaluation With Clock Times or Time Evaluation Without Clock Times→Message Output→Create Message Descriptions.
You can customize category-1 messages in the Implementation Guide. In Customizing for Time Evaluation, you then determine how time evaluation is to react to particular situations. This enables you to control whether postprocessing is necessary and, if so, which form, and to determine the significance of the situation for a correct evaluation result.
The message processing function is fully integrated in the Time Manager's Workplace. It uses the same design elements as the time data maintenance function.
This means that time administrators work with the same user interfaces for processing time evaluation messages as for maintaining time data.
In the message processing function of the Time Manager's Workplace:
All relevant contextual information is displayed for a message
Time administrators can switch between an employee-oriented and a message-oriented view
Time administrators can flag messages that they have already processed
For more information, see the Implementation Guide for Personnel Time Management and choose Time Manager's Workplace→Basic Settings→Set Up Message Processing.
Message functional areas enable you to see an overview of messages and to control how the messages are processed.
Not all message types need to be assigned to a message functional area. Unassigned message types are displayed in the Message View on the same hierarchy level as the message functional areas.
You can use processing methods to provide specific contextual information to streamline the processing of time evaluation messages. You can have the contextual information displayed together with the message type or with the message functional area. If, under one message functional area, there are messages with different contextual information, the information is grouped in one field.
Typical examples of contextual information:
Planned time and flextime account balances, when violations to working time provisions occur
Planned hours and overtime in the case of overtime approvals
Work schedule
You organize the contextual information into groups of display objects. A group of display objects can contain up to 10 display objects.
You can assign a group of display objects to each processing method.
You can use processing methods in two ways:
You assign a processing method to a functional area. All message types that fall under this functional area inherit this processing method. The messages are then grouped under the functional area, that is, they no longer explicitly appear in the Message View.
You assign a processing method to a message type. If the message type is not assigned to a functional area or no processing method is assigned to the functional area, then the processing method is displayed with the message type.
Even if you do not want to output contextual information, you can use the functional areas to structure the message list. For example, particular messages would not appear individually in the message list. In this case, assign a processing method to a functional area that does not have a group of display objects assigned to it. Make sure that the relevant message types do not have processing methods.