Overview of Purchase Approval

Continia Document Capture features a full approval workflow that enables you to approve documents after they’ve been received, scanned, and registered. This covers three overall methods of approval, multiple additional approval features and options, and two different approval clients, all to ensure that you get the flexibility you need to decide what's right for your particular organization.

For an overview of the various aspects of Document Capture purchase approval, check out the table below:

Standard Purchase Approval

With standard purchase approval, the approval workflow of any document submitted for approval is determined by the total amount of the document and the purchaser code you apply to it.

The document is initially routed to the approver that is associated with the entered purchaser code, and if the document amount is within the approver's approval limit, the approver can approve the document and end the approval process. If, on the other hand, the document amount exceeds the approver's approval limit, the document is forwarded to the manager of the approver instead. In case the manager doesn't have sufficient approval limit either, the document is then routed to the manager's manager, and so on until an approver with sufficient approval limit has been identified.

Note that this article uses purchase invoices to describe the application of standard purchase approval, but the functionality is equally applicable to credit memos.

To initiate standard purchase approval for an invoice

You initiate standard purchase approval for an invoice simply by applying a purchaser code to it. This is typically done during the field-capturing process that follows after document scanning and import.

To apply a purchaser code to an invoice, do as follows:

1. Follow the usual procedure for capturing fields:

   1. Choose the  icon, enter Document Categories, and then choose the related link.

   2. Select the PURCHASE code to open the document journal for purchase documents.

   3. In the list of documents displayed in the document journal, select the invoice for which you want to capture fields.

2. To apply a purchaser code, go to the Document Header section and locate the Our Contact field in the table.

3. For the Our Contact field, under Value, select the three dots on the right to open the Salespeople/Purchaser page.

4. In the list of purchaser codes, select the one you want to apply to the invoice, and then select OK to close the page.

The chosen purchaser code is now added to the Our Contact field and will be copied to the invoice during registration, thereby initiating standard purchase approval. When you submit the invoice for approval, it will be sent to the approver associated with the chosen purchaser code and, in case of insufficient approval limit, escalated to the approver's manager.

Using Approval Flows

An approval flow is a custom list of approvers that are required for the approval of applicable purchase documents. This article uses purchase invoices to illustrate how to use approval flows, but the functionality works equally well with credit memos.

Once you've set up an approval flow, you can assign it to a document to determine exactly who should approve the document and in what order. When you assign an approval flow to a document, it overrides the standard purchase approval process, which is based on purchaser codes.

All approvers in the approval flow must approve the document before it can be posted, and they must do it in the order specified by you during setup.

Important

The Approval Flow Code field that is required when you assign approval flows to documents is only visible if purchase approval has been enabled in the Document Capture Setup.

To assign an approval flow to an invoice

1. In the Role Center, under Continia Document Capture Activities, go to Purchase Approval - Invoices and select Open PIs to open the list of open purchase invoices.

2. From the list, open the invoice to which you want to assign an approval flow.

3. On the General FastTab, go to Approval Flow Code and select the three dots on the right to open the Approval Flows page.

4. Select the approval flow code you want to apply to the purchase invoice, and then select OK to close the page.

The code is now added under Approval Flow Code, and the selected approval flow is assigned to the invoice. When you submit the invoice for approval, it will be sent to the approvers specified in the approval flow, in the order given.

To assign approval flows using templates

If you want to always use approval flows to determine the identity and order of document approvers, you can apply the relevant approval flow code to a document template, which will then automatically assign the code to all documents that use this template.

To apply an approval flow code to a template, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Document Categories, and then choose the related link.

2. Select the PURCHASE code to open the document journal.

3. In the list of documents, select the one whose template you want to edit.

4. In the action bar, select Template > Template Card.

5. On the Purchase Documents FastTab, under Approval, select the Approval Flow Code field, and then select the code you want to apply to the template.

The selected approval flow code will now be added to the template and, by extension, assigned to all documents using this template.

