Approval Policies

Overview

Approval policies allow your organization to require manager approval before certain payments are processed. This adds a layer of oversight for transactions with specific counterparties.

When You Would Use This

You want to ensure that payments to certain counterparties are reviewed by a designated manager before they proceed.

How It Works

The approval process is based on two things:

The approval policy is enabled for your business.
A manager is assigned to a specific Business Contact.

When both conditions are met, any payment created to that counterparty will require the assigned manager's approval before it can proceed.

Steps

Enabling the Approval Policy

Go to Settings > Team Roles & Policies.
Toggle Approval Policy on.

Assigning a Manager to a Contact

Go to Business Contacts.
Find the counterparty you want to add oversight for.
In the Approver (Manager) dropdown, select a team member.

Viewing Assignments

In Settings > Team Roles & Policies, the Managers and Their Counterparties table shows all current manager-to-contact assignments.

What Happens Next

When a payment is created to a counterparty with an assigned manager:

The payment status changes to Awaiting Approval.
The assigned manager sees a To Approve item in their dashboard.
The manager can approve or reject the payment.
Once approved, the payment proceeds to the next step.

For Protected Pay, the same process applies when a release is requested — the manager must approve before the payer can release funds.

Notes

Only Admins can enable or disable the approval policy.
Managers are assigned per counterparty, not per payment.
If no manager is assigned to a counterparty, payments to that counterparty do not require approval — even if the policy is enabled.
Admins can bypass the approval process using Pay without Approval on Simple Pay transactions.