PeopleSoft Expenses 9.1 PeopleBook

Managing Approvals in PeopleSoft Expenses

This chapter provides overviews of approvals in PeopleSoft Expenses, approver types, and approval rules, lists common elements and discusses how to:

Use summary approvals for expense transactions.
Approve expense reports.
Approve time reports.
Approve time adjustments.
Approve travel authorizations.
Approve cash advances.
Approve expense transactions using email.
View approval errors.
Modify approved transactions.
Manage workflow.

Note. PeopleSoft Expenses delivers an approval and workflow configuration as part of system data. You can activate or inactivate transactions and approver types to match your business requirements. Oracle recommends that you manage your approval rules only through the PeopleSoft Expenses configuration pages; otherwise, modifications to the Approval Framework configuration data could disrupt approval routing. PeopleSoft Expenses supports only user lists that are based on application class. Using other user list sources may require customizing your system.

Due to the complex rules used by PeopleSoft Expenses, the PeopleTools - Monitor Approvals page should not be used to approve or deny expense transactions. To approve and deny expense transactions, use the PeopleSoft Expenses approval pages that are documented in this chapter.

Understanding Approvals in PeopleSoft Expenses

Many organizations enforce rules and policies related to expenses that employees and contractors incur for which they seek reimbursement. To manage these rules and policies, organizations can require one or more approvals for expense transactions as a normal part of the business process. The expense transaction types supported for approvals in PeopleSoft Expenses are travel authorizations, cash advances, expense reports, time reports, and time adjustments. You can activate all or some of the transaction types for approval through the approval configuration pages.

Organizations can have one or more types of approvers ranging from a departmental reviewer to an auditor who reviews expense transactions after reimbursements are processed. The approval process in PeopleSoft Expenses can involve certain actions that an approver can perform such as Approve, Deny, Send Back, Save, and Hold. The actions that an approver can take are determined through setup and configuration of the approver. Reviewing and approving expense transactions are performed through a set of pages that are accessed through the Summary Approvals pages, worklist, email, or email notification. These are a centralized set of pages used by approvers and auditors. PeopleSoft Expenses enables reviewers, approvers, and auditors to drill down to the transaction detail where they can view, modify, add, deny, undeny, or take action on the transaction. PeopleSoft Expenses also provides the ability to view or take action on expense transactions directly through an email approval message, depending on the configuration of your system.

Summary Approvals

The PeopleSoft Expenses approval functionality enables reviewers, approvers, and auditors to review and approve multiple expense transactions with one approval action. You control the approver actions that can be used on the summary approval pages. You can disable summary approvals if it violates company policy for expense approvals and disable transactions for approval on the summary approval pages if they have exceptions or contain risk. You can also configure approvals so that an approver with multiple roles can see the same transaction only once. Depending on how you set up PeopleSoft Expenses, reviewers, approvers, and auditors can:

Approve some or all expense transactions in their queues with one action.
Approve all expense transaction types on one page or approve by transaction type.
Drill down to view additional information and take action on transactions at the detail level.
Change the sort order of transactions and view them sequentially in the new order.
Search for transactions in a pending approval status.
View expense history for one or more employees prior to approval.
View risk and urgency alerts.
Approve transactions using any device that is capable of receiving HTML emails, including mobile and handheld devices.

Pooled Approvers

You establish pooled approvers by assigning multiple approvers to the same routing range of ChartFields or by adding multiple profiles to the Expenses Approval Setup - Approver Routing List. In both cases, you must select the Notify All Approvers option in the Submission Notifications group box on the Approver Routing List page. The system by default requires only one approver out of the pool to approve a transaction. You can modify this to reflect the number of approvers that your organization requires by changing the Number of Approvers Needed value on the Setup Process Definitions – Approval Step Definition - Step page.

The following rules apply to pooled approver functionality:

If you configure the system to require only one approver from a pool of approvers, and one of the approvers performs an approval action, the system withdraws the transaction from the other approvers' queues.
If you establish multiple profiles on the Expenses Approval Setup - Approver Routing list with multiple approvers assigned to each profile, the system requires only one approval from the pool if you set the Number of Approvers Needed field to 1 on the Setup Process Definitions – Approval Step Definition - Step page.
If you define a profile on an approver list that is associated with a refinement or filter that excludes a transaction, the system excludes the approvers assigned to that profile from the pool. For example, Auditor1, Auditor2, and Auditor3 profiles are on the prepayment auditor approver list. Auditor2 uses a refinement that selects only expense reports that contain project-related expenses. When an employee submits an expense report that does not contain project-related expenses, the approver pool consists of approvers assigned to the Auditor1 and Auditor3 profiles only. Auditor2 is excluded from the pool because no project-related expenses were included in the expense report.
If all approvers in a pool are excluded by the system because of refinements associated with their profiles, the system automatically approves the transaction for that role.
If all approvers on an approver list are defined with amount-based rules that exclude a submitted transaction, the system routes the transaction to the employee's supervisor. If the supervisor has already approved the transaction, the system routes the transaction to the next approval stage. If it is the last stage for approving an expense report or cash advance for payment, the system sets the status to Approved for Payment.

Email Approvals

Email approvals can be used to approve, deny, and send back expense transactions using email without requiring the user to sign in to the PeopleSoft Expenses system. PeopleSoft Expenses uses email collaboration within the approval framework to receive emails with interactive content. An approver can receive an email that contains the detail of the transaction and can approve the transaction.

Email approvals can be sent to a handheld mobile device or any email application capable of handling HTML or HTML attachments.

Understanding Approver Types

An approver type is a role, and PeopleSoft Expenses delivers these approver types:

Reviewer

A department reviewer can screen expense transactions for policy compliance prior to the approval process. If you use this type of role, approvals are not processed until the transaction has been reviewed.
Expense Manager

A department or expenses manager is authorized to approve some or all expense transactions. You can use the Expense Manager role instead of using the HR Supervisor role or you can use the role in conjunction with the HR supervisor for approvals of transactions meeting defined conditions, such as report total amount. You define these approvers through an approver list in PeopleSoft Expenses.
HR Supervisor

This role is the supervisor to whom the employee, contractor, or consultant directly reports, and is defined in the employee's user profile.
Project Manager

The person designated for project time and expense approvals may be the project manager as defined in PeopleSoft Project Costing, or the supervisor as an option in the product.
Project Supplemental Approver

This role is a supplemental or conditional approver for project-related expense transactions. Use this approver type instead of project manager approvals, or in conjunction with project manager approvals for project-related transactions that meet defined conditions, such as report total amount or reports with billable project hours. You define these approvers through an approver list.
Prepayment Auditor

This approver type supports an auditor process prior to payment processing for review and approvals.
Post Payment Auditor

Post payment auditors can take action on expense transactions that have completed the processing cycle. Certain combinations of transactions and approval actions are disallowed for this role.

Understanding Approval Rules

Employees cannot approve or audit their own expense transactions if the Enterprise Component's Approval Engine - Self Approval check box is deselected on the Approval Process Setup page for the stage, path, and step associated with the employee approval role. PeopleSoft Expenses compares the employee ID on the transaction with the employee ID that is associated with the user ID of the approver or auditor. This section discusses:

Deny and undeny rules.
Final approval rules.
Privilege rules.
Adding transaction lines during approval processing rules.
Routing rules.
Reassigning rules.
Approval constraints.
Final approval status rules.

Deny and Undeny Rules

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules for deny and undeny functionality:

When an approver who is authorized to approve all transaction lines in an expense report clicks the Deny button for a transaction, PeopleSoft Expenses sets the transaction status to Denied. The transaction cannot be modified or resubmitted. If multiple approvers exist, PeopleSoft Expenses does not route the transaction to any subsequent approvers.