Advanced Approval

As an alternative to standard purchase approval and approval flows, in which approval routes are always fixed and predetermined based exclusively on invoice amounts, advanced approval allows for a typically faster and much more flexible approval process based on both invoice amounts and user-defined dimensions. This basically means that:

• You can freely define the dimensions that help to identify all approvers for any invoice that's sent for approval.

• The next approver isn't identified until the current approver has approved all relevant invoice lines.

The concept is best explained using a number of scenarios, as provided below. Note that this article uses invoices for illustrative purposes, although the functionality works equally well with credit memos.

Note

Advanced approval must be enabled and set up in order to work. To do this, see Setting up Advanced Approval.

Advanced-approval scenarios

For advanced approval, the dimensions you define – together with the invoice line amounts – will determine who gets to approve any invoice sent for approval. The example scenarios below can illustrate how this works.

In these scenarios, an advanced approval group has been set up with the dimension Department Code applied, and the users Robin Bettencourt, Esther Henderson, and Otis Falls have been added as approvers. They have different approval limits for the two dimension values Production and Sales:

Scenario 1:

At some point, an invoice with the following line dimension values and amounts is sent for approval:

In theory, this invoice could be sent to Otis Falls for full approval, as he has permission and sufficient approval limit to approve both of the dimension values and, consequently, both lines. However, as Otis Falls is the highest-ranking approver and Document Capture strives to burden high-ranking approvers the least, the invoice will instead be sent to both Robin Bettencourt (first approver) and Esther Henderson (second approver), seeing that they have the required approval permissions and limits to approve one line each. The invoice will be sent first to Robin Bettencourt, whose approval permission matches the dimension value of the first line (Production), and once he has approved the first line, the invoice will be forwarded to Esther Henderson, whose approval permission matches the second line (Sales). When she has approved the second line, the invoice is fully approved.

Scenario 2:

Later, another invoice with the following line dimension values and amounts is sent for approval:

For this invoice, none of the three approvers can approve all lines, so the approval of it will again have to be split between them. Robin Bettencourt has permission to approve invoice lines with the dimension value Production, but his approval limit of $25,000 is insufficient here, as the two Production lines (lines 1 and 2) come to a total of $40,000. For that reason, the first approver will instead have to be Otis Falls, whose approval limit is sufficient for him to approve the first two invoice lines. However, although he also has permission to approve Sales lines, he's unable to approve the remaining invoice line, as the total of the three lines would then exceed his approval limit. So line 3 must instead be approved by a second approver, Esther Henderson, who can approve Sales lines for up to $25,000, which is enough to cover the approval of this remaining line. With her approval of line 3, the invoice is then fully approved.

Four-eyes approval

If you always want at least two approvers to approve invoices, you can enable four-eyes approval. This will play out differently depending on how you set it up when you enabled it. Using the same approval group as above, the following scenarios can illustrate the different flows:

Scenario 3:

In this scenario, you selected Invoice when you enabled and set up four-eyes approval.

At one point, an invoice with multiple lines that require multiple approvers is sent for approval. Since more than one approver is already required, four-eyes approval will be applied automatically, and there's no need for Document Capture to identify additional approvers. This is the case in scenarios 1 and 2 above, in which both invoices have multiple lines requiring multiple approvers, so if four-eyes approval had been enabled in these scenarios, the outcome would have been the same.

Scenario 4:

In this scenario, as in the previous one, you selected Invoice when you set up four-eyes approval.

Another invoice is sent for approval, but this one only has one line:

Two of the approvers in the approval group have the required permissions and approval limits to approve this line: Esther Henderson (who can approve Sales lines for up to $25,000) and Otis Falls (who can approve Sales and/or Production lines for up to $40,000). As Esther Henderson has the lower approval limit of the two, she will be identified as the first approver, and once she has approved the line, the invoice will be sent to Otis Falls for final four-eyes approval.

Scenario 5:

In this scenario, you selected Invoice Full Amount when you set up four-eyes approval, meaning that at least two approvers must approve the total amount of each invoice.

