/approvals
Some actions are deliberately not granted to one person end to end. Instead of firing directly they
create an approval request, and someone with the right authority decides. The decision, the
decider and the reason are recorded on the underlying record.
What routes for approval
Low-impact confirmations — sending a single reminder on a case you are assigned — stay one-click
actions. The distinction is deliberate: routing everything through approvals makes approval
meaningless.
The approvals inbox
Filter by module, entity type, action type and status to work one kind of decision at a time —
approving twenty expenses in a row is faster and more consistent than context-switching.
Deciding
1
Open the review
Open Review shows the request in context, including a preview of what will be sent or
posted where the action produces a document or a message.
2
Check the substance, not just the amount
For an expense: is it attributed to the right unit, with the vendor’s invoice attached? For a
demand letter: are the figures and the tenant’s details right?
3
Approve or reject
Rejection requires a reason. Write it for the person who has to act on it.
4
Confirm the outcome
Approval triggers the action. Check the underlying record shows it happened.
The actions available to you on a request are computed by the server, not by the browser. The
buttons you can see are the buttons you may actually use — if an approve button is absent, you do
not hold that authority for that request.
What happens on a decision
Because the action is staged rather than duplicated, there is no risk of the action happening
twice or of an approved action being forgotten.
Delegation and policy
Approval policies define what routes where, and delegation covers absence. Both are administrator configuration — a manager on leave with no delegate is the most common cause of a stalled approval queue.Working the queue well
1
Work by SLA, not by date
The age column exists so the oldest request does not quietly become the most urgent.
2
Batch by type
All expenses, then all credit notes. Consistency of judgement improves markedly.
3
Reject with substance
“Rejected” with no reason produces a resubmission of exactly the same request.
4
Watch the volume
A rising approval queue usually means a threshold is set too low, not that the team is
misbehaving.