For example, MGR1, MGR2, and MGR3 are required to approve expense reports. If MGR1 denies the expense report, PeopleSoft Expenses does not route the report the MGR2 or MGR3.
When an approver who is authorized to approve some transaction lines clicks the Deny button, PeopleSoft Expenses denies all transaction lines that the approver is authorized to approve. Any subsequent approvers cannot undeny those transaction lines.

If the approver is responsible for all transaction lines on the report and clicks the Deny button, the report terminates and is removed from any subsequent approvers' queues.
When approvals are performed by a pool of approvers, the first approver who denies the transaction and is authorized to approve all of the transaction lines sets the transaction status to Denied. The system removes the transaction from the approval pool.
When an approver denies a transaction by deselecting the Approve check box, but approves the overall transaction, the system routes the transaction to any subsequent approvers. The subsequent approvers can undeny the previously denied transaction line only if they have the authority to access the transaction line for approval.

Final Approval Rules

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules for final approvals:

You must authorize at least one active approver type to approve expense report transactions for payment.
You must authorize active approver types for expense report transactions to approve for payment, approve for billing, or both.
PeopleSoft Expenses sets the status for travel authorizations, cash advances, time reports, and time adjustments to Approvals In Process until the final approver approves the transaction.
Expense reports display a status of Approvals In Process until the final approver who is authorized to approve for payment has approved the transaction. Upon final approval, PeopleSoft Expenses changes the status to Approved for Payment. If no reimbursement is due back to the employee, PeopleSoft Expenses sets the status to Paid.
If a transaction is in the Staged or Paid status, PeopleSoft Expenses does not enable the Deny or Send Back actions for subsequent approvers and the transaction displays a Pending Billing Approval status. The exception to this rule is that a post payment auditor can deny lines on an expense report or deny the entire transaction.

Privilege Rules

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules for privileges:

If multiple approvers are authorized and one of the approvers adds a new line to an expense transaction, PeopleSoft Expenses records the user ID and date of the line added and routes the transaction to the next approver, if applicable.
If an approver adds a line or modifies a line to change the value of a routing ChartField in any distribution, PeopleSoft Expenses does not route the transaction back to the beginning of the approval process; only subsequent approvers will see the line.

Adding Transaction Lines During Approval Processing Rules

When approvers add new transaction lines during the approval process, the system routes the new lines to subsequent approvers based on the ChartField values assigned to the new transaction line. Approvers must have the appropriate permissions to be able to add new lines during the approval process.

See Understanding Approval Privilege Templates.

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules when adding transaction lines during the approval process:

When an approver adds an expense transaction line, the approver can modify the newly added line, regardless of his or her approval privileges, until the approver has submitted the transaction by clicking the Approve button.
If the approver does not have Delete or Full privileges, only the newly added transaction line can be deleted by the approver.
Any errors that the system identifies when entering a new expense transaction line must first be corrected before any action can be taken on the transaction.
The system stamps any added expense transaction lines with the approver's operator ID and date on the line detail pages for expense reports and travel authorizations, and on the summary page grids for cash advances and time reports.
When the approver clicks the Save Changes button, the transaction is validated and saved but no approval-related action is taken.
When the approver clicks the Approve button, any new transaction lines are added to the transaction when it continues through the approval framework approval process.
When the approver clicks the Deny button, the new transaction line is set to a status of denied. No additional changes can be made to the new transaction line, and any transaction lines that the approver has the authority to approve are permanently denied.
When the approver clicks the Send Back button, the transaction is returned to the submitter and includes any transaction lines added by the approver.
When the approver clicks the Hold button, the system submits the transaction and any added transaction lines to the approval process, but holds the transaction from any further processing.

For example, MGR1, MGR2, and MGR3 are pooled approvers that are potentially required to approve expense reports. If MGR1 puts the expense report on hold, PeopleSoft Expenses removes the report from MGR2 or MGR3's queue until MGR1 releases the transaction.
When a designated approver for a transaction adds an expense transaction line, the system considers this action an approval action.
When an expense transaction line is added by an approver, the system routes the transaction, including the added transaction line, to the next designated approver.

The added expense transaction lines are routed to subsequent approvers by means of the ChartField configurations entered on the transaction line and the approval framework configurations that are defined for your approvers. Each subsequent approver can take action based on his or her defined approval permissions.

When no other subsequent approvers exist, the new transaction line is approved when the transaction is approved.

Routing Rules

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules for routing:

This is the general defaulting rule used in rerouting (escalation), delegation, or reassignment functionality:
- If the system cannot determine the appropriate approver based on the configuration, the system routes the transaction to the HR supervisor or designated approver in the employee's profile.
- If the system cannot determine an HR supervisor or designated approver through the employee's profile, the system routes the transaction to the Expense System Administrator that you define in the PeopleSoft Expenses Manage Approvals - Transaction Definition (EX_TRANS_DEFN) component.
If the escalation process picks up a transaction for rerouting, and the approver who is designated as the target for rerouting is the same person as the employee or submitter, the system routes the transaction to the approver's supervisor.
If the rerouting process picks up a transaction for rerouting, and the approver who is designated as the target for rerouting is the same person as the employee or submitter, the system routes the transaction to the approver but does not enable him or her to take any transaction approval action on the approval pages.
If you reassign a transaction to an approver who has already approved the transaction, the system does not route the transaction to that approver again.
If supervisor A of an employee submits a report for the employee, the system routs the transaction to the supervisor of supervisor A.

Reassigning Rules

When you use the Define Security - Reassign Work page to reassign work from one approver to another, PeopleSoft Expenses validates user IDs and transactions:

PeopleSoft Expenses generates an error and terminates the reassign operation if you enter the same approver in the Reassign Work To field on the Define Security - Reassign Work page.

Example: MGR1 cannot reassign work to MGR1.
If the originator of an expense transaction is the same as the reassigned approver, PeopleSoft Expenses performs the reassignment, but when the new approver attempts to perform an approval action, that approver receives a message indicating that he or she is not authorized to approve a transaction that he or she submitted.

Example: MGR1 reassigns the work to MGR2. PeopleSoft Expenses encounters an expense transaction that MGR2 created and submitted to MGR1 for approval.
If the alternate approver is the same person as the approver whose work is being reassigned, the system reassigns the work in the following way:

Example: MGR1 assigns the work to MGR2. MGR1 is also the alternate approver for MGR2. The system ignores the delegation and reassigns the work to MGR2.
If an approver reassigns work to another approver who has designated an alternate approver, who in turn has designated an alternate approver who is the original approver, it is considered a circular reference and the reassignment stops at the first approver it encounters who is not the originator.

Example:
- MGR1 designates MGR2 as the alternate approver.
- MGR2 designates MGR3 as the alternate approver.
- MGR3 designates MGR4 as the alternate approver.
- MGR4 designates MGR1 as the alternate approver.
The approval engine loops through the delegated approvers until it can find no more alternates or until an alternate appears who has already appeared once in the approval chain of alternates. In the preceding example, the system would route the transaction to MGR4 and stop there because the alternate is an approver who has already been processed in the loop.

Approval Constraints

PeopleSoft Expenses has some approval constraints:

The system routes time reports and time report adjustments containing only non-project hours to the HR supervisor or designated approver whom you defined on the employee profile.
You cannot route cash advances to project manager or project supplemental approvers.

