Set up finance approval rules

The finance approval rules functionality in Sparkrock 365 enhances the Business Central approval workflow functionality. The finance approval rules functionality enables approval routes only for specific documents and has different setup records. Existing workflows are enabled and configured through the Business Central workflow configuration. For more information about Business Central approval workflows, see Set up workflows.

Dimension approval workflows are enabled through the Finance Approval Setup page. On the Finance Approval Setup page, you can specify the rule for approval level, enable a dimension approval workflow by supported document type, and specify the rules for self-approval per document type. Enabling a document type on the Finance Approval Setup page, automatically creates and enables a workflow.

When a supported document type, such as a purchase requisition is submitted for approval, the approval rules determine which document lines trigger an approval and the approvers for that rule. When an approval has been requested and approvers are found, the Status of the document changes to Pending Approval. For more information about supported document types, see Set up the Finance Approval Setup page.

To view which documents have been sent for their approval, approvers can use the Requests to Approve page. To send a request onto the next approver or complete the approval chain, approvers can use the Approve action. If there are no additional approvers, the Status of the document changes to Approved. To reject a request for approval, approvers can use the Reject action.

In the event that an approver is away and their normal approval entries are to be handled by a different user for a fixed length of time, an alternate can be configured. For more information, see Set up an alternate approver.

To define approvers, when they can approve, and for what type of document, use the Finance Approval Rules page.

To set up finance approval rules

1. Choose , enter finance approval rules, and then choose the related link.

   The Finance Approval Rules page opens.

2. To add a rule, on the action bar, choose New.

   A new row appears.

3. In Code, specify a code to represent the approval rule.

4. In Description, specify a description for the approval rule.

5. To activate this approval rule, select the Enable checkbox.

6. In Approval Type, specify one of the following options:

   • Amount: The approval rule is to be applied to the amount, including tax expense on the lines that are grouped as per approval rule filters.

   • Budget: The approval rule is to be applied when the document is over budget.

7. In Approver Type, specify the type of approvers.

8. In Approver No., specify the number that represents the user who is to approve.

9. In Approval Amount Threshold, specify the approval threshold limit when approval request entries are submitted.

10. In the filter fields, specify values as required.

    If a finance approval rule has a value specified for PR Type Filter or Expense Type Category Filter, Sparkrock 365 only applies the rule to purchase document lines that meet the filter criteria. When no PR Type Filter or Expense Type Category Filter is specified on the finance approval rule, Sparkrock 365 applies the rule to all lines in conjunction with the other filters that are specified on the rule.

    When the Approval Type is Budget, the following fields are inactive and cannot be used:

    • G/L Account Filter

    • PR Type Filter

    • Expense Type Category Filter

    • Override

Enable approval rules

The enabling of a rule ensures that the rule becomes active only after the setup is completed and performs a number of validations. Enabled rules can be edited. Editing does not trigger the validation.

When you enable an approval rule, Sparkrock 365 performs the following validations:

• Verifies that the approval group is not blocked or mySparkrock user is not active. The approval group is checked for blocked group lines as well.

• Verifies that the approval rule is included for at least one document type.

• Verifies on the approval rule, the Approver No.

Specifying document types

For each approval rule, you can specify the Document Types to which the rule applies. If you specify All, the rule is applied to all supported document types. If you specify Some, you must specify on the Approval Rule Document Types page, the supported documents to which the rule applies.

Overriding approvals

When an approval rule has Override selected, this rule overrides all other approvers for this line and is the only approval rule that is applied. In the case of two approval rules with override that are applied to the same document, both approval rules apply.

View the approvers for a rule

You may want to view the list of approvers for a rule, especially when the Approver type is an Approval Group.

To view the list of approvers for a rule

1. Choose , enter finance approval rules, and then choose the related link.

   The Finance Approval Rules page opens.

2. Select the approval rule for which you want to view the approvers, and then on the action bar, choose Approver.

   The mySparkrock User Setup Card or Approval Group page opens.

Copying approval rules

To save time and reduce the possibility of errors, approval rules can be copied.

To copy an approval rule

1. Choose , enter finance approval rules, and then choose the related link.

   The Finance Approval Rules page opens.

2. Select the approval rule that you want to copy, and then on the action bar, choose Copy.

   The Copy Approval Rule page opens.

3. In To Approval Rule Code, specify where to copy the rule.

4. In From Approval Rule Code, specify the source rule from which to copy.

5. To override other approval rules that are applied to the same document line, turn on Override.

6. To automatically enable the rule after the rule has been copied, turn on Enable.

7. In Copy, choose one of the following options:

   • All fields: All fields in the rule are copied.

   • Selected Fields: Only the fields that you select are copied.

8. Choose OK.

How approval rules work

Approval rules allow filtering of the Approval Amount Threshold based on the total in local currency, including tax expense, dimensions, general ledger account, PR type, and expense category for approval type amount. When values are entered on a line with a filter, the rule totals all the values as per the filter. For the threshold to be applied to individual values, the rule must be applied to individual values. Blank values are considered all values.

Amount thresholds are considered as absolute value and credit memo or negative total lines are multiplied by -1, and then compared against the rule.

