Configuring an Approval Map for Multistage Approvals

For a multistage approval process, you configure one approval map in which you define the conditions for each stage of the approval process.

Workflow of Multistage Approvals

With multistage approvals, a document is approved by multiple approvers in a fixed order; no reviews occur simultaneously. For example, if in your company all Accounts Payable bills should be initially approved by an accountant, and the bills whose total amount exceeds some threshold must also be approved by the top manager, you can configure a multistage approval process: Once an accountant has approved the bill in the first stage, that bill (if it matches the conditions specified for the second stage) goes to the top manager for final approval.

You configure the multistage approval process by using the Assignment and Approval Maps (EP205500) form. On the Rules pane of this form, you add a row for each required approval stage (the Seq. column specifies the order number of the approval stage). In each row, you should specify the employee responsible for approving AP bills on the selected stage, and the workgroup in which the approver is included. On the Conditions pane, you specify the criteria that Accounts Payable bills must met to be assigned for approval at each stage.

Besides the Approval Workgroup ID parameter, for each approval stage, you define the conditions that the documents should meet to be assigned to the approver of that stage. You can add as many specific conditions as needed (for example, whether the bill amount is above a specific threshold amount).