Final Approval Status Rules

PeopleSoft Expenses uses these rules for final approvals:

For travel authorizations, cash advances, time reports, and time adjustments, all active approvers must approve the transaction before the system marks the transaction header with a final approval status. Final approval status is Approved for these transactions.
For expense reports, PeopleSoft Expenses sets the transaction header status to Approved for Payment upon approval by the last active approver type who is authorized to approve for payment. If subsequent approvers are active, the system routes the transaction to them; however, the expense report is eligible for payment processing, regardless of any subsequent approver actions. If the expense report is in Approved for Payment status, subsequent approvers can deny it or send it back for revision during the prepayment approval process. However, subsequent approvers cannot deny or send back for revision if the expense report is staged for payment or paid.
For expense reports, the system sets the billing status to Approved for Billing upon approval by the last active approver type who is authorized to approve for billing. If subsequent approvers are active, the system routes the transaction to them.
For expense reports, a transaction status of Approved for Payment and project manager flag value of N sets the expense report to be eligible for staging to PeopleSoft Project Costing.

Common Elements Used in This Chapter

Urgency	The urgency icon is identified by a green circle, yellow triangle, or red square that indicates the level of urgency. A green circle indicates a low level of urgency, a yellow triangle indicates a medium level of urgency, and a red square indicates a high level of urgency. PeopleSoft Expenses displays a visual urgency alert to indicate that a level of urgency is associated with the expense transaction. Urgency levels are configured at the Installation Option level. Approvers can sort the transactions by urgency level on the Summary Approval page, which enables them to review the most urgent transactions first.
Risk	Click to access the View Exception Comments and Risks page and view the risk level, risk criteria, and risk details. (For cash advance and time report transactions, the risk button accesses the View Risk Details page.) The risk button is identified by a yellow triangle that has an exclamation point in the center. Approvers can sort the transactions by risk on the Summary Approval page, which enables them to review transactions that have risk first. PeopleSoft Expenses displays a visual risk alert to indicate that a level of risk is associated with the expense transaction. The risk button appears when the transaction meets the criteria that are defined on the risk template. The risk button appears at the header level for all transaction types, and at the line level for expense reports, travel authorizations, time reports, and time adjustments. Risk levels are defined by means of risk templates and are associated with an approver profile. Risk templates can have up to five levels of risk: no risk, low risk, medium to low risk, medium risk, and high risk. Using risk templates is optional.
Alert	The alert image is identified by a yellow triangle that has an exclamation point in the center. PeopleSoft Expenses displays a visual alert to indicate that an exception is associated with the expense transaction. You cannot click the alert image to transfer to another page. Exceptions are conditions that a transaction can be in that you can flag or exclude from summary approvals. An exception is not necessarily an error, but is considered as a condition or state. You select the exception conditions, such as Expenses Out of Policy or Preferred Merchant Not Used, on the Summary Approval Options page.
Errors	Click the error button to access the Approve Transactions - Error page, where you can view the details of the error. The error button is identified by a red flag. PeopleSoft Expenses displays a visual error alert to indicate that an error occurred when the system processed the transaction. Errors are conditions that prevent the approval of a transaction on the summary approval page. An error may be a budget checking status or an invalid action taken on a transaction, such as budget checking a time report.

Using Summary Approvals for Expense Transactions

This section provides an overview of summary approvals and discusses how to:

Use summary approvals for all transactions.
Use summary approvals for expense reports.
Use summary approvals for time reports.
Use summary approvals for time adjustments.
Use summary approvals for travel authorizations.
Use summary approvals for cash advances.

Understanding Summary Approvals

PeopleSoft Expenses delivers a configuration design that enables you to configure an approver for any type of role, whether it is line manager or auditor. All approvers and auditors perform reviews and approval actions through the same approval pages. In some organizations, approvers can view and approve many transactions each day. PeopleSoft Expenses enables reviewers, approvers, and auditors to view and approve some or multiple transactions in their queues with one action.

The Approve Transactions pages consist of a summary page of all transactions in an approver's queue and separate pages for each transaction type. On the Summary Approval Options page, you enable or disable the ability for approvers to act on multiple transactions on the Approve Transaction pages. For example, PeopleSoft Expenses does not display the Approve, Reviewed, Send Back, Hold, or Budget Check button on the Approve Transaction - Overview page if you deselect the Overview and Error Pages check box on the Summary Approval Options page. In this case, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the Approve Transaction - Overview page as a worklist and approvers must access the Approve Transactions pages for each transaction type (if enabled) or drill down to the transaction detail pages. PeopleSoft Expenses supports the Deny button and its functionality only on the transaction approval pages but not on the summary pages.

The Approve Transactions pages display urgency, risk, and alert images to help the approver with his or her decision-making process. Approvers can sort transactions based on urgency or risk, and they can click the risk button to access risk details.

Approvers click the link in the Description or Transaction ID column to drill down to view transaction details. They can also approve transactions from the detail pages.

On the Expenses Options page, you select the approval preference to govern the system's behavior after an approval action at the transaction detail level. For example, if you select Proceed to the Next Transaction for the approval preference, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the next transaction in the approver's queue that is of the same transaction type. If the approver is on the time report approval page, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the next time report in the approver's queue. If you select Return to List for the approval preference, PeopleSoft Expenses returns the approver to the Summary Approval page after each approval action taken at the detail level.

Approvers can select several transactions on the summary approval page and then click an approval action button. The system still observes all rules that you configured for approvals, for each transaction. At any time, approvers can click Refresh List to update their approval queues. If the approver takes an action that requires a comment and they select many transactions for the action, the system applies the comment entered by the approver to all selected transactions.

See Also

Configuring Summary Approval Options

Pages Used for Summary Approvals

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Use summary approvals for all transactions. View and approve multiple expense transactions in one approver action.
Approve Transactions - Expense Reports	EX_SHEET_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Expense Reports Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Expense Reports	Use summary approvals for expense reports. View and approve multiple expense reports in one approver action.
Approve Transactions - Time Reports	EX_TIME_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Time Reports Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Reports	View and approve multiple time reports in one approver action.
Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments	EX_TADJ_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments	View and approve multiple time adjustments in one approver action.
Approve Transactions - Travel Authorizations	EX_TAUTH_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Travel Authorizations Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Travel Authorizations	View and approve multiple travel authorizations in one approver action.
Approve Transactions - Cash Advances	EX_ADV_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances	View and approve multiple cash advances in one approver action.

Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions

Access the Approve Transactions - Overview page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview).

Search Pending Transactions

PeopleSoft Expenses provides a search utility for the summary approval pages that enables approvers to search for specific transactions in their queue that are pending approval. The search does not apply to transactions that the approver has already processed. This utility is intended for approvers who manage large numbers of transactions for review and approval. You can use this functionality to group transactions by some criteria to be approved with one action. For example, an approver can approve all expense and time reports for a special project before processing other transactions. The approver uses the search utility to select only those transactions.

The search utility enables approvers to add and delete rows; the conditional relationship between all rows is AND. If you select the Select All or Clear All check box after a search, the action applies only to those transactions returned in the search. If you click the Refresh List button, the system restores the approver's queue of pending transactions.

Column Name	PeopleSoft Expenses lists only columns that appear in the Transactions to Approve grid. If you select a column, then you must enter a criterion. Options are: Transaction Type Total Unit Name Employee ID Description This is available only for searches for expense reports, travel authorizations, and cash advances. If you enter a time report period end date for the criteria for a description field, the system does not return any time reports or time adjustments. Go to the Approve Transactions - Time Reports or Approve Transactions - Time Report Adjustments page to search for those transactions using Period End Date as the column name. Transaction ID Date Submitted Status Role Period End Date Appears if the transaction type is time report or time adjustment. Trip Date Appears only for travel authorizations. Budget Status Appears for expense reports and travel authorizations.
Expression	Select an operand to build the select criteria. Operands that appear for selection change based on the field that you select. If you select the Between operand, the system displays a second criteria field to accept a value for the end of the range. The second criteria field must be a value that is not less than the value of the first criteria field.
Criteria	Enter the specific condition of the select statement. For example, if you enter "2005 Annual Conference" for the criteria in the Description column, PeopleSoft Expenses displays only those expense transactions that match that description.
Search	Click to search the pending transactions in an approver's queue using the selection criteria that you entered in the Search Pending Transactions grid. The system deselects any transactions in the Transactions to Approve grid that you previously selected.
Clear	Click to remove all search criteria lines.

