Vendor Invoice Approval for Business Essentials

With the Vendor Invoice Approval workflow, both Cloud and On-Premise customers can automate the movement of AP invoices through your organization.  Empower your users to approve Invoices digitally using this prebuilt and ready to run workflow process.  Simply add your users into the process and instantly transform AP invoice approvals.  Whether you're remote or in the office, you can assign invoices to users in two step approval workflow, enabling them to take action by Approving, Rejecting, or Holding an invoice.  Once an invoice action taken, it is routed back to Accounting for manual entry into an Accounts Payable system for payment or reprocessed for further approval.  Use the workflow as is, or use the process as a base and build off of it to make a process tailored to your specific business needs.

Vendor Invoice Process Flow

Download The Workflow

The Vendor Invoice Approval workflow is delivered via Square 9's Solution Delivery Network.  The SDN offers customers a variety ready to run database designs, workflows, capture processes, and web forms.  Square 9's unique approach to delivering ready to run solutions allows customers to save time and money, deploying processes that would take days or weeks to deliver in a matter of a few hours.

Vendor Invoice Approval is deployed in two parts.  First, an Accounts Payable archive is added to a new or existing GlobalSearch database.  The Archive, supporting Fields, and related Searches are available from the QuickStart menu in the GlobalSearch Administration page.  When prompted for a Solution Template, choose "Accounts Payable With Workflow".

For customers already live with GlobalSearch, we recommend making all changes in a test database first to ensure you completely understand the impact of any changes to the system.  More details on using the QuickStart Application Builder can be found here.  

Preparation

There are a few steps that must be completed to ensure proper installation of this package.

List Creation

In preparation, the following fields must be added to your Business Essentials Database.

Approval Status

• In Process
• Not Applicable
• Pending Level 1
• Pending Level 2
• Approved
• Rejected
• Complete
• On Hold

Create two lists named as outlined below containing the usernames/emails of anyone who will be approving documents.

Approver (First)

Approver (Second)

Field Creation

In preparation, the following fields must be added to your Business Essentials Database.

Adding Fields to the Archive

To support Invoice routing, add your newly created fields to your Accounts Payable archive. 

From the Administration interface:

1. Select Archives
2. Ensure your Database is Selected
3. Click the More Options () icon to the right of the Accounts Payable archive and select Fields.
4. Add the following fields to your archive in the order defined below:
   1. Approval Status
   2. First Approver
   3. Second Approver
   4. Current Approver

Search Creation

Lastly, you must create two searches to support your workflow.  For more information on how to create searches, consult this documentation.

Vendor Invoices Awaiting Approval Search

You'll need to create a Search to show Vendor Invoices which are Pending Action.

GlobalAction Initator Search

This search will be used by GlobalAction to locate documents which need to be picked up.  As defined in the configuration below, GlobalAction will only pickup documents which have an Approver selected.

Installation

You can install the Vendor Invoice Approval Workflow directly from Square 9's Cloud.  

1. Log On to your GlobalCapture Instance
2. Select Manage
3. Select Migration
4. Select GlobalAction at the top right
5. Select Cloud
6. Select the workflow <NAMEOFWORKFLOW>

Below is a demonstration on how to complete this task.

Configuring Queue Security

After your workflow has been configured, you must go in and configure queue security.  In most situations, you will have two groups of users, anyone who may designated as an approver, and AP Staff who will be responsible for sending Invoices into the process.  These two groups will have different security permissions depending on the stage the invoice is in.

Assigning Queue Security for Approvers

1. Open the GlobalAction Designer
2. Open the Business Essentials - Invoice Approval Process Workflow
3. Double Click the "First Approver" Queue
4. Select and add all users who will act as an approver.  (It is recommended to add AP Staff here as well)
5. Click Save
6. Repeat the process on the queue labeled "Second Approver"
7. Save your Workflow

Assigning Queue Security for Accounting Staff

1. Open the GlobalAction Designer
2. Open the Business Essentials - Invoice Approval Process Workflow
3. Double Click the "AP Entry" Queue
4. Select and add all users who will fill the role of the role an accounting staff.
5. Click Save
6. Repeat the process on the queue labeled "Rejection Queue"
7. Save your Workflow

Configuring Email Notifications

1. Open the GlobalAction Designer
2. Open the Business Essentials - Invoice Approval Process Workflow
3. Double click the email node in the "First Approver" queue.
4. Alter the "To" field to use read "{f_First Approver}"
5. Add anyone else you would like to receive the notification.
6. Click Save
7. Double click the email node in the "Second Approver" queue.
8. Alter the "To" field to use read "{f_Second Approver}"
9. Add anyone else you would like to receive the notification.
10. Click Save
11. Save your workflow.

Configuring Security

This search will be used by GlobalAction to locate documents which need to be picked up.  As defined in the configuration below, GlobalAction will only pickup documents which have an Approver selected.