New Features and Enhancements in Services CPQ January 2024

The following new features have been introduced in the January 2024 release of Services CPQ.

If you are upgrading from a previous version, see Upgrading to Services CPQ January 2024. This provides a summary of the items that have been added for each feature and details of any required upgrade steps.

Guided Scoping

We have introduced guided scoping, which enables you to automatically create estimates and their records according to your responses to the estimate's requirements. By significantly reducing the time required for estimate creation, guided scoping enhances efficiency and mitigates the risk of variability in your organization's estimates.

An administrator defines requirements and their responses, as well as actions that run when the estimate is created. This can range from running a flow to modifying field values. For more information, see Guided Scoping Overview.

Retaining Desired Schedules with Estimate Actions

We have introduced the following changes so that the desired role request schedules are retained when using the Move Estimate Dates action on an estimate:

  • The schedules created for role requests in the Hours Breakdown view are now offset when the dates are moved.
  • To accommodate this change to the Move Estimate Dates action, we have changed the way that this action is processed so that volumes are unaffected. You will now receive a notification when the Move Estimate Dates action has finished processing, and you can't move the dates of an estimate that is currently being processed by another action. This is the same behavior as other actions, such as Create Project and Add to Opportunity.
  • We have created the Move Estimate Dates Asynchronously custom action, which uses the new processing method of the Move Estimate Dates action. For more information, see Custom Actions.

For more information, see Changing Estimate Dates.

We have also added support for copying schedules created in the Hours Breakdown view when creating an estimate from a template, adding to an estimate from a template, and adding estimate products to an estimate. You can choose whether schedules are included when using the custom actions and APIs for creating an estimate from a template and adding to an estimate from a template. For more information, see Permission Sets and Other Technical Documentation.

Estimate Record Page Usability Enhancements

We have made the following enhancements to the Estimate record page:

  • We have renamed the Push to Opportunity action to Add to Opportunity to enable you to better identify the function of the action. For more information, see Adding an Estimate to an Opportunity.
  • We have enabled the Estimate Builder to be larger on the Estimate record page by removing the side panel.
  • We have moved the Add from Template, Manage Products, Move Estimate Dates, Refresh Rates, and Mass Adjust Rates actions into the button bar in the Estimate Builder.
  • The Add to Opportunity, Create Project, Add to Existing Project, and Create Template from Estimate actions are now quick actions on the Estimate record page.
  • We have added a new Cost Contingency section in the Details tab on the Estimate record page. For more information, seeConfiguring an Estimate and Discounting Estimates.

Cloning Estimates to Different Opportunities

You can now clone an estimate to any opportunity that is in the same currency as the source estimate. Previously, you could only clone estimates to a new estimate associated with the same opportunity as the source estimate. For more information, see Cloning an Estimate.

The Stage, Approval Status, and Opportunity Product fields are now excluded by default when cloning an estimate. An administrator can control the fields that are excluded from cloning using the Estimate Fields Excluded From Cloning field set. For more information, see Estimate Field Sets.

Custom Action in Services CPQ – Salesforce CPQ Connector

We have created an invocable method for retrieving unsynced service quote lines from a quote that you can use within Salesforce Flow Builder. For more information, see Custom Actions.

Field Mappings in Services CPQ – Salesforce CPQ Connector

We have created the Estimate Product Instance to Quote Line Mappings page, which enables administrators to map fields on an estimate product instance to fields on a quote line. This ensures the required data is transferred from the estimate product instance to the appropriate fields on the quote line. The page can be accessed by navigating to the Est Prod Instance to Quote Line Mappings tab, or using the link on the Services CPQ Administration page. For more information, see Services CPQ Administration.

Permissions

For information about the changes to permissions in this release, see Permission Sets and Other Technical Documentation.

Fixes

Fixes are listed on the Known Issues page of the Certinia Community. You can access this page from the Community Support Hub. For a brief description of the issues that have been fixed in this version of Services CPQ, see the relevant section of the Known Issues page.