Change Sort Order

This section enables you to select up to three columns to reorder transactions in the Transactions Pending Approval grid. Select a sort key from the drop-down list box, select the sort key order (Ascending or Descending), and click Sort List.

Transactions to Approve

Select	Select transactions for an approval action. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this column if you did not enable summary approvals for the page. PeopleSoft Expenses disables the Select check box if you disallowed summary approvals for transactions with exceptions on the Summary Approval Option page, which requires the approver to drill down to the transaction detail to perform the necessary approval action.
Transaction Type	Identifies the type of expense transaction, such as expense report or cash advance. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this column only on the Approve Transactions - Overview page.
Total	Displays the total amount for monetary transactions or total hours for time transactions.
Unit	Displays the unit of measure. The submitter's the base currency code of the submitter's general ledger business unit appears for monetary transactions. PeopleSoft Expenses displays MHR for time reports and time adjustments.
Name	Displays the name of the employee whom the transaction is for.
Employee ID	Displays the employee ID of the employee whom the transaction is for.
Description	Displays the transaction header description for expense reports, travel authorizations, and cash advances; displays the period end date for time reports and time adjustments. Click the link to access one of the following pages, depending on the transaction type: Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Approve Cash Advance Report page. Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. Note. PeopleSoft Expenses uses the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page for time reports and time adjustments. See Approving Expense Reports, Approving Time Reports, Approving Time Adjustments, Approving Travel Authorizations, Approving Cash Advances.
Transaction ID	Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the transaction. Click the link to access one of the following pages, depending on the transaction type: Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Approve Cash Advance Report page. Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. Note. PeopleSoft Expenses uses the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page for time reports and time adjustments. See Approving Expense Reports, Approving Time Reports, Approving Time Adjustments, Approving Travel Authorizations, Approving Cash Advances.
Date Submitted	Displays the date on which the originator last submitted the expense transaction for approval. If an employee submits an expense transaction for approval on November 3, an approver returns the transaction to the employee on November 4, and the employee resubmits the transaction on November 5, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the date submitted as November 5.
Status	Displays the current header status of the expense transaction.
Role	Displays the type of role or approver type that the approver has for the transaction. Some employees in an organization can be both approvers and auditors. If an approver has only one role in the approval process, he or she can use the grid's Customization feature to hide this column.
Select All and Clear All	Use in conjunction with the Approve, Reviewed, Send Back, Hold, and Budget Check buttons. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display these buttons if you disabled summary approvals or the approval action on the Summary Approval Options page.
Approve	Click to approve an expense transaction. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this button if you disabled summary approvals or the approval action on the Summary Approval Options page.
Reviewed	Click to indicate that you have reviewed an expense transaction. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this button if you disabled summary approvals or the approval action on the Summary Approval Options page.
Send Back	Click to send an expense transaction back to the employee or the originator. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this button if you disabled summary approvals or the approval action on the Summary Approval Options page.
Hold	Click to place the expense transaction on hold. Placing a transaction on hold reserves it for that approver until he or she takes a subsequent action. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this button if you disabled summary approvals or the approval action on the Summary Approval Options page.
Budget Check	Click to budget check expense reports and travel authorizations. The system initially clears the transactions from the approval queue but redisplays them after the budget checking process finishes. PeopleSoft Expenses does not display this button if you disabled summary approvals or the budget check action button is disabled on the Summary Approval Options page. Note. If you make any changes to distributions or amounts, you must budget check the expense transaction again to reflect the changes in the commitment control ledgers.
Refresh List	Click to retrieve new transactions that may have been submitted to the approver's queue.
Comments	Enter a comment, which PeopleSoft Expenses displays on all summary pages. PeopleSoft Expenses displays the Comments section on the Approve Transaction pages if you selected the check box for Transaction Pages or Overview and Error Pages on the Summary Approval Options page.
Employee Expense History	Click to access the Transaction History grid to view one or many employee expense transactions, past and current transactions, and drill down to the transaction details.

Using Summary Approvals for Expense Reports

Access the Approve Transactions - Expense Reports page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Expense Reports).

The Approve Transactions - Expense Reports page is similar to the Approve Transactions - Overview page. This section documents the page elements that pertain to expense reports that PeopleSoft Expenses does not display on the overview page.

See Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions.

Transactions to Approve

Total Amount

Displays the total amount of the expense report.

Curr (currency)

Displays the currency associated with the expense report.

Budget Status

Displays the budget checking status of the transaction. Values are:

Not Chk'd: Indicates that budget checking is required.
Valid: Indicates that the transaction was successfully budget-checked.
Error: Indicates that a budget checking exception occurred during the budget checking process.

Description

Displays the transaction header description for the expense report. Click the link to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.

See Approving Expense Reports.

Transaction ID

Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the expense report. Click the link to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.

See Approving Expense Reports.

Using Summary Approvals for Time Reports

Access the Approve Transactions - Time Reports page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Reports).

The Approve Transactions - Time Reports page is similar to the Approve Transactions - Overview page. This section documents the page elements that pertain to time reports that PeopleSoft Expenses does not display on the overview page.

See Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions.

Transactions to Approve

Project Hours	Displays the total project-related hours for the time report.
Personal Hours	Displays the total personal-related hours for the time report.
Period End Date	Displays the date on which the time reporting period ends for the time report. Click the link to access the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. See Approving Time Reports.
Transaction ID	Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the time report. Click the link to access the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. See Approving Time Reports.

Using Summary Approvals for Time Adjustments

Access the Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments).

The Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments page is similar to the Approve Transactions - Overview page. This section documents the page elements that pertain to time adjustments that PeopleSoft Expenses does not display on the overview page.

See Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions.

Transactions to Approve

Project Hours	Displays the total project-related hours for the time adjustment.
Personal Hours	Displays the total personal-related hours for the time adjustment.
Period End Date	Displays the date on which the time reporting period ends for the time adjustment. Click the link to access the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. See Approving Time Adjustments.
Transaction ID	Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the time adjustment. Click the link to access the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. See Approving Time Adjustments.
Version	Displays the version number that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the time adjustment.

Using Summary Approvals for Travel Authorizations

Access the Approve Transactions - Travel Authorizations page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Travel Authorizations).

The Approve Transactions - Travel Authorizations page is similar to the Approve Transactions - Overview page. This section documents the page elements that pertain to travel authorizations that PeopleSoft Expenses does not display on the overview page.

See Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions.

Transactions to Approve

Total	Displays the total amount of the travel authorization.
Curr (currency)	Displays the currency associated with the travel authorization.
Budget Status	Displays the budget checking status of the transaction. Values are: Not Chk'd: Indicates that budget checking is required Valid: Indicates that the transaction was successfully budget-checked. Error: Indicates that a budget checking exception occurred during the budget checking process.
Description	Displays the transaction header description for travel authorizations. Click the link to access the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. See Approving Travel Authorizations.
Transaction ID	Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the transaction. Click the link to access the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. See Approving Travel Authorizations.
Trip Date	Displays the date the travel begins for the employee.

Using Summary Approvals for Cash Advances

Access the Approve Transactions - Cash Advances page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances).

The Approve Transactions - Cash Advances page is similar to the Approve Transactions - Overview page. This section documents the page elements that pertain to cash advances that PeopleSoft Expenses does not display on the overview page.

