Attaining Approvals
Objective
After completing this lesson, you will be able to describe the ways users can approve documents in SAP Ariba and perform an approval in guided buying.
Procure-to-Pay with Guided Buying Process Flow
Introducing Approval Processes
- Configurable approval rules allow you to build one dynamic structure that will add approvers based on conditions. Examples include:
- Add approvers based on total cost
- Add approvers for specific commodities
- Add approvers if the requester created a non-catalog (ad-hoc) item
- Approval rules can refer to lookup files to add the correct approvers. Loading of lookup files can be automated so they are always up-to-date.
- Guided buying uses the same set of business rules as SAP Ariba Procurement to specify the approvals that are required for specific requests and documents.
Approval Flow Terminology
- Watchers are informed about the request, but do not approve or deny the document.
- Approvers must approve or deny the document. If any approver denies the document, the entire document is denied.
- Serial routing sends the document to the first approver and waits for their approval before sending to the second.
- Parallel routing branches approval, sending it to multiple approvers at the same time.
- Groups can be approvers. Click a group name to see who can approve or deny on behalf of the entire group.
- Users can be added to the approval flow to approve as an individual.
Approve a Requisition in Guided Buying
Step 1: Click on Approve Requests from the Menu
- Notifications Bell
- You can also see items which require your attention from the Notification bell
- Approval Tile
- Administrators can also create a tile on the home page or a landing page which takes you to the items to approve
- Viewing Approval Requests
Within the Guided Buying application, you can view all requests for approval by accessing the menu from the upper left hand corner of the page and then selecting Approve Requests.
This page displays a summary of the current approvables. You can click the See details to review the document prior to viewing.
Step 2: Select the Document to Approve
- Approve or Watch
- You can see items which need your approval, items for which you are a watcher, and items you recently approved from here
- Not feeling Detail-Oriented?
- You can approve documents from this page without viewing additional details
- See Details to Deny
- You cannot deny from this screen and must click See details first
Step 3: Review Details
- Review the Approval Flow
- Approvers can see who else must approve and, if necessary, add additional approvers to the flow
- Item Details and Accounting
- Approvers can review pricing, supplier information, as well as the accounts being charged
Step 4: Click Approve
- Add Comments
- If you want to capture additional information, you can add a comment when approving
- Comments for Supplier
- By default, comments are internal only, but you can check a box to include comments on the Purchase Order for suppliers
- Click Approve
- Click the approve button to confirm your action
Other Ways to Approve
- SAP Ariba Buying User Interface
- Click Manage and select My To Do.
- Search for the document and select it from the list.
- Click Approve or Deny.
- Add comments and confirm.
- Email Approval
- Email is sent to approver with information about the requisition.
- Approver clicks Approve or Deny.
- New email is generated with an area to add comments, if desired.
- Approver sends generated email to "capture" approval or denial.
- SAP Ariba Mobile App
- Click To Approve tile.
- From the list, select the purchase requisition to approve.
- You may add comments, attachments, or see the history of the document.
- You can Pin the document to review when you get back to your desk.
- Click Approve or Deny at the bottom of the screen.