Setup Considerations: Revenue Recognition Schedules

You can use this topic to help make decisions when planning your configuration and use of Revenue Recognition Schedules. It explains:

Why to set it up.

How it fits into the rest of Workday.

Downstream impacts and cross-product interactions.

Security requirements and business process configurations.

Questions and limitations to consider before implementation.

Refer to detailed task instructions for full configuration details.

What It Is

You can create a schedule to recognize your revenue:

For individual transactions.

Independently from billing status.

Over multiple periods.

You can also configure templates with preselected values. Workday creates a revenue recognition schedule using the parameters at the same time as your other items, such as your customer contracts.

Business Benefits

Revenue recognition schedules:

Make it easier to automate period end accounting.

Dictate timing and the amount of revenue recognition.

Align with your selected accounting policies.

Use Cases

As a revenue accountant, you need to recognize revenue for deferred and accrued items. Workday enables you to create revenue recognition schedules for:

Awards.

Billable transactions.

Customer contracts.

Customer invoices.

Questions to Consider

Question	Considerations
When do you want to recognize revenue?	When you select a Revenue Recognition Method of Transaction , you’re able to select the Independent Revenue Processing check box on your revenue recognition schedule. When you select this check box, Workday will process the revenue even when billing isn’t complete.
Do you amend your customer contracts?	Workday updates the revenue recognition schedule when you select the Automatically Regenerate Installments check box on your revenue recognition schedule. Workday only regenerates installments when you: Use a revenue recognition method of Spread Even or Number of Days . Make changes to the contract line amount or worktags. Don't have your contract amendments on a business process for approval.
How do you recognize revenue?	If your company doesn't have guidelines for revenue recognition, we provide a reference topic covering revenue recognition methods.

Recommendations

Functionality	Considerations
Milestones	Assign a milestone to your revenue recognition schedules and templates if you don't want revenue recognition to occur before certain events dictated by you or your customer.
Schedule Type	Select a schedule type when you create your revenue recognition schedules and templates for improved reporting capabilities. Workday uses this field to group your revenue recognition schedules and templates.
Templates	Instead of creating the same revenue recognition schedules multiple times, Workday recommends that you create a template to improve efficiency.

Requirements

Feature	Considerations
Billable Transactions	When you update your billable transactions, your revenue recognition schedule doesn't update. Access the Create Revenue Installments for Billable Transactions task to update your revenue recognition installments.
Contract Rate Sheets	When you update your contract rate sheets, your revenue recognition schedule doesn't update. Access the Schedule Revenue Installments for Billable Transactions task to update your revenue recognition installments.

Limitations

Feature	Considerations
Intercompany worktags	Your revenue recognition schedule won't display any worktags if there’s an intercompany worktag. The worktags carry from your source transactions to the revenue recognition accounting that you create from your revenue installments.
Multiple-element revenue allocation	When you run multiple-element revenue allocation on a contract, you can't use the percent complete method for your schedule.

Tenant Setup

No impact.

Security

Domains	Considerations
Process: Revenue Schedule - Cancel in the Customer Contracts and Project Billing functional areas.	Cancel revenue recognition schedules for customer contracts.
Process: Revenue Schedule - Core in the Customer Contracts and Project Billing functional areas.	Create revenue recognition schedules for customer contracts.
Set Up: Customer Accounts in the Customer Accounts functional area. Process: Customer Invoice - View in the Customer Accounts functional area.	Import and export templates for revenue recognition schedules.
Set Up: Customer Contracts - Templates and Types in the Customer Contracts and Project Billing functional areas.	Create templates for revenue recognition schedules.

Business Processes

You can configure the Revenue Recognition Schedule Event
business process to enable you to create and approve revenue recognition schedules.

Reporting

You can use the Revenue dashboard to:

Create revenue recognition schedules and templates.

Access reporting on your revenue recognition schedules and templates.

You can use the

Revenue Recognition Schedules

report data source to create custom reports for revenue recognition schedules and templates.

Integrations

Web Services	Considerations
Cancel Revenue Recognition Schedule	Enables you to cancel your existing revenue recognition schedules.
Get Revenue Recognition Schedules	Retrieves revenue recognition schedules according to selected criteria.
Get Revenue Recognition Schedule Templates	Retrieves templates for revenue recognition schedules according to selected criteria.
Put Revenue Recognition Schedule Template	Adds or updates templates for revenue recognition schedules.
Submit Revenue Recognition Schedule	Adds or updates revenue recognition schedules and submits them to the Revenue Recognition Schedule business process.

Connections and Touchpoints

Features	Considerations
Customer Accounts	Nonproject related items that you recognize revenue for come from the Customer Accounts functional area.
Expenses	Workday uses project expenses to create revenue recognition schedules.
Financial Accounting	You create revenue recognition journals by using revenue recognition schedules.
Projects	You create revenue recognition schedules from customer contracts created for billable projects.
Project Billing	You create revenue recognition schedules from billable project time and expenses.
Time Tracking	You use the time tracked for billable projects to create revenue recognition schedule.

Workday offers a Touchpoints Kit with resources to help you understand configuration relationships in your tenant. Learn more about the Workday Touchpoints Kit on Workday Community.

Create Revenue Recognition Schedules for Customer Contracts