Review an approval assigned to you¶

Document approvals brings together workflow decisions waiting for you. Some approvals concern a record and its documents; others concern a project, case or request. Your decision records your part in the review. The process's approval rule determines whether more people must decide before the work advances.

Availability: This guide follows the six approval screens in WorkOS Final Screens. The frontend now provides local search/due filters, record and project examples, and a rejection dialog. Connected inbox reads, document access and saved decisions still need verification. Treat the steps below as the intended journey while that delivery is completed.

The current preview searches the names of five sample approvals on one example page. Due labels, counts and history are examples. Review, Reject or Keep reviewing can open a different fixed example instead of retaining your selected task; opening a file also loses the original approval context. Approve and Reject request show preview feedback only. They do not save a decision, notify a requester or save the typed reason as an approval comment.

Find the work waiting for you¶

1. Open Workflows, then select Document approvals beside My work and Pooled queues.
2. Review the approval title, process and step, requester, decision progress and due information.
3. To narrow the list, enter text in Search approvals, choose a due category and select Apply filters.
4. Use Previous and Next when more than one page is available.
5. Select Review on the approval you need to decide.

The inbox contains your assigned, active approval tasks with a pending decision for you. It is not a history of every approval in the organization. An approval can disappear after your decision is saved even when other reviewers still need to decide.

Search covers workflow titles, process names or codes, step names and supported request, project or case references and titles. Requester names and email addresses are not included in this search. Record reference and document filename search are also not established by this inbox.

No approvals need your attention is the quiet state; View all work returns you to other work. No approvals match your filters means the current filters found nothing; use Clear filters before concluding that there is no work. An empty page beyond the last result is another reason to return to an earlier page.

Understand due timing and progress¶

The process can set separate response, warning and completion times. The approval list places overdue completion work first, followed by work whose warning time has arrived, other timed work and work without an outstanding due time. Within those groups, timing and task creation order determine the list.

The current design's fixed “less/more than 24 hours” explanation needs correction. One no-deadline example also retains a Due today heading. Use the saved task's actual timing while those examples are reconciled. A time shown as Requested in this approval context comes from the approval task's creation time; it need not be the original business request's submission time.

Decision progress counts approved, rejected and pending decision slots. A required approval count can differ from the number of people involved. Do not interpret “decided” as “approved” or assume that all visible reviewers must always approve.

Review the supporting information¶

For a record approval, confirm the Reference, Subject, Type and Stage. In Documents, check the filename, version and current-version indicator, then use View file where supported. Review the relevant current material before deciding. Follow the governed viewer's expiry instructions and reopen from the source if its session expires.

The document list can include earlier versions as well as current ones. A version-history entry describes a file version; it is not an approval decision or proof of who approved that file. Approving does not verify that the document is still the same version you viewed. If the content changes while you are reviewing, refresh and resolve the change before deciding.

For an approval without record context, read the Source information, such as its project reference and title. A missing record-document section is expected for that kind of work. Review the corresponding business information through your authorized access; the inspected screen does not establish a universal shortcut to every source.

Read Decision history for each reviewer's role, decision, comment and timing. An unresolved decision has no resolved time. A note may describe an earlier reassignment while the decision is still pending. Missing reviewer details should remain visibly unavailable rather than being replaced with a guessed name.

You need workflow access and authority to resolve your own assigned decision. Record-backed review also requires record access. A workspace owner or support role does not automatically become the assigned approver. Personnel records use their separate protected path and are excluded from the ordinary record-detail composition inspected here.

Approve or reject¶

To approve, review the task and supporting information, then select Approve when the action is permitted. Check the saved outcome and refreshed work list. The inspected Final Screens show the approval action directly; they do not establish an additional confirmation step.

To reject:

1. Select Reject when the process permits rejection.
2. Read Reject this approval?.
3. Enter Reason for rejecting (optional) when useful. Give a clear business explanation without adding unrelated sensitive information.
4. Select Keep reviewing to return without submitting, or Reject request to submit the rejection.
5. Check the saved decision and resulting workflow state.

The reason is optional in the inspected decision model. A saved comment is decision evidence; notification and requester visibility depend on the connected source flow and are still being verified. Rejection is different from returning a request for correction. It also does not apply a signature; use the separate signing guide for a signing task.

What your decision changes¶

Your saved decision completes your approval task. The wider approval may remain pending:

• Sequential review: reviewers decide in order. A rejection rejects the approval; an approval can open the next reviewer's task.
• All reviewers: every pending slot must approve; a rejection rejects the approval.
• Any reviewer: one approval is enough. Rejections can leave the approval pending while other decisions remain.
• Required-count review: the configured number of approvals must be reached. The approval is rejected when even all remaining decisions could no longer reach that number.

The quorum and majority modes in the inspected implementation use a stored required count. Their names alone do not establish a universal voting percentage.

When the approval resolves, other outstanding tasks for that approval are cancelled. An approved route may continue to another step or a configured handoff. A rejected approval ends the workflow as rejected. Neither result alone establishes that a separate dispatch, filing or external service completed its work.

Managers should check both individual decisions and the overall process outcome. Administrators maintain reviewer assignments and approval rules. Executives can use this distinction to understand where work is waiting without treating a single vote as full business completion.

When something changes or fails¶

Provide support with the workspace, task or business reference, time, action attempted and visible result. Keep document capabilities and sensitive document contents in the approved support channel. Complete connected success, denial, changed-assignment, dependency-error and uncertain-result screens remain part of delivery work.