Set Up Resource Allocation

Article
03/21/2023

To ensure that a service task is performed well, it's important to find a resource who is qualified to do the work. You can set up Business Central so that it's easy to allocate someone who has the right skills for the job. In Business Central, we call this resource allocation. You can allocate resources based on their skill, availability, or whether they are in the same service zone as the customer.

To use resource allocation, you must set up:

The skills required to repair and maintain service items. You assign these to service items and resources.
Geographic regions, called zones, that you define for your market. For example, East, West, Central, and so on. You assign these to customers and resources.
Whether to display resource skills and zones, and whether to display a warning if someone chooses unqualified resource, or a resource that is not in the customer zone.

To set up skills

Choose the icon, enter Skills, and then choose the related link.
Fill in the fields as necessary. Hover over a field to read a short description.

To assign skills to service items and resources

Choose the icon, enter Service Items or Resources, and then choose the related link.
Open the card for the service item or resource, and then choose one of the following:
- For service items, choose Resource Skills.
- For resources, choose Skills.

To set up zones

Choose the icon, enter Zones, and then choose the related link.
Fill in the fields as necessary. Hover over a field to read a short description.

To assign zones to customers and resources

Choose the icon, enter Customers or Resources, and then choose the related link.
Open the card for the service item or resource, and then choose one of the following:
- For customers, choose a zone in the Service Zone Code field.
- For resources, choose the Service Zones action.

To specify what to show when a resource is chosen

Choose the icon, enter Service Management Setup, and then choose the related link.

In the Resource Skills Option field, choose one of the options described in the following table.

Option	Description
Code Shown	Displays the code only.
Warning Displayed	Shows the information and displays a warning if you choose a resource that is not qualified.
Not Used	Does not show this information.

To update resource capacity

You may need to change the capacity of resources.

Choose the icon, enter Resource Capacity, and then choose the related link.
Choose the resource, and then choose the Set Capacity action.
Make the changes, and then choose Update Capacity.

To update skills for items, service items, or service item groups

If you want to change the skill codes assigned to items, for example from PC to PCS, you can do so either for an item, service item, or for all items in a service item group.

Choose the icon, enter Items or Service Item, or Service Item Group, and then choose the related link.
Choose the entity to update, and then choose the Resource Skills action.
On the line with the code to be changed, in the Skill Code field, choose the relevant skill code.
If the item has associated service items, a dialogue box opens with the following two options:
- Change the skill codes to the selected value: Select this option if you want to replace the old skill code with the new one on all the related service items.
- Delete the skill codes or update their relation: Select this option if you want to change the skill code on this item only. The skill code on the related service items will be reassigned, that is, the Assigned From field will be updated.