Approvals Workflow

This article covers setting up an approval workflow and all the configuration options available.

For more information on the Workflow check out this article. 

Approval Workflow

To start creating your approval flow first make sure your approval app has been configured. Ensure you have approvers and that those approvers have been added to groups.
For more information check out this article.

Once your approvals app is good to go, open the form you want to use and open the Workflow tab. 

Approval Flow

Here you can configure your approval flows. Approvals allow you to add sequential or concurrent approval steps that need to be approved before the approval events trigger. 

You can create an approval flow by clicking the "configure approval flow" button, allowing you to configure your approval steps. Each step has a label and is assigned a group. 

Conditional Approval Steps

Steps can also be set to trigger conditionally based on the form submission, meaning if you only want an approval step to be required when specific conditions are met. You can configure that using the conditional logic configuration on that step.

Approval Forms

As part of the approval flow step, you can include an approval form. These forms need to be completed as part of the approval steps approval. Meaning, that the approval form will need to be completed before the approval step can be approved.

Approval form data can be viewed in the approval applet, similar to the original submission. This allows administrators and approvers to view the content of the approval forms from any step.

Approval form data can also be captured in the Approval Events, see Approval Events for more information.

Concurrent Steps

In addition to having sequential approval steps, the approval process also incorporates concurrent steps. This structure requires multiple groups to approve a submission at the same time before advancing to the next sequentual step.

Default Notification Email Address

Use the default notification email address to specify which form email element will be used to contact the person submitting the form. Once this is configured the email address will be automatically pre-filled when actioning the approval.

Preset Responses

To make responding to approvals easier use a preset response. Preset responses allow you to create a set of responses that can be easily added to your approval actions. Create a set of Deny and Clarifications responses that can be used to pre-fill the notification notes for your approval actions. 

The response notes can also include content from the form such as the form name {FORM_NAME} or inputs from the form e.g. {ELEMENT:element-name}.

Automated Denial

Automated Denial allows you to automatically deny approvals that have been sent for clarification after a set number of days. For example, if you want to automatically deny any approval that has been sent for clarification for 7 days of no response as per the example screenshot below. 

You also have the option to notify the submitter when the approval is automatically denied. When doing this you can specify the email address you want to notify. If you are using a default notification email address then that email address will be used for the automated denial email notification. You are also able to use preset denial responses for these email notifications as per the example screenshot below. 

Approval Flow Clarification Request Configuration

Clarifications are an important part of approval flows allowing approvers to send the submission back to the original submitter to fix any issues there may be with the submission. 

Allow approval while awaiting clarification

By default this setting is turned on, it ensures that any approval is able to be approved even when in a state of awaiting clarification. During this off will ensure that no approver is able to approve a submission while it is in a state of awaiting clarification.

Skip payment

In the platform payments are made prior to the approval process. Meaning if an approval needs to be sent back to the submitter for clarification they may need to make a payment again. To avoid any additional payments the approver can choose to skip any additional payments by checking the "Would you like to skip the payment for this clarification?" checkbox. This configuration here is setting the default for that

Email Templates

Email templates allow you to customise the body of the email that is generated by the platform. For more information on Email Templates check out the Email Templates Article. 

Once you have an email template configured you can set the email template to be used in your forms approval flow. Email templates are universal for the form flow, meaning they connect be configured on a per step bases.

Pending Approval Reminder

Approval reminders allow you to send reminder emails to Approvers if they have any approvals older than the number of threshold days that are awaiting actioning. The reminder threshold is specific to the form, meaning that all approval steps within the flow will use the same reminder configuration. Once the threshold is met then approvers will receive daily emails reminding them of their outstanding approvals. Reminder emails are sent at 7am based on the timezone configured in your account. Please note that unlike other email notifications approvers are not able to unsubscribe from reminder emails. 

This feature is currently in BETA and we are looking for user feedback. If you have any feedback or suggestions please reach out to [email protected].

Approval Events

Approval events are events that run when the final step in an approval has been approved. These are the same event options as draft and submission events.

Approval Forms

If an approval contains approval forms, the approval form data can be added to the submission event using the 'Include approval form content' button under the Advanced section in PDF Configuration. Once this is turned on, all approval form content will be added to the submission event. 

Get Help

If you have any questions or would like assistance with setting up your approvals  please contact us via this support portal or email [email protected]. We are happy to assist in any way we can.