Approval Rules

Note: We're introducing approval rule groups which requires new settings around approval rules. Don’t see these yet? Approval rule groups in Expense management settings is currently in Limited Availability (LA) for some of our customers. Expect a wider release soon.

Approval rules route invoice requests to selected reviewers. To quickly locate a specific rule, search or filter.

To add new approval rules, as well as edit and delete existing ones, select Expenses, Settings, Approval rules.

Make sure your organization has defined its routing process so that you can configure your approval rules. For example, you might have one set of reviewers for travel invoice requests, and a different set of reviewers for invoice requests over a specific dollar amount. You can attach an approval rule to any invoice request and forward the request to specific reviewers in the correct order.

  1. From Expenses, Settings, Approval rules, select Add.

  2. Enter a name and description, and specify if the approval rule is for invoice requests, purchase requests, or both.

  3. Define approval levels for the rule. When adding or editing a level, consider the following:

    • Each approval level should contain the amount and each approver required to complete the approval process. For example, if you require three approvers for a specific amount, enter the amount and add all three approvers to the same level. Don't create a new level for each approver.

    • Approval rules can have multiple levels if necessary. For example, to associate specific reviewers to different amounts, create multiple levels.

  4. For customers who are working with approval rule groups (in LA as noted above), select Edit groups to determine which approval rule groups you want to associate with this approval rule. This list only displays the approval rule groups added from the new Approval rule groups tab and are no longer tied to the security groups you previously configured in database view.

  5. For customers who are not working with approval rule groups yet, you can continue to specify which security groups have access to the rule. Select Edit groups to make your selections.

    Tip: You can continue creating security groups in database view (Accounts Payable, Administration). By creating a security group and assigning users, you determine the type of access your users have. Properly setting up security ensures that users can access only the areas that you specify.

  6. Select Save.

You may need to update a rule's name and description, or change approval levels. To update, select Edit next to a rule's menu.

To delete, select Delete next to a rule's menu. Note that you can't delete a rule if it's currently in use.

Tip: Before you delete, confirm that the rule isn't associated with an invoice request.

Tip: Approval rule groups must be associated with at least one rule. If you remove an approval rule group's association with a rule, and the group isn't associated with any other rule, the group is permanently deleted.