Project Management with T24

Project Management with T24

This is a complicated topic that I’ll attempt to simplify to some extent here and point out how a project plan for T24 should be written and how it should be followed and tested “as you go” and how to make sure that you cover all of the business requirements that the client has specified. This is fairly simple and straightforward, but the caveat here is that T24 is not going to work very well if you do NOT follow a project plan that starts from the “top down” on the T24 client (customized) design and then follows a logical sequence of steps that will ensure that you do not “build sideways” and wind up with a lot of disjointed if not disconnected processes when you are finished with your initial build of T24.

1. “Top down” – what does that mean
   • This means that you get your whole T24 design worked out so that you build it in this order after all of the business requirements are finalized and approved--
     • Accounting - general ledger - account number format
     • Customer info
     • Product info
     • Risk and credit limit info
     • Credit "tree" (products you track for credit lines)
     • Reporting (all reports in detail specified in detail)
     • Enquiries (goes with reports)
     • Interfaces to 3rd party systems
     • Documents and forms
     • Category numbers (very important)
     • Work flow and processes
     • Security profiles
2. “First steps” – where do you begin
   • Begin with the category numbers assignment
   • Then work out the lines in your general ledger
   • Then get the specs up on reports and the data you need in them and whether it is in T24 or not
   • Set up the customer info and profiles
   • Set up the account numbers
   • Set up the products vs the T24 modules you plan to build
3. “General Ledger – what does it need to do other than accounting
   • The general ledger is a report basically - it is "virtual" in T24 meaning that it is created in the End of Day run - it is NOT a database - remember that - it only comes at the close of business when you do the End of Day
4. “Product modules” – what do they have to do first
   • They must have the category ranges assigned to them as recommended by Temenos
5. “Accounting vs. Process” – which side “drives” the workflow in T24
   • T24 is NOT an accounting process driven system - it is a workflow or "process by steps" in a series of product entries type of system - accounting driven processes such as sweeps may be set up however
6. “Do I need reports” – what reporting generally involves FIRST in T24 before you set them up
   • Reporting in T24 is done via the Enquiries module - Reporting was turned off long ago - if you want to set up an interface to an outside reporting system such as one in SQL then you must set up connectors to the various data fields in T24 (in JBase) that you want to extract to SQL
7. “What about the documents and messages” – this is something that you need to plan for early in the build
   • T24 has a very poor documents production system internally - better you interface to a document module outside of T24 and set up documents and letters and such there - T24 uses an ancient VI (UNIX) word processing system
8. “Does T24 allow for additions” – Yes, which is why you “gap” the system parameters
   • We won't go into gapping here but learn what it is and use it religiously when you design and build T24
9. “What does End of Day run” do – A lot, read on . . . this can be the most complicated management issue in T24 if you have a sloppy system build (how to avoid crashes on EofD)
   • In short, End of Day is a process that updates the system and runs all of the data to calculate charges, fees and accruals and to post all of this information to the appropriate accounts and to set the system up for the next day's business day/date
10. “Do you think that the screens in T24 are easy to set up” – In general yes, but you need a clear set of data capture requirements first
    • They are if you plan in advance. Don't improvise. Have a fixed standard for screen design and appearance and follow it to the letter.