Approvals

An approval policy decides who has to sign off before a purchase order is opened or sent, a vendor deposit is paid, or a supplier bill is paid, based on the amount. You set the policies under Settings → Purchasing → Approval Policies, and approvers work through everything waiting on them under Orders → Approvals.

Turn on approval emails

Approvers always get an in-app alert, but alerts are easy to miss. Email for approval alerts is off until someone turns it on, so finish your set-up by turning it on for every approver. See Get approval requests by email.

Understand approvals

To…	Go to…
learn how policies, tiers and steps decide who approves	How approvals work
learn which edits send an approved document back for approval	How re-approval works

Set up approvals

To…	Go to…
build amount tiers and approvers for purchase orders, and test an amount	Set up purchase order approvals
require sign-off before a deposit or a bill is paid	Set up deposit and bill payment approvals
choose whether requesters can approve their own requests, and set reminders and the re-approval tolerance	Set approval rules
decide whether imported, reordered, forecast and dropship purchase orders need approval	Choose which purchase orders need approval
make sure approvers get requests and reminders by email	Get approval requests by email

Request and approve

To…	Go to…
send a draft purchase order for approval, or approve it in one click	Request approval for a purchase order
review what's waiting on you, then approve or reject it	Approve or reject a request
approve or reject many requests at once	Approve requests in bulk
request payment for a vendor deposit, then approve it and record the payment	Request and approve a vendor deposit payment
request approval to pay a bill, then approve it and pay within the approved amount	Request and approve a bill payment
take back a request, or nudge the approvers	Withdraw a request or send a reminder

Keep approvals moving

To…	Go to…
let a colleague approve for you while you're away	Hand off approvals while you're away
finish a stuck request that nobody can approve, with override rights	Override or re-route a stuck request
edit a policy while requests are waiting, or turn a policy off	Change or turn off a policy
find the cause and the fix when approval emails don't arrive, a purchase order skipped approval, or nobody can approve	Troubleshoot approvals

Look it up

To…	Go to…
read any approval status, chip or headline	Approval status reference
check every setting and validation message on the policy page	Policy settings reference
look up the queue's columns, filters and row actions	Approvals queue reference
see who gets each approval alert, and what it says	Approval alerts reference
see which permissions manage policies, and why none of them lets anyone approve	Approval permissions reference
find out why Approve is unavailable, or what an unapproved document can't do	Approval messages reference

Policies, requests and delegations are also available over the SKU.io API, where the same policy rules apply. See the API reference at developer.sku.io.