See Using Summary Approvals for all Transactions.

Transactions to Approve

Total	Displays the total amount of the cash advance.
Curr (currency)	Displays the currency associated with the cash advance.
Description	Displays the transaction header description for cash advances. Click the link to access the Approve Cash Advance Report page. See Approving Cash Advances.
Transaction ID	Displays the transaction ID that PeopleSoft Expenses assigned to the transaction. Click the link to access the Approve Cash Advance Report page. See Approving Cash Advances.

Approving Expense Reports

This section provides an overview of how to approve expense reports and discusses how to:

Approve an expense report.
Approve expense report details.
Approve expense report line details.
Modify and approve expense report line details.
View expense report default accounting.
View accounting details.
View exception comments and risks.
View VAT information.
View associated reservations.
Compare expense reports with travel authorizations and pending reservations.

Understanding How to Approve Expense Reports

After an employee submits an expense report, it goes through the approval process. Part of the approval process can include a review by an internal auditor. Expense reports can be audited before (prepayment) or after (post payment) reimbursement. The audit can be performed by one or many auditors, either sequentially or from a pool of auditors. In some organizations, auditors can only randomly or selectively review expense transactions for audit purposes. To selectively route expense transactions to an approver or auditor, define a refinement template and configure it for selective criteria, then assign it to an approver. The criteria established in the refinement template filters which transaction an approver or auditor sees in his or her queue. For example, a post payment auditor can review only transactions with project expenses associated with it or expense reports that are missing receipts.

You can authorize approvers and auditors to modify expense transactions through the approvals configuration. The privileges associated with an approver determines what he or she can change, add, or delete on expense transactions. If you use PeopleSoft Project Costing, you can charge some of your expense items to project-related ChartFields and your expense report approval procedures might include a review by a project manager. Project managers can also modify expense transactions if you enable that authorization through the privilege configuration. However, if an expense transaction has been processed for payment, some privileges can be constrained to maintain the integrity of payments issued or information already posted to other products.

PeopleSoft Expenses delivers a feature for supplemental or conditional approvers. If you use HR supervisor approvals but want to have an additional approval required as a standard or based on a transaction condition such as a monetary amount, you can use the expense approver list to define the supplemental approver by profile. If the condition is amount-based, you can define the amount rules for the profile on this list. The same concept applies for project approvals. You can use Project Manager as assigned in PeopleSoft Project Costing for standard project approvals, but also use the Project Supplemental Approver list to define a supplemental or conditional approval for project-related expenses.

Note. When you use Business Unit or Department criteria in the refinement template, routing is based on the employee's home business unit and department, not the business unit and department contained in the distributions.

Pages Used to Approve Expense Reports

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Approve expense reports on the summary approval page.
Approve Transactions - Expense Reports	EX_SHEET_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Expense Reports Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Expense Reports	Approve expense reports.
Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary	TE_SHEET_LINES	Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Overview page. Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Expense Reports page.	Approve expense reports.
Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type]	TE_SHEET_LINE_DTL	Click the expense type link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.	View details about the expense transaction line. This is a view-only page, and is accessible only to approvers who have add, delete, or view approval privileges for the transaction line.
Approve Expense Report – Expense Detail for [expense type]	EX_SHEET_ERRORS	Click the expense type link on the Approve Expense Report – Expense Report Summary page.	View and modify the details of the transaction line. This page is editable, and is accessible only to approvers who have full or modify approval privileges for the transaction line.
Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail	EX_SHEET_ENTRY	Select Expense Report Detail from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.	View and modify transaction details for the expense report. This option appears only if the approver has full, add, or delete privileges for the transaction line.
Approve Expense Report - Accounting Defaults	TE_SHEET_SPLIT	Click the Accounting Defaults link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.	View the accounting distribution summary for the expense report.
Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail	TE_SHEET_DIST	Click the Update Accounting Detail link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page.	View, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines.
Approve Expense Report - View Exception Comments and Risks	TE_EXCPTN_COMM_SHT	Select View Exception Comments from More Options in the Report Information grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Click the Exceptions button in the Expense Line Items grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Click the Risk button in the Expense Line Items grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Click the Risk Detail link in the Report Information group box on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page when risk exists for the header. Click the Risk icon in the Detail grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page when risk exists for the line. Click the Risk icon on the Approve Transactions - Overview page.	View exception comments and risks for expense reports.
Approve Expense Report - View Approver Comments	TE_APRVL_COMMENTS	Click the View Approver Comments button in the Approval History grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.	View approvals and comment history that approvers and auditors made. Note. The Approval History grid appears only when an employee resubmits an expense report that an approver previously denied and returned to the employee.
Approve Expense Report - VAT Information	TE_SHEET_VAT_SUM	Select VAT Information from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page.	View VAT information
Approve Expense Report - View Associated Confirmed Reservations	TV_TA_RESERVATION_VIEW	Click the View Associated Reservations link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page.	View the details of any travel reservations associated with the expense report. The reservations cannot be edited or disassociated from the expense report but are provided to aid the approver in making the approval decision.
Approve Expense Report – Compare Totals	EX_TA_RES_COMP	Click the Compare Totals link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page.	View the comparative totals and variance percentages for any associated travel authorizations and confirmed travel reservations as compared to the expense report totals.

Approving an Expense Report

Access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page (click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Overview page).

The fields on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page are the same as the fields on the Create Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page and are documented in the "Processing Expense Reports" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the expense report approval process are documented in this section.

User Defaults

Click to access the Employee Profile - User Defaults page to view the employee's defaults and preferences.

Report Information

Travel Auth ID (Travel Authorization ID)	Displays the identifier for the travel authorization that is associated with the expense report, as a link. Travel authorizations that are copied to an expense report also appear as a link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page. Click the travel authorization link to view the details of the travel authorization. If no travel authorization is associated with the expense report, this field is hidden.
Accounting Defaults	Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Defaults page to view or modify the accounting distribution summary for the expense report. See Viewing or Modifying Default Accounting.
Compare Totals	Click to access the Compare Totals page to view and evaluate the totals for the expense report as compared to the total amounts for any associated or added travel reservations or associated travel authorizations that are linked to the expense report
View Cash Advance	Click to access the View Cash Advance page and view information about cash advances that the employee applied to the expense report. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this link only if the employee applied a cash advance to the expense report.
Apply Cash Advances	Click the link to access the Apply Cash Advance(s) page. Post payment auditors cannot apply cash advances to expense reports.
More Options	Select from the list to view additional information about this expense report. Options are: Adjustment Cash Advance: Select to access the Request Cash Advance page or the View Cash Advance page. An adjustment cash advance is needed only if the employee owes money to the company or if an approver or auditor has denied one ore more lines on the expense report that have been reimbursed to the employee. Approvers and auditors can create adjustment cash advances if they deny one or more lines on expense reports for which employees have already been reimbursed. After creating an adjustment cash advance, the approver or auditor can view it. View Exception Comments: Select to view the Approve Expense Report - View Exception Comments page. Expense Report Detail: Select to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page. Approvers can edit descriptive information and expense report line items if their privileges authorize them to do so. VAT Information: Select to access the Approve Expense Report - VAT Information For Expense [type] page. Document Sequencing: Select to access the Document Sequencing page. This link appears only if document sequencing is enabled for the employee's default general ledger business unit.

Receipt Information

Receipts Received

Select to indicate that the travel and expense department has the appropriate receipts on file. This field appears only if you set up your expense system to check that receipts are received; otherwise, the Receipt Information section and the Receipts Received check box are hidden.

