Approval alerts reference
Approvals tell people what's waiting on them with alerts. Every approval alert shows under the bell and on the Alerts page. It's also emailed, but only to people who have turned on email for it, and email starts off for everyone. This page lists each approval alert, who gets it, what it says, and how its delivery works.
The examples use Priya Shah (purchasing manager and administrator, approves purchase orders up to $10,000), Dana Reyes (the buyer who raises purchase orders, deposits and bill payments) and Sam Turner (the owner and an administrator, the only approver above $10,000).
To turn approval emails on, see Get approval requests by email.
The approval alerts at a glance
All approval alerts are in the Purchase Orders group of Settings → Alerts & Notifications, and each carries the Approval tag on the Alerts page. Names in the first column are as they appear in My Notifications and Alert Preferences.
| Alert | Sent when | Sent to | Priority | Covered by the policy page's email switch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Approval Requested | A request starts, or moves on to its next step | Everyone who can approve the current step right now, and anyone covering for them as a delegate | High | Yes |
| Approval Reminder | A request has waited longer than the policy's reminder interval, or the requester clicks Send reminder | Everyone who can still approve the current step, and their delegates | High | Yes |
| Approval Overridden | A request is approved with Override approve | Everyone who could still have approved it, and the requester | High | Yes |
| Approval Decision | A request is approved or rejected, or a deposit or bill payment is ready to pay | The requester, and the default payer for deposits and bill payments | Normal | No |
| Approval Escalated | A request runs out of reminders, or nobody is left who can approve it | Administrators and anyone with Approval Policies → Override & re-route | High | No |
| Payment Recorded Outside Approval | A bill payment synced from your accounting system wasn't covered by an approved payment request | Administrators, and every approver on the bill payment policy | High | No |
The Approver email notifications card on Settings → Purchasing → Approval Policies turns email on or off for the three alerts an approver needs: Approval Requested, Approval Reminder and Approval Overridden. Everyone, approvers included, sets the other three for themselves in My Notifications.
Default delivery
| Setting | Default | Where to change it |
|---|---|---|
| In-app | On | Each person, in My Notifications |
| Off | Each person, in My Notifications. For approvers, an administrator can also use the switches on the policy page. | |
| Frequency | Instant | Each person picks Instant, Daily Digest or Weekly Digest in My Notifications. The policy page's switch always sets Instant. |
Approval emails go to the email address on the person's user account. Someone without an email address gets in-app alerts only, and shows No email on the policy page's card.
In-app and email are independent. Turning off In-app for an approval alert doesn't stop its email, and turning off Email doesn't remove it from the bell.
What an approval email contains
Each person's approval email greets them by name, for example Hello Priya Shah!, and carries the same message as the alert, for example Dana Reyes requested approval for PO-0064 · Cuddlebug Clothing Co. (4,280.00 USD, Up to $10,000). Then it shows:
- a line with the amount and the tier, for example Amount: 4,280.00 USD · Tier: Up to $10,000
- the requester's note, after Note from the requester:, when they left one
- a button at the end, such as Review & approve, which opens the purchase order, deposit or bill with its approval ready to review
The email subject is the alert title, a dash, and the document, for example Purchase order approval needed — PO-0064 · Cuddlebug Clothing Co. A copy sent to a shared address under Email Recipients is the same email, greeted Hello!. A Daily Digest or Weekly Digest email lists the alerts in a summary instead.
Amounts show in the document's currency. When that differs from your base currency, the base amount follows in brackets, for example 11,400.00 EUR (12,431.70 USD).
Approval emails and alerts are notices. Their button opens the document's Approval card, or Orders → Approvals for the import alert, where you decide in the app. SKU.io checks your right to approve at that moment, so a link from an old email can't approve something you're no longer allowed to, and an alert never approves anything for you. Replying to an approval email does nothing.
Each alert in detail
The table for each alert below also quotes the description that sits under the alert's name in My Notifications.
Approval Requested
| Title | Purchase order approval needed, Vendor deposit approval needed or Bill payment approval needed |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when a purchase order, vendor deposit or bill payment needs your approval under an Approval Policy (or reaches your step). Sent directly to the approvers who can act on it, and their delegates. |
| Message | Requester requested approval for document (amount, tier). |
| Example | Dana Reyes requested approval for PO-0064 · Cuddlebug Clothing Co. (4,280.00 USD, Up to $10,000). |
| Email button | Review & approve |
| Why you get this | Sent directly to you |
- It goes to the people who can approve the current step. For PO-0064 that's Priya and Sam. For PO-0065, which is over $10,000, it's Sam only.