Yet another invoice is sent for approval, this time with the following line dimension values and amounts:

Robin Bettencourt has permission to approve Production lines, and his approval limit of $25,000 covers both lines – that is, the total invoice amount – so he will be identified as the first approver. When he has approved the two lines, the invoice will be forwarded to Otis Falls, who also has the required permission and approval limit to approve both lines. Once he has approved the lines as the second pair of eyes in the four-eyes approval process, the invoice is fully approved.

Force Approval

The Force Approval feature allows approval administrators to force the approval of a specific document through, thereby bypassing the usual approval workflow. As evident in the below, this article uses purchase invoices as an illustrative basis to explain how this is done, but the functionality also works with credit memos.

To force the approval of an invoice

As an approval administrator, you can force the approval of a purchase invoice by following these steps:

1. Open the purchase invoice whose approval you want to force through.

2. On the Purchase Invoice page, in the action bar, select Actions > Approval Administration > Force Approval.

3. A dialog box asks if you want to force the approval of the invoice. Select Yes.

The invoice will now be instantly approved and moved to the Released PIs tile in the Role Center.

Approval Sharing

Approval sharing enables you to have all of your approval tasks automatically forwarded to another approver for a period of time, in case you're unable to approve documents yourself during that period. The other approver will then act as your substitute until you're available again.

There are two types of approval sharing:

• The kind that's done by admins on behalf of other users (for any user and any purpose)

• The kind you do yourself when you're out of office

Both kinds have to be set up every time you're unavailable. For more information and details on how to do this, see Setting up Approval Sharing.

Editing Approval Requests

As an approval administrator, you're able to edit any open or created approval request, including manually adding an approver, changing the assigned approver, and deleting the approval request itself.

To edit or delete an approval request

To edit or delete an approval request as an approval administrator, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Purchase Approval Request Entries, and then choose the related link.

2. In the list of approval entries, select the one you want to edit or delete.

3. To add an approver, go to the action bar and select Add Approver. On the Forward to User page that opens, select the approver that you want to add, and then select OK to close the page.

4. To change an existing approver, select the Approval by field. In the lookup list, select the approver that should replace the existing one.

5. To delete the approval entry, go to the action bar and select Delete. In the dialog box that opens, select Yes to delete the entry.

Setting up Document Approval

Continia Document Capture features a full approval workflow that enables you to approve documents after they’ve been received, scanned, and registered. To set up document approval in a way that suits your particular organization, check out the table below for a list of relevant links:

Enabling Purchase Approval

Most of the basic document approval settings for Continia Document Capture – including those for approval workflows, force approval, four-eyes approval, and approval checks and validations – can be edited from the Document Capture Setup page. This article describes how to access and edit these settings and how to enable purchase approval in the first place.

To enable purchase approval using the assisted setup guide

You can easily enable Document Capture purchase approval using the assisted setup guide. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Assisted Setup, and then choose the related link to open the corresponding page.

2. Under Continia Document Capture, select Create approval workflow to open the assisted setup guide.

3. Select Next, and then select the approval workflows that you want to set up. Select Next to continue.

4. If you want to set up users as approvers right away, select Open Continia User Setup to open the user setup page, and then edit the list of users as needed. You can also do this later, following this guide.

5. If you want to configure a number of more advanced approval settings immediately, select Approval Setup to open the Document Capture Setup page, and then make any necessary changes. You can also do this later, following the guide below.

6. Select Next > Finish to complete the guide.

Once you've completed the assisted setup guide, go to the Continia Solution Management page and enable the Document Approval module. For information on how to do this, see Using Continia Solution Management.

To set up purchase approval

To set up Document Capture purchase approval, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Document Capture Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. On the General FastTab, under Purchase Approval, select the field to the right of Status to open the Edit - Document Capture Setup / Purchase Approval page.

3. Under General, you can enable the following kinds of approval by toggling their respective switches:

   • Enable Invoice Approval

   • Enable Credit Memo Approval

   • Allow Force Approval – to actually apply force approval, see Force Approval.