Expense Line Items

	Click the Exceptions button to access the Approve Expense Report - View Risk/Exception Comments page.
Expense Type	Click the expense type link to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page to view details about the expense transaction line.
PC Business Unit, Project, and Activity	If you have one distribution that contains the PC ChartFields, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the existing values in the appropriate columns. If multiple project distributions exist for the expense line, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the Multiple link. Click the Multiple link to access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail page to view, add, or modify the general ledger or project-related ChartFields, general ledger business unit, or distribution split amount. If you change the distribution split amount, the total must equal the original amount of the expense transaction.
Receipt Verified	Select if the receipt for the expense transaction matches an expense line item. If the expense item does not require a receipt, this field is not available.
Receipt Required	If this field is selected, a receipt is required to substantiate the expense type. This field is display-only.
Approve Expense	Deselect this check box if you do not approve a specific expense line. If you deselect the check box, you must select a reason from the drop-down list box (next to the Approve Expense check box) and optionally enter a comment in the Approval Detail section. Any expense lines that are denied can be undenied by any subsequent approvers.
Select Reason...	Select a reason that you did not approve a specific expense line. This field appears after you deselect the Approve check box.

Expense Report Totals

Definition of Totals

Click to access the Definition of Totals page to view an explanation of each expense total.

Pending Actions

This section displays the names of the approvers, auditors, project managers, and other defined approvers who need to review and approve the expense report.

Action History

PeopleSoft Expenses displays the transaction submittal and approval activities that have occurred, as well as the approver's name and date on which he or she took action.

Click the View Approver Comments button to access the Approve Expense Report - View Approver Comments page and view comments that an approver made regarding expense lines.

Comments

Enter information regarding the expense report such as why you denied the expense report or an expense transaction line. If you enter comments and send the expense report back to the employee, PeopleSoft Expenses displays your comments when the employee modifies the expense report. After employees resubmit expense reports, PeopleSoft Expenses displays a View Approver Comment icon in the Action History grid next to the name of the approver who made the comment. Selecting the icon transfers the approver to the View Approver Comments page.

Review	Click to indicate that you have reviewed the expense report. Some organizations use expense screeners to review expense transactions for policy compliance.
Approve	Click to approve the expense report. This action changes the status to Approved for Payment. The expense report is ready for payment processing. If more than one approver is required, the status changes to Approvals in Processuntil the last authorized approver approves the expense report for payment.
Send Back	Click to send the expense report to the employee for correction or revision. This action changes the status to Pending. If you send the expense report back to the employee, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field.
Hold	Click to place the expense report on hold. Holding an expense report claims the transaction for the approver. If a pool of approvers exists, each of whom can approve a transaction, placing the transaction on hold means that only the holding user can take action on the transaction.
Deny	Click to deny the entire expense report. This action changes the status to Denied. If you deny the expense report, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field. The system does not route denied expense transactions to subsequent approvers and the employee cannot resubmit it.
Save Changes	Click to save any modifications that were made to the expense report, but take no approval-related action. If the expense report approval process uses pooled approvers, another member of the pooled approvers list can access the expense report and take action. Note. If the approver does not have privileges to make changes, this button is hidden.
Expense Report Detail	Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this link only if the approver is authorized to add, delete, or modify expense lines.
Budget Check	Click to access the Commitment Control page to budget check the expense or view comments about the budget check. This link is available only if any of the accounting distributions contain a GL business unit that is enabled for Commitment Control. Note. If you make any changes to distributions or amounts, you must budget check the expense report again to reflect the changes in the commitment control ledgers.

Approving Expense Report Details

Access the Expense Report Detail page (select Expense Report Detail from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

The Expense Report Detail page enables you to add, modify, or delete expense report lines as needed based on your approval privileges. If you are authorized to add expense lines, PeopleSoft Expenses records your operator ID and date stamps the transaction. The new transaction line is routed to subsequent approvers for review and approval, if applicable.

Many of the fields on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page are the same as the fields on the Create Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page or the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page, and are documented in the "Processing Expense Reports" chapter and in this chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the expense report approval process are documented in this section.

Report Information

View Associated Reservations

Click to access the View Associated Confirmed Reservations page. The View Associated Confirmed Reservations page displays only the confirmed reservations that are associated with the expense report and enables the user to drill down to the details of the reservation transaction line. This page is view-only and cannot be edited by the approver.

The View Associated Reservations link appears only if confirmed travel reservations are associated with the expense report and the Use Travel Services check box is selected on the Installation Options - Expenses page.

Compare Totals

Click to access the Compare Totals page. The Compare Totals page calculates the variance between the total amounts for an expense report and any associated travel authorizations and confirmed travel reservations. The calculations are automatically triggered when the page is opened and display the totals and variances for the types of reports associated with the expense report.

Details – Overview tab

Select	Use in conjunction with the Copy Selected or Delete Selected buttons.
Expense Type	Select an expense type to add an expense item. Note. You can add a new expense line item only if you have the approval privileges to do so. After you add an expense line item and approve the expense report, the system routes the expense report and new line item to subsequent approvers as needed.
Expense Date	Enter the date for any added expense line items. If you have permissions to modify transaction lines, you can also modify the expense date for any transaction line item.
Amount Spent	Enter the amount for any added transaction lines or modify the transaction line amount for existing transaction lines.
Currency	Displays the currency associated with the transaction amount spent.
Payment Type	Enter the method used to pay for the expense, such as with a credit card or cash. This may be supplied by default from the employee profile if it has been defined there.
Billing Type	Select the appropriate billing type for the expense transaction. If you use PeopleSoft Project Costing, the system requires billing codes to identify project costs that are both billable and charged to project costing ChartFields. PeopleSoft Expenses sends the information to PeopleSoft Project Costing, and PeopleSoft Project Costing passes these items to PeopleSoft Billing for processing. The billing type determines the billing code that PeopleSoft Project Costing uses.
Detail	Click the Detail link to access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail page for a specific transaction line. If you navigate to the transaction line details using this link, the system displays a Next Expense button that enables you to navigate through the expense lines from within the Expense Line Detail page for review, edit, and approval processing.
	Click to add additional transaction lines to an expense report. Only approvers with the authority to add transaction lines will have access to the add button. The button is hidden if the approver does not have add privileges. When an approver adds a new transaction line, that approver can modify or delete the transaction line that he or she added prior to submitting the transaction, regardless of his or her other privileges. When the expense transaction is submitted by the approver, the transaction is routed to any additional approvers, who can modify the new transaction line if they are responsible for approving that transaction, and if they have privileges to add, delete, or modify the transaction line.
Delete Selected	Click to delete selected transaction lines. To delete a transaction line, the approver must be responsible for approving the transaction line and he or she also must have privileges to delete a transaction line.
Add	Click to add transaction lines to the expense report. The Add option is available only if the approver has the privileges to add transaction lines. When an approver adds a new transaction line, that approver can modify or delete the transaction line that he or she added prior to submitting the transaction, regardless of his or her other privileges. When the expense transaction is submitted by the approver, the transaction is routed to any additional approvers, who can modify the new transaction line if they are responsible for approving that transaction, and if they have privileges to add, delete, or modify the transaction line. Select from these options: Entries from My Reservations: Select to access the Add My Confirmed Reservations page and select available, confirmed reservation lines to add to the expense report transaction lines. Note. The Entries from My Reservations option appears only if the Use Travel Services check box is selected on the Installation Options - Expenses page. Expenses from My Wallet...: Select to access the My Wallet page and select expense transactions to add to the expense report. Multiple Expenses...: Select to access the Add Multiple Expenses page and select several expense types to add to the expense report. New Expense: Select and add one blank line to the Details grid. You can then select the expense type on the line. See Adding and Associating Travel Reservations to Expense Reports. See Applying My Wallet Transactions to Expense Reports. See Copying or Adding Expense Lines.
Check For Errors	Click to check the expense transaction lines for missing or invalid information. Lines flagged with errors display an error icon. You can click the icon to go to the Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page, which displays all the errors associated with the expense line. Note. Transaction lines with errors must be corrected before the transaction can be saved, held, or approved and continue through the approval process. See Correcting Expense Report Transaction Line Errors.

