Establishing Approvals Workflows for your vendor invoices and employee expenses is a crucial precursor to the accounting process in RedTeam Flex.
When Invoices from Vendors are entered into RedTeam Flex, they are routed for various users to review and approve. The same occurs for Employee Expenses. This workflow of approvals is determined by the Approvals Workflow set up in the Configuration menu.
The workflow is established using roles, which can also be created and managed in the Configuration section. Many users in RedTeam will be assigned the same role, so for the system to determine which user receives invoices on each project, the person who receives the invoice for approval must also be a member of that project's Team. For details on adding a member to your Team, see the "Manage Project Team Members" article.
Employee Expense approvals have some additional factors for their approvals. Unlike invoices, expenses can be created outside of a project for overhead reasons. Overhead expenses will bypass project team member roles and instead seek approvals based on Supervisor status. Vendor invoice workflows are based on cost type, meaning that separate workflows can be established for materials, subcontract, labor, equipment, or other type invoices respectively. On the other hand, expense workflows are based on company division, and all expenses within a given division of your company will follow the same workflow.
1. Update Vendor Invoice Approvals Routing
Establishing Approvals Workflow is an important part of the accounting setup process. It is used to route Vendor Invoices for approval by members of each project team. To set up this matrix of approvals, you will need to configure the Approvals Workflow under the Configuration section of RedTeam.
Default Workflow:
If no edits are made to the Approvals Workflow for Vendor Invoices within your database, each invoice will follow the path below
Project Manager (PM): All invoices will go to the Project Manager first, regardless of amount
Operations Manager (OM): All invoices over $5,000 will go to the Operations Manager after being approved by the PM. If an invoice is under $5,000, it will skip over the OM and go to the Project Accountant (PA)
Project Accountant (PA): All invoices will come to the Project Accountant for the final approval and execution
The Approval Matrix can be configured with as many or as few levels of approval as you need, as well as dollar limits for each role (in the above example, all Invoices approved by the PM under $5,000 go straight to Accounting, but anything over $5,000 must also be approved by an Operations Manager). If an Invoice is rejected for any reason, it returns to the last person in the Matrix, who can made changes accordingly.
NOTE: If any of your reviewers are assigned multiple permissions roles within the workflow (such as a PM who also has OM permissions), they will only need to approve one time to pass the invoice to the PA in the above example. An invoice will be approved for all of the roles the user holds IN SEQUENCE. This means that if a user holds the PM and PA roles, they will still need to approve the invoice twice, once before the OM and again after the OM, but if their roles are listed in sequence within the configured workflow, they will only need to approve once for all roles.
Steps:
From Configuration, locate "Approvals Workflow" (under the heading: Accounting)
Choose the Approval Workflow you want to update: Material or Subcontract
Click the tools icon
Click "Open"
Click the tools icon next to an Approval Level to change the info (i.e. maximum approval limit) using the "Edit" button or to delete the Approval Level entirely with the "Delete" option.
Click the New (+) icon to add a new Level to the Approval Matrix. You can add a new Approval Level to be inserted anywhere in the Matrix.
Fill in each of the fields in the editing window as desired; each field is defined for you below:
Sequence: this number indicates the order in which this approver will be listed within the matrix (i.e. the number 2 indicates that this will be the second approver in the approval chain)
Role: this indicates which permissions role will be the approver for this step in the sequence (i.e. the Operations Manager (OM) will be our second approver)
Limit: This number indicates that if an invoice is under a certain total value, it may skip one or more of the following approvers (i.e. if the limit is $5000, any invoice with a total of $4999 or less can skip the Operations Manager, and be sent straight to the Project Accountant for final approval)
Under Limit: this number indicates which step in the sequence an invoice should flow to next if the total is under the Limit amount set above (i.e. if the Under Limit is set to 3, any invoice under the Limit amount of $5000 will flow directly to the 3rd approver, skipping over any approvers in between)
Instructions: this is an open field for any additional notes that you would like to leave for future editors (i.e. you can explain any setting choices you made or your reason for making a change here)
Click "Save" after making any changes while Editing or Adding an Approval Level
Click "Close" when finished
Pro-Tips:
If you would like all invoices, regardless of of total value, to flow to the next step in your approver sequence without skipping anyone, be sure the Limit for that sequence number is $999,999,999, and the Under Limit is set to the next number in the sequence (i.e. if you are setting up Sequence number 1, the Under Limit should be set to number 2). This will ensure that all invoices flow from your first approver to your second, no matter what the total value
Your final approver in any sequence should always have a Limit of $0, and an Under Limit that matches the Sequence number (i.e. if your final approver is sequence number 3, the Under Limit number should also be 3)
You may have as many approvers in your sequence as you would like; simply use the New Icon (+) to add more approvers to the Sequence as needed
The “Level” number shown next to each approver in the workflow list view does not affect your matrix in any way; this number is a “left-over” indicator from an older version of RedTeam’s approval matrix system
2. Update Employee Expense Approval Routing
Employee Expense Approvals are used to route through supervisors and project team members, as needed. To use Employee Expense Approvals as an accounting tool, the workflow must first be configured. The expense workflow is set up in Expense Approvals within the Configuration Menu. Each company division will have its own workflow.
