SAP ESS Record Working Time: Understanding HR-Enabled CATS

I have been spending a great deal of time working in ESS/MSS recently and it surprised me how many people who use the ABAP WebDynpro version of Record Working Time or CATS on ESS do not have the “HR-Enabled CATS” functionality enabled. Many people I talked to worked in SAP daily had not even heard of the HR-Enabled CATS functionality even though they had been using CATS on ESS for years and it was a big part of their day to day operations.

It is important to understand that CATS or Cross Application Time Sheets was developed for and does involve modules outside of HCM and I am sure that was part of the reason some of this functionality was missing when SAP initially developed it and then SAP started to improve the integration with the HCM system and Time Management.

As SAP describes it, HR-Enabled CATS “integrates the HR and CATS systems”. This does not tell us too much and might help explain why so many people ignore the functionality and choose to leave it disabled or do not know to enable it. In this blog post, I am going to go into the details and to show the value this functionality adds to any SAP HCM system. Overall, the following functionality is enabled when you activate HR-Enabled CATS:

• Leave data such as vacation is automatically pulled into the time sheet
  • Entered directly on Infotype or via Approved Leave Request
• Holidays are pulled into the calendar and holiday hours are pulled into the time sheet
  • Configurable
• Time sheet due date is displayed in the time sheet
  • Configurable
• Time account balances are shown in the application via a separate tab to see your quota balances
• New “Work Schedule” button appears which has the details of your work schedule for the time sheet period being displayed

As you can see, there are a lot of changes and definitely some helpful value added functionality. Next, let’s talk about each functionality in greater detail including screenshots.

Leave Data Pulled into Time sheet

This change is to automatically pull in approved leave requests. The approved leaves can either be entered directly in IT2001/IT2002 via PA31/PA61/Time Manager’s Workplace or created via leave request once they are approved (If approval is necessary). To give an example of this functionality, let’s assume that I requested vacation for two days and it was approved by my manager and then via the standard process created on Infotype 2001. After this process concludes, when I look at this Infotype via PA20/PA51 I should now see the entries for the leave.

Now, if I do NOT have the HR-Enabled CATS functionality turned on then here is what I would see – nothing on those days although my time sheet would show a total of 24 hours scheduled for this week:

If I DO have the functionality turned on then I would see the following:

As you can see, the vacation entry was automatically pulled in and shown in the time sheet and it is not editable by the user. If the functionality was not turned on and I come back from my vacation, I may fill in time accidentally out of habit without realizing I was on vacation which results in inaccurate time and manual intervention in some cases.

Holidays Pulled into Calendar & Time sheet

This functionality is pretty self explanatory – when you have a holiday it will be shown on the calendar and in the time sheet. Let me once again showcase with and without the functionality turned on. You can see that the time sheet has a total of 32 scheduled hours, but you could forget that it is a holiday and enter time on that date incorrectly (You should at least get a warning message though). I will also note that the calendar shows it as a Non-Working Day.

Now lets look at it again but with the functionality turned on. I highlighted in red to show some of the key differences. The system automatically shows the entry in the time sheet. Once again, it is not editable by the user.

Time Sheet Due Date Shown

This is an optional item that you can choose to show so employees are aware of when their time sheet is due. Here is what it looks like if you do not have this functionality turned on. There is an empty space under the remark telling you when you can navigate to:

Here is what this functionality looks like when enabled. For the purposes of this demonstration, I set it up to use the end of the month as the due date, but you can configure it otherwise (Ex: End of Payroll period minus a few days) if you wish:

Time Balance shown in Application via Separate Tab

This is an area where someone can see their time accounts, or quota information within this application. Once again, here is what it looks like without HR-Enabled CATS turned on with an empty space next to the Calendar tab button:

Now here is what it looks like with the functionality turned on and the “Time Account” tab selected. I highlighted the key information which shows your quota information:

New Work Schedule Button

Last but certainly not least, there is an additional button for “Work Schedule” which will show your scheduled time if you click on it. Here is what is shown without the functionality enabled with no button between “Worklist” and “Template”:

Here is a screenshot of the button, as well as what comes up when you click the button:

You can see the import button that I highlighted in my screenshot above from this screen. If you click it, the system will automatically pull all of your scheduled time into the timesheet for you.

Overall, SAP delivered a lot of fantastic functionality with the HR-Enabled CATS functionality and it is definitely something that everyone should explore and have turned on because it provides a lot of value for very little effort. I continue to be surprised by the amount of people who do not know about this functionality and wanted to share a thorough document which shows the functionality in greater detail.