   • Use Account and Dimension Approval Permissions – to configure account and dimension permissions for a group or an individual user, see Approval User Groups and Configuring account and dimension permissions.

4. To enable four-eyes approval, go to 4-eyes Approval and select either Required or Required - both with full amounts limits, depending on what you prefer. Under 2nd Approver, specify if the second approver should be selected manually or automatically. For more details, see Four-Eyes Approval.

5. If you want amounts and/or dimensions to be checked during or before approval (the latter only applies to dimensions), go to Checks and Validation and fill in the fields as needed.

Continia User Setup for Approvals

In order for a user to be able to approve documents in either Continia Document Capture or the Continia Web Approval Portal, the user must be configured as an approver first. This article provides details on how to do so.

To set up users as approvers

In order to enable a user to approve documents, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Continia User Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. Select the user who you want to set up as an approver.

3. In the action bar, select Edit to open the selected user's Continia User Setup Card.

4. On the General FastTab, fill in the fields as necessary. The following fields are mandatory:

   • In Salesperson/Purchaser, enter the name of the selected user as registered in Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central.

   • In Approver ID (Manager), enter the ID of the selected user's manager (or any other next-level approver that can approve documents if the user's own limits are insufficient).

   • Under Purchase Invoice and Credit Memo Approval, be sure to either enter a maximum approval amount for the selected user under Approval Limit or, if applicable, select Unlimited Approval.

   Note

   If you want to configure assigning permissions for the user or for a group that the user is a member of (see To configure individual approver permissions and To configure account and dimension permissions for a group), you must enable Can Edit Posting Lines as well.

   In case you want the user to be an approval administrator, toggle the Approval Administrator switch. For more information, see Approval administrator permissions below.

5. On the Web Approval FastTab, select the approval client that the selected user will use to approve documents. The selected approval client will be opened whenever the user selects a link in a notification email.

Approval administrator permissions

Approval administrators have more permissions than ordinary approvers. When you set up a user as an approval administrator, the user will be able to:

• Forward approval requests on behalf of other users. Ordinary approvers receive an error message if they attempt to do so.

• Use the Force Approval feature.

• Delete or edit approval requests, including adding and changing approvers.

• Approve documents for which imported and assigned amounts don't match. Ordinary approvers receive an error message in such cases, whereas approval administrators can choose to continue.

• Allow automatic approval of a document during registration when the document is matched with another document that hasn't yet been fully approved. Ordinary approvers receive an error message in such cases, whereas approval administrators can choose to continue.

• Change imported amounts.

Configuring account and dimension permissions

When you've set up a user as an approver as described above, you can configure the account and dimension permissions of that user. You do this using the following two actions in the action bar of the Continia User Setup page (also available in the Continia User Setup Card):

• Approval User Groups – this enables you to assign one or more group permissions to the individual user.

• Approval Permissions – this allows you to configure the individual permissions of the user.

To assign group permissions to an approver

To assign one or more group permissions to a user that's been configured as an approver, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Continia User Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. Select the user whose permissions you want to configure.

3. In the action bar, select Approval User Groups.

4. On the page that opens, add the group(s) whose permissions you want to assign to the user.

    

To configure individual approver permissions

When setting up the individual permissions of an approver, you can configure the following two kinds of permissions:

• Assigning permissions – what accounts and dimensions the user can choose between when assigning accounts/dimensions to invoice lines during approval

• Approval permissions – what invoice lines the user can approve (only lines that have been assigned accounts/dimensions for which the user has permissions)

Also, in order for assigning permissions to take effect, the Can Edit Posting Lines feature must be enabled, as described above under To set up users as approvers (step 4). Otherwise the user will receive documents for approval as read-only and will only be able to approve or reject them.

To configure the individual permissions of a user that's been set up as an approver, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Continia User Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. Select the user whose permissions you want to configure.

3. In the action bar, select Approval Permissions.

4. On the page that opens, in the Type column, select the type of permission. G/L Account, Item, Fixed Asset, Charge (Item), and Job are all types of account permissions, whereas Dimension represents dimension permissions.

