Set up delegation for purchasing approvals

When an approver goes on holiday, they can simply turn on approval delegation to ensure their approval responsibilities are handled during an absence.

Set up approval delegation

The first step is to enable delegation within your Purchasing application, and then assign approval delegates. Every Purchasing transaction approver should have an appropriate delegate.

For example, for some approvers, a peer in their department or their manager might be the appropriate delegate. If you use value-based approval policies, make sure the delegate has the same or higher purchase value permission level as the original approver.

To learn how an approval request is handled when a delegate is not available, see About purchasing approval delegation.

You enable delegation and assign delegates on the Configure Purchasing page and, in a multi-entity, shared environment, at the top level.

1. Go to Purchasing > Setup > Configuration.
2. Scroll down to the Enable functionality section, and in the Approvals subsection select the Enable delegation checkbox.
   A Manage button appears
3. Choose a Default delegate type, user or user group. If you choose a user group, all members of the group can approve transactions on behalf of the approver.
4. Select the Default delegate. The selected default delegate is used to automatically pre-populate the Manage delegates table.
5. Check that an appropriate delegate is selected for each approver in the table. If the default delegate is the same as the approver, you'll need to select a different delegate.
6. Select Save.

Turn off approval delegation

Turning off approval delegation has no effect on purchasing transactions that are currently in the approval cycle. Any new transactions that are submitted will no longer be rerouted for approval if an approver is out-of-office. However, your default delegate and delegate approvers remain intact and will be used if you re-enable approval delegation.

1. Go to Purchasing > Setup > Configuration.
2. Scroll down to the Enable functionality section, in the Approvals subsection deselect the Enable delegation checkbox. The Manage button disappears.
3. Select Save.

Field descriptions

The following table describes each field on the Manage delegates page.

Manage delegates page field descriptions

Field	Description
Default delegate type	Choose whether to select a specific user or a user group to be the default delegate. If you choose a user group as the delegate, only the members of the group with the required approve purchase transaction permissions are able to approve.
Default delegate	Only users or user groups with approve purchase transaction permission appear in the list. The default delegate that you select is used to: Automatically be used as the default delegate for each approver in the table. If you change the default delegate, all approvers previously assigned the default delegate are updated with the new delegate. If an approver is assigned a non-default delegate, there is no change when a new default delegate is selected. Assign as the delegate for any new approver—a user who is subsequently given approve purchase transaction permission after delegates have been assigned. You can always change the delegate for an approver.
Approver	Read-only. Every user with approve purchase transaction permission appears in the table.
Delegate type	Displays the default or selected delegate type for the approver.
User or user group	A user or user group who can approve on behalf of the approver. Only users or group members with approve purchase transaction permission appear in the list. Users who are restricted to specific entities can be selected as delegate approvers. However, a restricted delegate approver cannot approve a transaction which contains any line-items assigned to restricted entities. When the approver turns on out-of-office approval delegation, Sage Intacct reroutes any new approval requests to the delegate. The delegate remains the approver of the transaction even after the approver turns off out-of-office approval delegation. If you use value-based approval policies, make sure the delegate has the same or higher purchase value permission level as the original approver. To view a delegate's value permission level, see Value approval rules.