Form Approvals | Overview - Zoho Forms

Overview

Having an approval process within your organization becomes essential to approve certain documents, applications, invoices, budgets, purchase orders, discounts, vacation time, etc. To streamline the manual approval processes that you already have and make them more efficient, and easier to manage, you can automate the repetitive approval processes by building appropriate forms and setting up an approval process. You can configure multiple levels of approval and add designated approvers from your organization, who will get notified when new form entries are received for review and approval. You can trigger email notifications for each stage of the approval process, and choose to process integrations set up for your form only on the approval of the form entries. This automation can ensure a systematic approach that will prevent delays and establish uniformity across team members.

How do Form Approvals work?




For example, consider a Leave Request application from your employees that requires multi-level approval:

1. Employee submits a Leave Request form.    
      
Leave Request Form                      
                          
2. Manager 1 gets notified 
3. Manager 1 approves the request      
4. Manager 2 gets notified     
5. Manager 2 approves the request
6. HR get notified
7. HR approves the request

Levels of Approval

8.  Final Approval status - Approved
9. Employee gets notified on final decision.

Approval Notification

The approval automation feature is fully available on our mobile apps, so you can set up the entire forms workflow approvals online and offline.
Approvals in mobile

Form Approval Workflow Use-cases

Form approval workflows are a common in businesses and organizations that need to collect data and then review and approve them before further processing. Here are some examples of how form approval workflows can be used:

Employee Onboarding
HR departments can use form approval workflows to collect new employee information such as personal details, job role, and department, and then send the form for approval to the relevant managers or team leaders before the employee can be officially onboarded.

Purchase Requests
Businesses can use form approval workflows to collect purchase requests from employees, including items, quantities, and budgets. The form can then be sent for approval to the relevant managers or department heads before the purchase can be authorized.

Leave Requests
Organizations can use form approval workflows to collect leave requests from employees, including the type of leave, dates, and reasons. The form can then be sent for approval to the relevant managers or HR personnel before the leave can be authorized.

Expense Reports
Companies can use form approval workflows to collect expense reports from employees, including expenses such as travel, accommodation, and meals. The form can then be sent for approval to the relevant managers or accounting personnel before the expenses can be reimbursed.

Service Requests
Service providers can use form approval workflows to collect service requests from clients, including the type of service, scope, and budget. The form can then be sent for approval to the relevant project managers or service delivery personnel before the service can be initiated.

Steps to setup Form approvals

Approval Workflow
  1. Set up levels of approval
  2. Configure Approval Settings
  3. Send email notifications in approval process
  4. Review of form entry by approvers

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