- On a request with several steps, it's sent again to the next step's approvers when each step finishes.
- Anyone covering an approver's requests as a delegate gets it too.
- When a request was raised automatically, for example by auto-reorder or a forecast schedule, the message starts An automated process requested approval for…
- When you approve a purchase order yourself in one click, no request alert goes out, because there's nothing left to approve.
One alert per import
When a purchase order import sends several purchase orders for approval at once, each approver gets one alert instead of one per purchase order:
| Title | N approvals waiting on you |
| Message | N documents from a purchase order import await your approval. |
| Lists up to 10 of the purchase orders, then …and n more. | |
| Email button | Open the Approvals queue |
An approver with only one purchase order from that import gets the normal Approval Requested alert. The import alert counts as Approval Requested, so the same email setting covers it.
Approval Reminder
| Title | Reminder: Purchase order awaiting your approval (or Vendor deposit, Bill payment) |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when an approval request has waited on you longer than the policy's reminder interval. |
| Message | Document (amount) is still waiting on your approval. |
| Email button | Review & approve |
- Automatic reminders follow the policy's Reminders rule: every set number of hours, up to a set number of times. Weekends don't count toward the hours. When the hours are left blank, no automatic reminders go out.
- Manual reminders go out when the requester clicks Send reminder on the Approval card. Administrators and anyone with Approval Policies → Override & re-route can send one too. One can be sent every 4 hours.
- A reminder goes to everyone who can approve the current step at that moment, including delegates.
Approval Overridden
| Title | Purchase order approval overridden (or Vendor deposit, Bill payment) |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when an administrator, or someone with the Approval Policies "Override & re-route" permission, overrides an approval request. Sent to the approvers who could still have approved it and the requester. |
| Message | Name overrode the approval of document (amount). Reason: reason |
| Email button | Open purchase order (or Open vendor deposit, Open bill payment) |
It goes to everyone who could still have approved any step that was open, and to the requester. The requester gets this alert instead of an Approval Decision alert. For a deposit or bill payment, the default payer also gets the ready-to-pay alert described below.
Approval Decision
| Title | Purchase order approved or Purchase order rejected (or Vendor deposit, Bill payment) |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when an approval request you raised is approved or rejected. Also tells the default payer when a deposit or bill payment is approved and ready to pay. |
| Message | Approver approved document (amount). For a rejection, Approver rejected document (amount). Reason: reason |
| Example | Sam Turner rejected PO-0063 · Baby Bumble (6,900.00 USD). Reason: Hold until the spring catalogue is confirmed. |
| Email button | Open purchase order (or Open vendor deposit, Open bill payment) |
- It goes to the person who raised the request when the final step is approved, or when anyone rejects it.
- You don't get it for a decision you made yourself.
- When an automated request is rejected, there's no requester to tell, so the alert goes to that step's approvers and to administrators instead.
Ready to pay. When a vendor deposit or bill payment is fully approved, overridden, or goes through an Auto-approve tier, the default payer set in Settings → Purchasing → Payment Approvals gets Vendor deposit approved — ready to pay or Bill payment approved — ready to pay. The payer doesn't get it when they made the final approval or the override themselves, because they already know. Nobody gets it when no default payer is set.
Approval Escalated
| Title | Purchase order approval is stuck (or Vendor deposit, Bill payment) |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when an approval request has run out of reminders, or no one is eligible to approve it. Sent to administrators and anyone with the Approval Policies "Override & re-route" permission, so they can re-route or override it. |
| Message | Document (amount) needs attention: reason Re-route or override it from the document. |
| Email button | Open approval |
The reason is one of these:
| Reason in the message | What happened |
|---|---|
| it has waited through every reminder without a decision. | Every automatic reminder went out and nobody decided. |
| no one is currently eligible to approve it. | The request reached a step with nobody who can approve it, for example because the only approver is the requester and the policy says they can never approve their own request. |
| nobody is left who can approve its current step. | Everyone who could approve the current step has since left the company's account, lost the role that listed them, or been removed. This is checked every hour, even when reminders are off. |
Once a request has escalated, the Approval card shows that it was escalated to admins, and no more automatic reminders go out for it. The request stays where it is until someone acts. To act on it, see Override or re-route a stuck request.
