Work Order Approvals let you add spend control to work orders — requiring a review before a high-value job is sent to a contractor. This feature is available on Pro and Enterprise plans. To upgrade, contact your Account Manager.
How to Create a Work Order Approval Workflow
1. Navigate to Settings > Automation > Approval Workflows.
2. Click Create a new workflow.
3. Fill in the details — name, optional description, companies, and set Approval type to Work Order Approval.
4. Click Create and save.
Defining Approval Steps
Click Add a step.
Optionally give the step a name.
Set conditions — select Budgeted cost as the field, choose an operator (e.g. greater than), and enter the value.
Add further conditions if needed.
Select approvers — by Role, specific Users, or a Team. Only users with permissions for all selected companies will appear.
Set escalation — enter the number of hours before the approval escalates, then select the escalation approver(s).
Click Save.
Add further steps by repeating this process.
Publishing the Workflow
Change the workflow status from Draft to Published.
Click Save workflow.
Submitting a Work Order for Approval
When creating a work order, you'll see these save options:
Save as Draft
Save and Approve — approves immediately, bypassing the workflow.
Save and submit for approval — routes through the workflow.
Note: To prevent users from bypassing approval workflows, remove the Can approve maintenance work orders permission from their role.
How to Approve or Reject a Work Order
Access the approval via the notification email link, or navigate to Approvals from the menu.
Review the work order details.
Click Approve or Reject.
Optionally add a comment.
Approved work orders show as Completed in the Work Order approvals table.
Managing Approval Permissions
By default, users who can create work orders can also approve them without a workflow. To enforce approval routing:
Navigate to Settings > Company & Users > Maintain User Roles.
Select the role to update.
Expand Dashboard Permissions.
Toggle Can approve maintenance work orders off.
Click Save User Role.
Note: Users added to an approval workflow step can still approve work orders even if this permission is disabled.
North American customers will see "Purchase Order" where this article says "Work Order". For more information on regional terminology, see our Glossary of Regional Terminology.