PRJ2000: Work Total Greater Than Expected After You Remove Resource from Summary Task

In Microsoft Project, the total work value for a summary task may be greater than the sum of the work values for all resources assigned to the summary task and its subtasks.

This problem occurs when the following conditions are true:

1. A summary task has at least one resource assigned.
2. You remove one or more resources from the summary task by directly editing a task table, such as the table in the Task Sheet view or the table in the Gantt Chart view.
   
   For example, in the table of a Gantt Chart view, you delete one or more resource names from the Resource Names field for the summary task.

When you remove one or more resources from the summary task by directly editing a task table, the assignment work value for all the resources that you remove is not removed from the summary task. Instead, the assignment work value for at least one of the resources that you remove is transferred to the Unassigned resource, and the work value that is transferred to the Unassigned resource is still included in the total work value of the summary task.

To resolve this problem, obtain Microsoft Project 2000, Service Release 1 (SR-1).

To obtain SR-1, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Temporary Workaround

To temporarily work around this problem, use either of the following methods.

Method 1

Use the Assign Resources dialog box to assign and then remove a resource on the summary task that has the incorrect work value. To do this, follow these steps:

1. On the View menu, click Gantt Chart.
2. Select the summary task that has the incorrect work value.
3. On the Tools menu, point to Resources, and then click Assign Resources.
4. In the Assign Resources dialog box, click the name of a resource, and then click Assign.
   
   NOTE: The resource that you assign in this step can be any resource; it does not have to be the same resource that you previously removed.
5. Click Remove.
6. Click Close.

Method 2

Use the Resource Usage view to change the assignment work for the Unassigned resource associated with the summary task to zero. To do this, follow these steps:

1. On the View menu, click Resource Usage.
2. In the table portion of the view (left pane), under the Unassigned resource name, locate the summary task that has the incorrect work value.
3. Click in the Work field next to the summary task name, and then change the value to 0.
   
   NOTE: For these steps to work correctly, you must change the work value in the table portion of the view. Do not use the timescale portion of the view (right pane) to change the work value.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article. This problem was corrected in Microsoft Project 2000, Service Release 1 (SR-1).