Approving Expense Report Line Details

Access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page (click the expense type link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

This page appears when the approver has the approval privilege of Add, Delete, or View.

Update Accounting Detail

Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail page to view, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines, depending on the privilege allowed for the approver. Approvers can modify the general ledger or project-related ChartFields, general ledger business unit, or distribution split amount. If you change the distribution split amount, the total must equal the original amount of the expense transaction.

Previous Expense and Next Expense

Click to approve the previous or next expense transaction line item from within the Expense Line Detail page. If you navigate to this page using the Check for Errors button or using the error flag, you can review and approve only the transaction lines that have errors. However, if you navigate to this page using the expense type link or the expense line detail link (depending on your privileges), you can navigate to and approve each transaction line from within the Expense Line Detail page.

Modifying and Approving Expense Report Line Details

Access the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page (click the expense type link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

This page appears when the approver has the approval privileges of Full or Modify for the expense transaction line.

Accounting Detail	Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail page to view, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines, depending on the privilege allowed for the approver. Approvers can modify the general ledger or project-related ChartFields, general ledger business unit, or distribution split amount. If you change the distribution split amount, the total must equal the original amount of the expense transaction.
Add Additional Attendees	Click to access the Expense Report - Attendees page to view the names, companies, and titles for an expense type that required a list of attendees on the expense report.
Receipt Split	Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Receipt Detail for Expense [expense type] page to view the expenses on the receipt or to split an expense on the receipt into smaller, detailed expenses.
Itemize Hotel Bill	Click to access the Approve Expense Report - Itemize Hotel Bill page to split the hotel receipt into more specific charges, such as room and telephone charges.
Previous Expense and Next Expense	Click to approve the previous or next expense transaction line item from within the Expense Line Detail page. If you navigate to this page using the Check for Errors button or using the error flag, you can review and approve only the transaction lines that have errors. However, if you navigate to this page using the expense type link or the expense line detail link (depending on your privileges), you can navigate to and approve each transaction line from within the Expense Line Detail page.

View Expense Report Default Accounting

Access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Defaults page (click the Accounting Defaults link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

Access to the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Defaults page depends on how you set up your Approval Privilege Templates.

See Viewing or Modifying Default Accounting.

Viewing Accounting Details

Access the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail page (click the Update Accounting Detail link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Detail for [expense type] page).

Access to the Approve Expense Report - Accounting Detail page depends on how you set up your Approval Privilege Templates.

See Viewing or Modifying Accounting Details.

Viewing Exception Comments and Risks

Access the Approve Expense Report - View Exception Comments and Risks page (select View Exception Comments from More Options in the Report Information grid on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

PeopleSoft Expenses displays comments for each expense transaction line.

If the system determines risk for the transaction, the approver can view the risk level, the risk criteria that triggered the risk, and the details of the risk.

Viewing VAT Information

Access the Approve Expense Report - VAT Information page (select VAT Information from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary page).

Expense Line VAT Information

Expense Type

Click the link in the column to view VAT information about the expense transaction line.

VAT Accounting Detail

Distribution Line Number

Click the link in the column to access the Approve Expense Report - VAT Accounting Detail page to view the VAT accounting detail for the expense transaction line.

Viewing Associated Reservations

Access the Approve Expense Report - View Associated Confirmed Reservations page (click the View Associated Reservations link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page).

Itinerary ID

Displays the itinerary ID as a link enabling you to drill down to the details of the confirmed travel reservation.

Expense Type

Displays the expense type for the itinerary line item associated with the expense report. Click the link to drill down to the details of the itinerary.

Travel Date

Displays the date on which the travel itinerary line item occurred.

Amount

Displays the total amount of the travel reservation in the transaction currency.

Comparing Expense Reports with Travel Authorizations and Pending Reservations

Access the Approve Expense Report - Compare Totals page (click the Compare Totals link on the Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Detail page).

The Compare Totals page displays the total amounts for an expense report and any associated travel authorizations and confirmed travel reservations and calculates the variance between the report totals. The calculations are automatically triggered when the page is opened and display the totals for the types of reports associated with the expense report.

Report ID	Displays the report ID assigned to the expense report.
Report Type	Displays report types used in the totals comparison calculations. Values include Expense Report, Travel Authorization, and Travel Reservation. Only the report types associated with the expense report appear on this page.
Total	Displays the calculated summarized total for each report type displayed.
Variance	Displays the difference between the expense report total and the total for this report type in units of currency.
Variance % (variance percentage)	Displays the difference between the expense report total and the total for this report type as a percentage.

Approving Time Reports

This section provides an overview of time report approvals and discusses how to approve a time report.

Understanding Time Report Approvals

After you submit a time report, it goes through an approval process. When you enter a time report and submit it for approval, its status changes according to what action is taken at each stage of the process.

Pages Used to Approve Time Reports

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Approve time reports on the summary approval page.
Approve Transactions - Time Reports	EX_TIME_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Time Reports Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Reports	Approve time reports on the summary approval page.
Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary	TE_TIME_LINES	Click Period End Date or Transaction ID on the Approve Transactions - Overview page. Click Period End Date or Transaction ID on the Approve Transactions - Time Reports page.	Review, approve, hold, send back, or deny time reports.
Approve Time Report - Project Time Details	TE_TIME_DETAIL	Click the Details button on the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page.	Add, modify, or review project ChartField defaults for a time report.
Approve Time Report - View Risk Details	EX_EXCPTN_COMM_TR	Click the Risk button on the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page. Click the Risk button on the Summary Approval page. Click the Risk Details link on the Approve Time Report - Project Time Summary page.	View risk details for time report transactions. If the system determines risk for the transactions, the approver can view the risk level, the risk criteria that triggered the risk, and the details of the risk.
View Approver Comments	EX_COMMENTS_HIST	Click the Approve Approver Comments button in the Action History grid on the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page.	View approver comments.

Approving a Time Report

Access the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page (click Period End Date or Transaction ID on the Approve Transactions - Overview page).

The fields on the Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary page are the same as the fields on the Create Time Report - Time Report Summary page and are documented in the "Processing Time Reports" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the approval process are documented in this section.

See Preparing Time Reports and Time Adjustments.

User Defaults

Click to access the Employee Profile - User Defaults page to view the employee's defaults and preferences.

Project Time Tab

	Click the Details button to access the Approve Time Report - Project Time Details page to view or modify project ChartFields, general ledger ChartFields, and location defaults for a time report.
Remaining Work	Displays the calculated difference between the remaining work totals from PeopleSoft Project Costing and the hours entered into the daily totals on the time report. Note. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this field only if you installed PeopleSoft Program Management and selected the Allow Entry of Estimate to Complete check box on the Expenses Definition - Business Unit 2 page.
New Estimate	Enter or modify an estimated time to complete the project or activity. Note. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this field only if you installed PeopleSoft Program Management and selected the Allow Entry of Estimate to Complete check box on the Expenses Definition - Business Unit 2 page.
Change Requests	Select to generate a change request when the approver approves the time report. If you deselect the check box, the system does not generate a change request and does not update the PeopleSoft Program Management tables. The system enables the check box only for the project manager who owns the project; the system disables the check box for approvers who are not the project manager who owns the project. Note. PeopleSoft Expenses displays this field only if you installed PeopleSoft Program Management and selected the Allow Entry of Estimate to Complete check box on the Expenses Definition – Business Unit 2 page.

