This article outlines the process for setting up contact approval workflows. The Contact Approvals feature allows you to maintain oversight and control over the creation and editing of contacts within your Re-Leased platform.
Contact Approvals ensure that new contacts meet your business requirements before they become active within the system.
More information on how to add and edit contacts here.
NOTE: This feature is only available for Pro and Enterprise customers. To find out more about Approvals you can contact your Account Manager or leave a contact request here.
Setting Up a new Approval Workflow for Contacts
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Click into 'Settings' via the overflow menu at the top of the screen
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Under 'Automation' select 'Approval Workflows'. This page will list any workflows previously created.
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Click on 'Create a new workflow'
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Populate the fields on the screen;
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Provide a clear name
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Add a description (optional)
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Select the companies the workflow will apply for
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Select 'Contact approval' for the Approval Type
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Select the Companies you want to apply the approval workflow to
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'Create and save'
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NOTE: You can only have ONE contact approval workflow per company.
Set-up the workflow steps
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Select 'Add a step' to create the first step in your workflow. A modal will open
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In the modal, give your step a name (optional)
Name
Optional: provide a name for the workflow step.
Conditions
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Select the 'Field' ('Contact Tags', or 'Contact category')
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Select an 'Operator'. 'is one of' or 'is not one of'. 'One of' will include any contacts that have the field assigned to it. It is an inclusive value. 'not one of' is an exclusive value
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Then add the Value you want the approval flow step to be triggered from. For example, selecting 'Creditor' will trigger an approval workflow for any new suppliers (creditors) that are created
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Add an additional condition to be met to trigger the workflow if required (optional)
Select New Condition to add more rules to this workflow step.
Approval
Select who can approve the Contact for this step. This can be specified at role, team or user level.
NOTE: only those users with permissions for ALL the Companies included in the workflow will be visible
Escalation
Its helpful to have an escalation point if the selected Approver/s have not approved within a certain timeframe. As with the Approval step above, the escalation point can be role, team or user level.
Reminders
Set the time limit in hours for sending one reminder to the Approvers and another to the Escalation point. The minimum number of hours is 1, the maximum is 167 hours (7 days).
Example:
If you set a reminder for 24 hours, the timeline would be:
- 0 hours: the approval email is sent to the listed Approvers
- 24 hours: a reminder is sent to the listed Approvers if the approval step has not been completed
- 48 hours: the approval is escalated to the Escalation Approvers
Triggering a Contact Approval Workflow
Currently, contact approvals are triggered when new contacts are created;
- from the Contacts page or
- when adding a new Creditor while creating an invoice in the Process Expense Invoices flow (Credia Plus customers only)
To trigger the approval workflow via the Contacts page:
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Save your changes.
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The workflow is automatically triggered if the criteria match an active approval workflow.
Note: If you are an Invoice Intelligence customer, new contacts will not trigger a contact approval workflow.
Approving or Rejecting a Contact
Approvers will receive notifications when a new contact requires approval:
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Access the approval request via the notification or navigate to the Approvals page.
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Review the contact details provided.
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Choose Approve or Reject, and add comments if necessary.
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Confirm your decision.
Contact Approval permissions
You can control who can approve new contacts via the 'Maintain User Roles' settings. By default, existing users who can create contacts can also approve them without going through an approval workflow.
- Select the role you wish to edit permissions for
- Expand 'Contact Permissions'
- At the bottom of the list, 'Can approve maintenance work orders' can be selected or de-selected depending on your needs.
- Scroll to the bottom of the page and click 'Save User Role'
If the permission to approve contacts has been deselected, Users with this role will no longer be able to approve contacts where they meet a condition to trigger a workflow (Contact category, contact tag or contact custom field is used)
Note: If the contact created is not explicitly included in the workflow conditions, they will auto-approve.
NOTE: Users added to an approval workflow will be able to approve Contacts, regardless of this permission.
Related Articles
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