Set up deposit and bill payment approvals

A vendor deposit policy and a bill payment policy decide who signs off before money goes to a supplier. While a policy is on, a deposit or a bill can't have a payment recorded until it's approved. This page sets up both the way the chapter's example team does it: one tier, All amounts, approved by either Priya Shah or Sam Turner.

Before you begin

• You need to be an administrator, or have a role with Approval Policies → Edit rules (which includes View rules). See Approval permissions reference.
• If your account used amount-based levels under Settings → Purchasing → Payment Approvals before approval policies arrived, a policy may already be on. See If a policy is already on.
• Approvers must be users in your account, or members of a role you add. They need an email address to get approval emails.
• If you already use a Default payment approver (the default payer) under Settings → Purchasing → Payment Approvals, read What changes for your default payer first. Their job changes when the policy is on.

What each policy checks

Policy	The amount it matches to a tier	While the policy is on
Vendor deposits	The deposit amount	Vendor deposits must be approved before a payment can be recorded.
Bill payments	The bill's outstanding balance when payment approval is requested	Supplier bills must be approved before a payment can be recorded.

Tiers work the same way as on the purchase order policy: limits are inclusive and amounts are compared in your base currency. See Plan your tiers. A deposit or bill policy has no Re-approval or Applies to setting: any increase to an approved amount asks for approval again. See How re-approval works.

Steps

1. Go to Settings → Purchasing → Approval Policies.

2. Click the Vendor deposits tab.

   While the policy is off, the tab shows Vendor deposits don't need approval yet and explains that deposits follow your Payment Approvals settings.

3. Click Set up approvals.

   The policy turns on with one tier, named All amounts. The grey hint beside it reads Every amount. Nothing is saved until you click Save.

4. In the Approvers box, select Priya Shah and Sam Turner.

5. Leave Requires set to Any one, so either of them can approve a deposit.

6. Click the Bill payments tab.

7. Click Copy from Vendor deposits.

   You see Copied from Vendor deposits — review and save. The bill payment policy is now on, with the same tier and approvers. Check them before you save.

8. Click Save.

   One Save saves both tabs. You see Approval policy saved.

9. In the Approver email notifications card, click Turn on email for everyone.

   In-app alerts are easy to miss, and nobody gets approval emails until email is turned on, so a deposit or a bill payment can wait unseen and hold up a supplier. If you turned email on for Priya Shah and Sam Turner while setting up purchase orders, the card already shows All approvers get emails. Email is set per person, so it covers every policy they're on. See Get approval requests by email.

Copy a policy from another tab

The Copy from… button in each tab's Policy card lists the other two policies, each with its number of tiers. A policy with No tiers set up yet can't be copied. While a policy is off and another policy has tiers, its tab also shows a Copy from button next to Set up approvals.

Copying:

• Replaces the tab's tiers and approvers with the other policy's.
• Copies the Self-approval and Reminders rules.
• Doesn't copy the purchase order policy's Re-approval or Applies to rows, because deposits and bills don't have them.
• Turns the policy on.
• Saves nothing until you click Save.

Copying from Purchase orders brings both purchase order tiers with it. To cut it down to one All amounts tier, open the first tier's Tier actions menu (…) and click Delete tier, then add Priya Shah to the remaining tier. The last tier can't be deleted (The no-limit tier can't be deleted), so delete the tiers above it.

If a policy is already on

Accounts that had amount-based payment approval levels for vendor deposits or supplier bills found the matching policy already switched on when approval policies were released. It was converted from those levels so payments keep going to the same people:

• Each band between two level thresholds became a tier, and each level that applied in that band became a step, in the old order. Amounts below the lowest threshold go to the default payer, or are auto-approved when no default payer was set.
• Self-approval is Allow — the requester counts like any other approver and reminders are off, because the old levels didn't have those rules.
• Payment requests that were waiting at the time became approval requests under the new policy.
• The old thresholds were compared in each document's own currency. The policy compares amounts in your base currency, so check the tier limits if you pay suppliers in other currencies.

Review the converted policy on each tab and adjust it like any other.

What changes for your default payer

Settings → Purchasing → Payment Approvals has a Default payment approver for Vendor Deposits and another for Supplier Bills. Without a policy, that person gets every payment request, whatever the amount, and approves and records the payment.

While a policy is on, the policy decides who approves, and the default payer's role changes:

• The Rules card on the policy tab says: While this policy is on, the default payer in Payment Approvals is only notified when a deposit is approved and ready to pay. It no longer decides who approves. The bill payments tab says the same about bills.
• The Payment Approvals page shows Approvals for vendor deposits are controlled by the Approval Policy. The default payer below is notified when a deposit is approved and ready to pay.
• The default payer hears about it through the Approval Decision alert. That alert isn't in the policy's email card, so they turn on its email themselves under Settings → Alerts & Notifications → My Notifications.
• If the default payer should approve as well, add them to the policy's tiers.

Turn a policy off and deposits or bills go back to your Payment Approvals settings. See Change or turn off a policy.

What people see after you save

• When Dana Reyes opens a deposit that hasn't been submitted, its note names the approvers and the tier: Submitting sends the payment request to Priya Shah or Sam Turner (All amounts). The tier of a one-tier policy is called All amounts in notes, the queue, alerts and emails.
• On a bill, the payment button reads Submit for Approval, and its tooltip says no money moves until the payment is approved.
• Someone who can approve the amount themselves sees Approve for Payment on a bill instead, because submitting approves it in one click.
• An amount in an auto-approve band is approved as soon as it's submitted. To set one up, see Skip approval for small amounts.

Next steps

• Request and approve a vendor deposit payment
• Request and approve a bill payment
• Set approval rules, for self-approval and reminders on each policy.
• Get approval requests by email
• Manage vendor deposits and Track and pay purchase invoices, for the deposit and bill basics.