5. If you selected Dimension in step 4 above: In the Dimension Code column, add a dimension code. If you selected anything other than Dimension in step 4, leave the field empty.

6. In the Assigning Permission column, specify how you want to set up the assigning permissions you want this user to have.

   Tip

   Explanatory notes on the options:

   • All: The user can assign all accounts/dimensions to invoice lines during approval, and no further setup is required.

   • Include Selected: The user can assign the accounts/dimensions that you select in the No. of Assigning Selections column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

   • Exclude Selected: The user can assign all accounts/dimensions except the ones you select in the No. of Assigning Selections column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

   • Filter: The user can assign the accounts/dimensions that you select in the Assigning Filter column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

7. In the Approval Permission column, specify how you want to set up the approval permissions you want this user to have.

   Tip

   Explanatory notes on the options:

   • All: The user can approve invoice lines with any accounts/dimensions, and no further setup is required.

   • Include Selected: The user can approve invoice lines with the accounts/dimensions that you select in the No. of Approval Selections column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

   • Exclude Selected: The user can approve invoice lines with any accounts/dimensions except the ones you select in the No. of Approval Selections column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

   • Filter: The user can approve invoice lines with the accounts/dimensions that you select in the Approval Filter column (which is then mandatory to fill in).

   • Same as Assigning: The settings configured for assigning permissions in step 6 are copied and used as the user's approval permissions as well.

8. If you selected Filter in step 6 above: In the Assigning Filter column, select the accounts/dimensions that you want the user to be able to assign to invoice lines during approval.

9. If you selected Filter in step 7 above: In the Approval Filter column, select the accounts/dimensions that you want the user to be able to approve invoice lines for.

   Note

   For both filter options (steps 8 and 9), you can enter ranges or multiple accounts/dimensions using standard filter notation – for example, 10100..10500 and 10100|10500.

10. If you selected Include Selected or Exclude Selected in step 6 above: In the No. of Assigning Selections column, select the accounts/dimensions that you want the user to be (un)able to assign to invoice lines during approval.

11. If you selected Include Selected or Exclude Selected in step 7 above: In the No. of Approval Selections column, select the accounts/dimensions that you want the user to be (un)able to approve invoice lines for.

Setting up Approval Sharing

If you're unable to approve documents for a period of time, you can have all of your approval tasks automatically forwarded to another approver during that period. You essentially share your approval tasks with a designated approver, and this approver will then act as your substitute until you're able to approve documents again yourself.

Approval sharing can be carried out for any user and any purpose (on behalf of other users than yourself) – typically done by admins – or for and by yourself if you're out of office.

Approval sharing

To set up approval sharing, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Approval Sharing, and then choose the related link.

2. In the action bar, select Edit List to make the list editable.

3. In the Owner User ID and Shared to User ID columns, enter the user ID of the person who's sharing approval tasks and that of the substitute approver.

4. In the Sharing Type column, select Normal unless you specifically need to change the out-of-office settings of the person who's sharing approval tasks (a rather rare exception).

   Note

   Individual users usually set up out-of-office approval sharing themselves using the procedure described below. However, it may occasionally be necessary for an admin to do it on behalf of a user. In such cases, the admin must select Out of Office instead of Normal, and the user will then be able to edit the entry later, if necessary. If the admin selects Normal (by far the most common scenario), the user will not be able to edit the entry at a later point.

5. In the Valid From and Valid To columns, enter or select the start and end dates of the period in which approval tasks should be shared.

6. If you want the substitute approver to inherit the limits and permissions of the person who's sharing approval tasks, select the Use Owners Limits & Permissions checkbox.

7. If approval emails should be forwarded to the substitute approver, select the Forward Emails checkbox.

8. If you want approval tasks to be shared for all companies in which both users are present, select the Copy to All Companies checkbox. If you don't select this checkbox, the approval sharing you're setting up will only apply to the company that you're currently in.

