Work Order Procedures

Description

WORK ORDER PROCEDURE WORKSHOP
March 12-13, 2025 (W 9-4:30 Th 8-12) 
Stearns Electric Association
29643 Frontage Rd
St Joseph, MN 56374

Who should attend:
Co-op employees at all levels
This course is for all employees of rural utilities who have any part of the plant construction process. This course stresses the importance of each participant in the process and asks staff to think about their eventual impact on the cost of Total Utility Plant and the recovery of that plant through the rates of the system’s members. For almost all electric cooperatives and utilities, their biggest investment is the electric infrastructure assets including poles, wire, and transformers needed to deliver electricity. It’s a complex process to take raw materials, labor and overheads and convert them to our organization’s largest asset. This workshop will provide an overall understanding of the Work Order system, how the investment gets paid for, and an exploration of numerous components within the Work Order system.

Description:
· Gain an understanding of 740c codes including new construction, system replacements, and retirement of plant. What is a work order, unit, assembly, and CPR’s (continuing property records). Understand when to capitalize costs or expense jobs. What’s so special about special equipment? What about depreciation? What is the impact of using contract labor versus in house labor?

· Not only is the work order accounting system complex, it’s expensive. How are we going to pay for this infrastructure investment? What about repairs and maintenance? And storms? Or Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) payments from a declared disaster? How about contributions in aid of construction (CIAC)? How do rates recover all these costs?

· When does work order needs to be set up? What do I need to know about a staking sheet? Other topics will include inventory, overhead allocations and factors, closing of work orders, stores expense, standard costs, and internal controls.

Together, we will step through this intricate process to understand the components, as well as understand how it shows up on the monthly billing statement to the consumer!

Key Topics:

• Understanding work order components
• Labor
• Material
• Overhead
• The work order chain of events – Who does what and when?
• Inventory
• Assembly Units
• Continuing Property Records
• Let’s get out to the field
• Identifying assets versus maintenance work
• Process for handling each
• General work order procedures
• Opening and closing of work orders
• Retirement
• Construction
• Assignment and approval best practices
• Staking/assembly updates
• Inventory reconciliation
• Finished and unfished jobs
• Charging time and equipment
• Completing/closing a work order
• Accounting and depreciation concepts
• Unitization
• Converting from assemblies to assets
• Correlating work order costs to asset categories
• Debrief process
• Standard costs
• The cost of work orders
• How does the utility pay for system improvements and maintenance?
• Ratepayer impact – who and how are we paying for this?
• Impact of financing/borrowing versus collecting through rates
• Correlation of the Form 7 to system improvement and maintenance decisions
  

What To Bring:
Participants are asked to have a calculator and your system’s most recent year end Form 7.
Additional/optional information – bring the total amount collected in CIAC – Contribution in Aid of Construction over all

Cost:
$658 Education Member
$758 Non  Education Member

Location:
Stearns Electric Association
29643 Frontage Road
St Joseph, MN 56374

EVENT POLICIES

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MREA EVENT CODE OF CONDUCT (LINK TO FULL POLICY)
MREA is committed to providing a safe, productive and welcoming environment for all participants and staff in MREA meetings, conferences, training programs, and events both online and in-person. All Event participants including but not limited to attendees, speakers, exhibitors, staff, students, guests and vendors, are expected to abide by this MREA Event Code of Conduct, and this code applies to all space and situations in which MREA meeting-related activities are being conducted, including virtual meetings and those sponsored by organizations other than MREA but held in conjunction with MREA Events. Participation constitutes agreement to comply with the Code of Conduct as a condition of attendance. 

2025 LATE REGISTRATION
All events in 2025 will be subject to a $50 late registration fee for anyone that registers less than 2 weeks prior to the published event dates.