The following examples illustrate in more details how approvals work:

Example One

Rule	Threshold	Department	Program	G/L Account	PR Type	Expense Category
1	$10	ADM or PROD	LARGE or MEDIUM

This rule will be applied to lines that have the following combination of dimensions:

• ADM and LARGE

• ADM and MEDIUM

• PROD and LARGE

• PROD and MEDIUM

Subset One

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program
1	$7	ADM	LARGE
2	$7	ADM	MEDIUM

Total for the rule is $14. The rule is applied.

Subset Two

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program
1	$7	ADM	LARGE
2	$7	PROD	MEDIUM

Total for the rule is $14. The rule is applied.

Subset Three

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program
1	$7	ADM	LARGE
2	$7	PROD	XLARGE

The rule is applied to only line 1. Total is $7. The rule is not applied.

Example Two

Rule	Threshold	Department	Program	G/L Account	PR Type	Expense Category
2	$5,000

The rule has an amount and all filters are blank. The rule applies to all lines, effectively making the rule applied on the document total.

Example Three

Rule	Threshold	Department	Program	G/L Account	PR Type	Expense Category
3	$10	ADM	LARGE	61300

The rule is applied only to lines that have:

• Department: ADM

• Program: LARGE

• G/L Account: 61300

Subset One

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program	G/L Account
1	$7	ADM	LARGE	61300
2	$7	ADM	LARGE	61400

The rule applies only to line 1. Total is $7. The rule is not applied.

Subset Two

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program	G/L Account
1	$7	ADM	LARGE	61300
2	$7	ADM	LARGE	61300

Total for the rule is $14. The rule is applied.

Example Four

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program	G/L Account	PR Type	Expense Category
3	$10			61300

The rule is applied only to lines that have G/L Account = 61300.

Subset One

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program	G/L Account
1	$7	ADM	XLARGE	61300
2	$7	PROD	LARGE	61300

Total for account 61300 is $14. The rule is applied.

Subset Two

Requisition Lines:

Line No.	Amount	Department	Program	G/L Account
1	$7	ADM	XLARGE	61300
2	$7	PROD	LARGE	61400

The rule applies only to line 1. Total is $7. The rule is not applied.

Over budget approvals

Workflows can be set up to only trigger when a document is over budget. These workflows are based on the dimensions that are part of the approval rule and are part of the budget checking. Dimensions that are part of the approval rule when the Approval Type is Budget and that are not enabled for budget checking are ignored in the calculation.

The Approval Amount Threshold specifies the amount over the budget that triggers the approval workflows. In an over budget scenario, the total is negative. The threshold when applied to a rule is multiplied by -1.

The over budget approval is applied on the total of available amount after the request as per the dimensions that are specified on the rule. All budget checking lines that meet the criteria of a rule are totaled.

The Override option that is available when the Approval Type is set to Amount does not impact over budget approvals. Over budget approvals take place after amount approvals are completed and are the last stage of the approval process.

During processing of over budget approvals, the following settings on the Finance Approval Setup page are considered:

• Approval level settings

• Self-approval settings

The following functionality is supported for over budget approvals:

• Alternates

• Approval types of mySparkrock User and mySparkrock Group

• Approval group settings of All Must Approve and Notification Only

• Specifying document types on finance approval rules

Approval rules and self-approval

The following sections describe how self-approval settings affect approval rules.

No applicable approval rules and no backstop approval group

Sparkrock 365 automatically approves finance requests and purchase documents when there are no applicable approval rules, and no backstop approval group is set up. When Sparkrock 365 does not find an approver, and on the Finance Approval Setup page, Self Approval is set to Always or If No Other Approver Exists, Sparkrock 365 automatically approves the document. Alternatively, when Sparkrock 365 does not find an approver, and Self Approval is set to Never, Sparkrock 365 displays the following error:

No eligible approvers found for this document. Check Approval rules and Backstop approval group on Finance Approval Setup.

Notification only and all must approve

Notification only approvers who are set up on an approval group are not affected by self-approval settings.

When the All Must Approve checkbox is selected for the approval group and sequence, the approver must approve regardless of the self-approval setting when there is another approver for this rule and sequence. If there is no other approver, the prevent self-approval setting takes effect.

Override approvals

Prevent self-approval options work with override approvals.

Other Approvals

Other approvers can be:

• Active alternate approvers as defined by the start date and end time on the alternate.

• Approvers from the same sequence on an approval group for an approval rule.

• Users with the same HR Position.

• Users with the same HR Class.

Self-Approval Examples

To further your understanding of how self-approvals work, review the following self-approval examples.

Example One

In this example:

• Chloe is the alternate for data entry.

• Owen is the requester.

Option One: Chloe is the Approver

Chloe creates a request for Owen, Chloe is an approver. This is considered self-approval and Chloe is not allowed to approve.

Option Two: Owen is the Approver

Chloe creates a request for Owen, Owen is an approver. This is considered self-approval and Owen is not allowed to approve.

Example Two

In this example:

• Owen is the requester and creator.

• Owen and Chloe are approvers for rule one, sequence one.

• Owen and Charlie are approvers for rule one, sequence two.

• Owen is an approver for rule one, sequence two.

Owen creates the document and requests approval. Chloe approves for the approval group, even though Owen is the only approver at sequence 2. Owen is removed, and Chloe is the only approver.

Example Three

In this example:

• Owen is the requester and creator.

• Owen and Chloe are approvers for rule one, sequence one.

• Owen and Charlie are approvers for rule one, sequence two.

Owen creates the document and requests approval. The approvers for the document are only Chloe and Charlie.

Related information

Set up finance approvals

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