Out-of-office approval sharing for individual users

Although you can indeed set up out-of-office approval sharing using the above guide, which is particularly useful for admins setting it up for multiple users at the same time, there's a more user-friendly way to do it for each individual user, enabling you to do it yourself:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Purchase Approval Entries, and then choose the related link.

2. In the action bar, select Out of Office Setup.

3. Under Forward from date and Forward to date, enter or select the start and end dates of the period in which your approval tasks should be shared.

4. Under Forward to, enter the user ID of the substitute approver to whom your approval tasks should be forwarded.

5. If you want your approval tasks to be shared for all companies in which both you and the substitute approver are present, select the Copy to All Companies checkbox. If you don't select this checkbox, the out-of-office approval sharing you're setting up will only apply to the company that you're currently in.

Although hidden from users on the Out of Office Setup page, these two fields actually exist behind the scenes and are enabled by default whenever you set up approval sharing using this page. If you wish to change these default settings, it must be done on the Approval Sharing page, typically by an admin.

Email Notifications

Using Continia Document Capture, you can make sure that approvers are notified by email whenever they need to carry out an approval action in Document Capture or the Continia Web Approval Portal, such as approving, rejecting, or canceling a document. You can notify the approvers either manually or automatically using job queues.

If necessary, you can customize the actual emails as you please, and it's also possible to set up reminder emails in order to escalate the importance of having documents approved.

To send status emails manually

You can easily send status emails to approvers whenever you find it necessary to notify them that there are documents pending their approval. To do this, follow these steps:

1. In the Role Center, go to Continia Document Capture Activities.

2. Under Actions, select Send Status email to Approvers.

Emails are now sent to all approvers that have pending approval requests. Each email will contain a table with all documents pending approval and a link to the approval client that the recipient of the email has been configured to use for approving documents (either Document Capture or the Web Approval Portal). The approval client will then display all remaining approval requests that haven't already been taken care of for that day.

To send status emails using job queues

It's also possible to have status emails sent to approvers automatically using job queues, so you don't have to worry about notifying the approvers manually yourself.

For more information and details on how to do this, see Setting up Job Queues.

In order to avoid duplicate notifications, we recommend that you disable the standard Microsoft Dynamics NAV/Business Central notifications. Otherwise, Document Capture and NAV/Business Central will both notify approvers repeatedly about the same approval requests.

As an alternative, Document Capture 2022 R1 and later versions will feature functionality that enables you to configure the application so that it doesn't send standard notifications at all.

As with the manual method described above, each email that's sent using a job queue will contain a table with all documents pending approval and a link to the approval client that the recipient of the email has been configured to use for document approval (Document Capture or the Web Approval Portal), and the approval client will display all remaining approval requests for that day.

To customize notification emails

You can easily customize certain parts of the emails that are sent to approvers, including their default subject lines and the actual text they contain.

To customize notification emails, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Document Capture Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. On the General FastTab, under Purchase Approval, select the field to the right of Status to open the Edit - Document Capture Setup / Purchase Approval page.

3. Under Email Setup, fill in the fields as needed.

4. Optional: If you want to import a custom HTML template with, for example, different text and formatting than the default template, go to the action bar and select Status Email > Import Template > Choose, and then open the HTML template that you want to import.

    

In case a custom template has previously been imported and you wish to use the default template instead, you can delete the imported template by following these steps:

On the Edit - Document Capture Setup / Purchase Approval page, in the action bar, select Actions > Email > Delete Template.

A dialog box asks if you want to delete the template. Select Yes to delete the previously imported template and revert to the default.

To set up reminder emails

If you want to add an extra level of urgency to the notification emails that are sent to approvers, you can set up one or more customized reminder emails in which you stress that it's important for the recipients to approve all pending documents.

Anything you enter when setting up reminder emails as described below – for example, the body text or subject lines of reminder emails – will overwrite whatever you might have configured on the Edit - Document Capture Setup / Purchase Approval page as described above.

To set up reminder emails, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Approval Reminder Email Setup, and then choose the related link.