Payment Recorded Outside Approval
| Title | Payment recorded outside approval |
| Description in My Notifications | Triggered when a supplier payment synced from your accounting system was recorded on a bill without an approved payment request. Sent to administrators and the bill payment policy's approvers. |
| Message | A payment of amount on bill was synced from your accounting system without an approved payment request. |
| Email subject | Payment recorded outside approval — bill number |
| Email button | Open bill |
It applies only while the bill payment policy is on. The payment is never blocked, because the money has already moved. It's kept so the bill's balance stays right, and it shows a Paid outside approval chip on the bill's payments. Hover over the chip to read Recorded in your accounting system without an approved payment request. It was kept so the bill's balance stays right — review it with whoever approves bill payments.
Who sees each alert in My Notifications
My Notifications lists only the alerts you're in the audience for. Having a row doesn't mean you get every alert of that kind: approval alerts go to the people each request involves. The row lets you choose how they reach you. Under each alert, Why you get this: says why the row is there.
| Alert | You see the row when | Typical Why you get this |
|---|---|---|
| Approval Requested, Approval Reminder, Approval Overridden | You're listed on a policy that's on, directly or through a role, or you're covering someone's approvals as a delegate right now. Administrators always see them. | You approve, or cover approvals for someone, under an approval policy |
| Approval Decision | You've raised an approval request, you're a default payer, your role can edit purchase orders, or you're an administrator. | Sent directly to you, or You have the "Purchase Orders → Edit" permission |
| Approval Escalated | Administrators and anyone with Approval Policies → Override & re-route. | You're an administrator, or You have the "Approval Policies → Override & re-route" permission |
| Payment Recorded Outside Approval | You're an administrator. | You're an administrator |
A requester who isn't an approver doesn't see the Approval Overridden row, so they get that alert in the app only. Approver rows appear only while a policy you're on is switched on.
Which emails each person should turn on
The policy page's switch covers approvers. Everyone else turns on the emails that matter to them in My Notifications:
| Person | Turn on email for | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A delegate, such as Jordan Lee covering for Priya | Approval Requested and Approval Reminder | Delegates get the approver rows only while the hand-off is running, and they're not listed on the policy page's email card. See Hand off approvals while you're away. |
| A requester, such as Dana Reyes | Approval Decision | To hear when they can send the order or pay the supplier. |
| The default payer set under Settings → Purchasing → Payment Approvals | Approval Decision | To hear when a deposit or bill payment is ready to pay. |
| Administrators and anyone with Approval Policies → Override & re-route | Approval Escalated | A stuck request waits until someone overrides or re-routes it. See Override or re-route a stuck request. |
Presets
The Presets buttons at the top of My Notifications change which alerts show in the app. They keep your email choices, including approval emails an administrator turned on for you from the policy page. The confirmation reads This changes which alerts show in the app. Your email choices are kept.
| Preset | Effect on approval alerts |
|---|---|
| Everything | In-app on for every approval alert. Email unchanged. |
| Important only | In-app stays on for the high-priority approval alerts. Approval Decision, which is normal priority, stops showing in the app. Email unchanged. |
| Critical only | In-app turns off for every approval alert, because none of them is critical. Email unchanged. If your approval email is off too, you only find requests through the count on Orders → Approvals. |
Company-wide settings that still apply
An administrator's settings in Settings → Alerts & Notifications → Alert Preferences sit above each person's choices:
- Turning an approval alert off there stops it for everyone, in the app and by email. Each person's row then shows Disabled company-wide. Leave the approval alerts on while you use approvals.
- Email Recipients and Slack Channel send every alert of that type to a shared inbox or channel. That's different from the per-person email above, which only goes to the people the alert is for.
- Who receives sets the audience. Approval Escalated and Payment Recorded Outside Approval go to that audience. The other four approval alerts always go only to the people involved in the request. Adding someone to their audience adds the row to that person's My Notifications, but doesn't send them other people's requests.
For how those settings work, see Choose which alerts your team gets.
Older purchase order approval alerts
Purchase Order Approval Requested and Purchase Order Approval Decision belong to the simpler purchase order approval used while the purchase order policy is off. While the policy is on they never fire, so My Notifications hides them and shows only the approval alerts on this page.