Project expenses will use the company division assigned to the customer facility to determine which approval workflow will be used.
Overhead expenses will use the company division assigned in the payroll section of the employee's profile to determine which approval workflow will be used. Note that only direct supervisor and next-level supervisor roles will be counted for these expenses. Project-specific roles such as project manager, operations manager, etc. will be skipped.
Here is an example workflow with four levels of approval:
Project Manager -> Direct Supervisor -> Next-Level Supervisor -> Controller
In this case, after the employee has created their expense and routed it, the expense will first go to the project PM for approval. From there, it is sent to the employee's direct supervisor, then to the supervisor's supervisor, then to the project's controller. If an Invoice is rejected for any reason, it returns to the previous person in the Matrix, who can make changes accordingly.
NOTE: If any of your reviewers are assigned multiple permissions roles within the workflow (such as a PM who is also the direct supervisor), they will only need to approve one time to pass the invoice to the Next-Level Supervisor in the above example. An invoice will be approved for all of the roles the user holds IN SEQUENCE. This means that if a user holds the PM and Controller roles, they will still need to approve the invoice twice, once before the Supervisors and again after them, but if their roles are listed in sequence within the configured workflow, they will only need to approve once for all roles.
Default Workflow:
If no edits are made to the Approvals Workflow for Employee Expenses within your database, each invoice will follow the path below
Direct Supervisor: All expenses will go to the employee’s assigned Direct Supervisor first, regardless of amount; the Direct Supervisor will be the final approver for all Overhead Expenses, while Project Expenses will continue to the Project Accountant for final approval
Project Accountant (PA): All Project Expenses will come to the Project Accountant for final approval and commitment
Steps:
From the Configuration Menu, click "Approvals Workflow" (under the heading: Accounting)
Select the Expenses tab of the Approval Types
Choose the company division Approval Workflow you want to update
Click the tools icon.
Click "Open"
Click the New Icon (+) in the top right corner to add additional individuals to the approval sequence, or click the Tools Icon next to an existing sequence number and select “Edit”
Fill in each of the fields in the editing window as desired; each field is defined for you below:
Sequence: this number indicates the order in which this approver will be listed within the matrix (i.e. the number 2 indicates that this will be the second approver in the approval chain)
Approver: this indicates which individual OR permissions role will be the approver for this step in the sequence (i.e. our first approver may be an individual, such as Direct Supervisor, while our second or third approver may be a permissions role, such as Project Accountant)
Limit: This number indicates that if an expense is under a certain total value, it may skip one or more of the following approvers (i.e. if the limit is $500, any expense with a total of $499 or less can skip the Next Level Supervisor, and be sent straight from the Direct Supervisor to the Project Accountant for final approval)
Under Limit: this number indicates which step in the sequence an expense should flow to next if the total is under the Limit amount set above (i.e. if the Under Limit is set to 3, any expense under the Limit amount of $500 will flow directly to the 3rd approver, skipping over any approvers in between)
Instructions: this is an open field for any additional notes that you would like to leave for future editors (i.e. you can explain any setting choices you made or your reason for making a change here)
Click "Save" after making any changes while Editing an Approval Level
Click "Back" or the (x) button in the top right to close out the window.
Pro-Tips:
If you would like all expenses, regardless of of total value, to flow to the next step in your approver sequence without skipping anyone, be sure the Limit for that sequence number is $999,999,999, and the Under Limit is set to the next number in the sequence (i.e. if you are setting up Sequence number 1, the Under Limit should be set to number 2). This will ensure that all expenses flow from your first approver to your second, no matter what the total value
Your final approver in any sequence should always have a Limit of $0, and an Under Limit that matches the Sequence number (i.e. if your final approver is sequence number 3, the Under Limit number should also be 3)
The approvals flow for Overhead expenses cannot include permissions roles, as these expenses are not part of the budget for any particular project; if you plan to use Overhead expenses in RedTeam, your first approver for expenses should be the Direct Supervisor, followed by the Next Level Supervisor if desired. Any Role based approvers after that will only apply to Project Expenses. The highest level of supervisor in your workflow will always be the final approver for Overhead Expenses. (See default workflow above for example)
You may have as many approvers in your sequence as you would like; simply use the New Icon (+) to add more approvers to the Sequence as needed
3. Approvals Workflow Configuration Metadata
When changes are made to the Approvals Workflow for Vendor Invoices, RedTeam tracks those changes and records them. The metadata is tracked separately by type of invoice (material or subcontract). The metadata records who made the change and when the change was made. Within the expanded metadata information you will find the details of which approval role was changed and what specific change was made.
Most commonly, access to the Configuration Menu is limited to small numbers of employees with specific roles that grant them the permissions.
Steps:
Go to the configuration menu and click Approvals workflow within the Accounting section.
Click the toolbox of the workflow type, then click Open. Metadata is listed separately by workflow type.
Click the more icon in the top right, then click Metadata.
When viewing the metadata, click the + icon to the left of the entry to view expanded details.