2. In the action bar, select New to create a new reminder email entry.

3. In the Level column, specify the level of the reminder by entering an integer. As the Level column determines the order in which reminder emails are sent out, the first level is typically labeled 1, and any subsequent levels are then labeled with consecutive numbers (2, 3, etc.).

4. In the Due Date Calculation column, enter the amount of time that should pass before a reminder email is sent out at this level (calculated from the moment the approval request was sent to the approver).

   Note

   Your entry must be an integer followed by D (days), WD (weekdays), W (weeks), M (months), Q (quarters), or Y (years) – for example, 2W (two weeks). For more advanced formulas, you can also use the mathematical symbols + and –, or you can enter the letter C (current) as a prefix to any of the previously mentioned time units – for example, CM+10D (current month plus ten days).

5. Optional: In the Send CC to column, specify if you want to have reminder email copies sent to the manager of either the current approver or the original approver.

6. Optional: In the Send CC to User ID column, enter the ID of any other user that you want to receive copies of reminder emails.

7. In the Email Subject column, enter the text to be displayed in the subject line of all reminder emails sent at this level.

8. Optional: If you want to customize the body text of any of the reminder emails, select the relevant reminder level, go to the action bar, select Beginning Text and/or Ending Text, and enter the text you want to have displayed in the body of all reminder emails sent at this level.

Creating Approval Flows

As an alternative to standard purchase approval, you can set up one or more approval flows, which are essentially custom lists of approvers required for document approval. When a document has been assigned an approval flow, all approvers in the flow must approve the document before it can be posted. The approvers must approve the document in the order you specify when you set up the flow.

When you create an approval flow, you must provide it with an approval flow code that is suitable for your particular organization's setup. The code can be entered as free text and should be whatever word best describes the approval flow you're setting up, such as SMALL (for small purchases) or GERMANY (for supplies procured in Germany) – basically anything you prefer. The entered code is to be used when you assign the approval flow to a document.

To set up an approval flow

1. Choose the  icon, enter Approval Flows, and then choose the related link.

2. In the action bar, select New to add an approval flow.

3. In the list, under Code, enter a suitable code for the approval flow.

4. Optional: Under Description, enter a free-text description of the approval flow.

5. Under Selection Method, specify how approvers are to be selected for the approval of documents that have this approval flow code applied. For more information, see Adding amount limits to an approval flow below.

6. Under No. of Approvers, select the number (0 for new flows) to open the Approvers page.

7. In the action bar, select New to add an approver.

8. In the list, under Name, select the three dots on the right to open the Continia User List. Select a user from the list, and then select OK to close the page.

9. Under Approval Amount Limit, add the amount limit that you want to apply to this approver. This applies specifically to this approval flow and overrules any other approval limits configured elsewhere for this user.

10. Repeat steps 7-9 for every additional approver you want to add to the flow.

Adding amount limits to an approval flow

By adding amount limits to an approval flow, you can enable the flow to release documents whenever the specified approval level is met. In this way, each document for approval won't have to be forwarded to all approvers in the flow if it can be released by an approver with the appropriate approval limit early in the process. This ensures that only the necessary number of people are involved in the approval process, thereby enabling documents to be approved faster.

To add amount limits to an approval flow, follow the guide above under To set up an approval flow. The actual amount limits are added as numerical values for each individual approver in step 9 of the guide, under Approval Amount Limit. In step 5 of the guide, you can decide how these amount limit values should then be used to select approvers for the approval of documents with this approval flow applied. You can choose between the following selection methods:

Setting up Advanced Approval

Advanced approval allows you to have business documents approved based on document amounts and user-defined dimensions. To set it up, you must do as follows:

• Disable standard purchase approval and enable advanced approval.

• Set up advanced approval groups.

• Add approvers to the advanced approval groups.

Note that this article uses invoices to illustrate the process. It works just as well with credit memos though.

To enable advanced approval

To disable standard purchase approval and enable advanced approval, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Workflows, and then choose the related link.

2. Select Purchase Invoice Approval Workflow to open its Workflow page.

3. Disable the workflow by toggling the Enabled switch, and then exit the page to get back to the list.

4. In the action bar, select New > New Workflow from Template.

5. Select Purchase Invoice Advanced Approval Workflow to add it to the list of workflows.

6. On the Workflow page that opens, enable the workflow by toggling the Enabled switch, and then exit the page to get back to the list.

   Note

   Purchase Invoice Approval Workflow and Purchase Invoice Advanced Approval Workflow can't both be enabled at the same time.

To set up advanced approval groups

To set up advanced approval groups with filters and dimensions, follow these steps:

1. Choose the  icon, enter Advanced Approval Groups, and then choose the related link.

2. In the action bar, select New to open the Approval Group Card.

3. On the General FastTab, under Code, enter the code that you want this approval group to have. The code can be anything that makes sense to you and your organization.

4. Under Priority, enter the priority of the approval group. If you enter 1, this group will be the first one that's linked to invoices sent for approval.

5. Optional: Fill in the remaining fields on the General FastTab as needed:

   1. Description: Enter a description of the approval group.

   2. First Entry Created by: Specify who should be the first approver of invoices linked to the approval group. Purchaser (the default option) refers to the purchaser on invoices sent for approval, while Approver ID refers to the first approver in the group who has the same dimensions as the first invoice line and who has a sufficient approval limit.

   3. Four Eyes Approval: Specify if at least two approvers must approve invoices in order for them to be considered fully approved (Invoice), or if at least two approvers must approve the total amount of the invoices for them to be fully approved (Invoice Full Amount).

6. Optional: If you want the approval group to be linked only to invoices that meet certain filtering conditions, you can specify these conditions on the Filters FastTab. You can add three kinds of filters, relating to different parts of the invoices that are sent for approval: filters relating to fields in the purchase header, to the purchaser field, or to the vendor field.

   Note

   For example, if you add a field filter under Purchase Header Filter, such as Due Date=01-08-23, the approval group will only be linked to invoices that match this filter – that is, invoices that are due on 1 August, 2023.

7. On the Dimensions FastTab, in the list of dimensions, locate the dimension(s) that you want to apply to this approval group, and then select the box(es) under Active. If you want to make one or more dimensions mandatory, select the relevant box(es) under Mandatory.

    

To add approvers to advanced approval groups

Once you've created an advanced approval group as described above, you must add users – that is, approvers – to it. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Open the Approval Group Card of the relevant group (unless already open): Choose the  icon, enter Advanced Approval Groups, choose the related link, and then select the relevant approval group in the list.

2. In the action bar, select Users to open the Advanced Approval Users page.

3. In the list, under Name, select the three dots on the right to open the Continia User List, and then select the user that you want to add to the group as an approver. Select OK to close the user list.

4. Under Approval Amount Limit, enter the approval limit of the approver.

5. For each of the remaining list columns, do as follows:

   1. Select the field to open the Edit - Approval User Dimenion Selection page.

      Note

      The columns of the list represent the dimension(s) that you've applied to the approval group when setting it up, and they vary accordingly (see step 7 in the guide above under To set up advanced approval groups). For example, if you applied the dimension Department Code when you set up the approval group, it will appear as a column on the Advanced Approval Users page.

   2. In the list of dimension values, select the value that you want to add to the approver, and then select the box under Approval Permission to add it. Select Close to close the page and return to the Advanced Approval Users page.

6. Repeat steps 3-5 for any additional approvers that you want to add to the approval group.

Whenever an invoice is sent for approval, Document Capture will then create an approval entry by assigning the approver from the approval group who has the lowest approval limit (but enough to approve as the first approver) and the same combination of dimension values as one or more of the invoice lines. When the first approver has approved all relevant lines but doesn't have sufficient approval limit to approve all invoice lines, Document Capture then assigns the next approver in the same approval group who has a higher approval limit, and a new approval entry is created. This process is repeated until all invoice lines have been approved.