Pending Actions

This section displays the names of the approvers and project managers who need to review and approve the time report.

Action History

PeopleSoft Expenses displays the transaction submittal and approval activities that have occurred, as well as the approver's name and the date on which he or she took action.

Click the View Approver Comments button to access the View Approver Comments page and view comments that an approver made regarding the time report.

Comments

Enter information about the time report such as why you denied the time report. If you enter comments and send the time report back to the employee, PeopleSoft Expenses displays your comments when the employee modifies the time report. After employees resubmit the time reports, PeopleSoft Expenses displays comment history only to approvers and project managers.

Reviewed	Click to indicate that you have reviewed the time report.
Approve	Click to approve the time report. This action changes the status to Approved. If more than one approval is required, the status changes to Approvals in Process until the last approver approves the time report.
Send Back	Click to return the time report to the employee for correction or revision. This action changes the status to Pending. If you send the time report back to the employee, you must also provide an explanation in the Comment field.
Hold	Click to place the time report on hold. Holding a time report claims the transaction for the approver. If a pool of approvers exist, each of whom can approve a transaction, placing the transaction on hold means that only the holding user can take action on the transaction.
Deny Request	Click to deny the time report. This action changes the status to Denied. If you deny the time report, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field. The system does not route denied time report transactions to subsequent approvers and the employee cannot resubmit it.
Save Changes	Click to save any modifications that were made to the time report, but take no approval action. If the time report approval process uses pooled approvers, another member of the pooled approvers list can access the time report and take action. Note. If the approver does not have privileges to make changes, this button is hidden.

Approving Time Adjustments

This section discusses how to approve time adjustments.

Pages Used to Approve Time Adjustments

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Approve time adjustments on the summary approval page.
Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments	EX_TADJ_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments	Approve time adjustments.
Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary	TE_TIME_LINES	Click Period End Date or Transaction ID on the Approve Transactions - Overview page. Click Period End Date or Transaction ID on the Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments page.	Review, approve, hold, send back, or deny time adjustments.

Approving Time Adjustments

Access the Approve Transactions - Time Adjustments page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Time Adjustments).

The fields on this page are the same as the fields on the Create Time Report - Time Report Summary page and are documented in the "Processing Time Reports" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the approval process of time adjustments are documented in this section.

See Preparing Time Reports and Time Adjustments.

Version	Displays the adjustment number of the transaction.
View Other Version	Select to view different versions or adjustments of the time report.

Approving Travel Authorizations

This section provides an overview of travel authorization approvals and discusses how to:

Approve a travel authorization.
Approve travel authorization details.
Approve travel authorization detail lines.
View travel authorization exception comments and risks.
View approval comments.

Understanding Travel Authorization Approvals

After an employee submits a travel authorization, it goes through the approval process. From the time that an employee creates the travel authorization until an approver approves it, the travel authorization's status changes, depending on the action taken at each step of the approval process.

Approvers use the Approve Transactions - Overview, Approve Transactions - Travel Authorizations, or Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page to review, approve, hold, send back, save changes to, or deny authorizations. The Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page is similar to the page that employees use to prepare travel authorization.

Pages Used to Approve Travel Authorizations

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Approve travel authorizations on the summary approval page.
Approve Transactions - Travel Authorizations	EX_TAUTH_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Travel Authorizations Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Travel Authorizations	Approve travel authorizations on the summary approval page.
Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary	TE_TAUTH_LINES	Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Overview page. Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Travel Authorization page.	Review a summary of travel authorization expenses and select an approval status. Managers and project managers who have authority to approve travel authorizations use this page.
Approve Travel Authorization - Accounting Defaults	TE_TAUTH_SPLIT	Click the Accounting Defaults link on the Travel Authorization Summary page.	View, add, or modify the accounting distribution summary for the travel authorization, depending on the privilege that you are allowed as an approver.
Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Detail	EX_TAUTH_ENTRY	Select Travel Authorization Details from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page.	View or modify the travel authorization request details.
Approve Travel Authorization - View Exception Comments and Risks	TE_EXCPTN_COMM_TA	Select View Exception Comments from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. Click the Exceptions button in the Details grid on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. Click the Risk button in the Details grid on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page. Click the Risk Details link in the Report Information group box on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page when risk exists.	View travel authorization exception comments and risks.
Approve Travel Authorization - View Approval Comments	EX_COMMENTS_HIST	Click the Approval Comments icon on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page in the Action History grid.	View approval comments that were entered by a previous approver.
Approve Travel Authorization - Expense Detail for [expense type]	TE_TAUTH_LINE_DTL	Click the Expense Type link on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page.	View and approve expense details on a travel authorization.
Approve Travel Authorization - Accounting Detail	TE_TAUTH_DIST	Click the Update Accounting Detail link on the Approve Travel Authorization - Expense Detail for [expense type] page.	View, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines, depending on the privilege that you are allowed as the approver.

Approving a Travel Authorization

Access the Travel Authorization Summary page (click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Overview page).

The fields on the Travel Authorization Summary page are the same as the fields on the Travel Authorization Entry page and are documented in the "Preparing Travel Authorization" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the approval process are documented in this section.

See Preparing Travel Authorizations.

User Defaults

Click to access the Employee Profile - User Defaults page to view the employee's defaults and preferences.

Report Information

The information in this section is from the Report Information page and is not editable by approvers.

Accounting Defaults

Click to access the Accounting Defaults page and view or modify the accounting distribution summary for the travel authorization.

More Options

Options are:

Travel Authorization Details: Select to access the Travel Authorization Details page.

View Exception Comments: Select to access the Travel Authorization - View Exception Comments page.

Details

Expense Type

Click the link in this column to access the Expense Detail for [expense type] page and view or modify information about the expense lines.

Approve

Deselect the check box if you do not approve an expense line. You must select a reason from the drop-down list box (next to the Approve check box) and optionally enter a comment in the Approval Detail section. If an authorized approver adds a transaction line, the approver can add, modify, or delete the transaction line that he or she added, regardless of his or her privileges. After the transaction is submitted by the approver, the transaction, along with any new transaction lines, is passed to any subsequent approvers, who can then modify or deny the new transaction lines based on their approval authority and privileges.

Pending Actions

This section displays the names of the approvers, auditors, project managers, and other defined approvers who must review and approve the travel authorization.

Action History

PeopleSoft Expenses displays the transaction submittal and approval activities that have occurred, as well as the approver's name and the date on which he or she took action.

Click the View Approver Comments button to access the View Approver Comments page and view comments that an approver made regarding travel authorization expense lines.

Comments

Enter information about the travel authorization such as why you denied it. If you enter comments and send the travel authorization back to the employee, PeopleSoft Expenses displays your comments when the employee views or modifies the travel authorization. After employees resubmit travel authorizations, PeopleSoft Expenses displays comment history only to all approvers.

Approve	Click to approve the travel authorization and change the status to Approved and automatically enter the current data and approver's user ID. If you use budget checking, PeopleSoft Expenses deactivates this button if it determines that the travel authorization request needs to be budget-checked prior to approval.
Send Back	Click to return the travel authorization to the employee for correction or revision. This action changes the status to Pending. If you send the travel authorization back to the employee, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field.
Hold	Click to place the travel authorization on hold and change the status to Hold by Approver.Holding a travel authorization claims the transaction for the approver. If a pool of approvers exixts, each of whom can approve a transaction, placing the transaction on hold means that only the holding user can take action on the transaction and the transaction is removed from the pooled approvers queue.
Deny	Click to deny the entire travel authorization and change the status to Denied. If you deny the request, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field. The system does not route denied travel authorizations to subsequent approvers and the employee cannot resubmit it.
Save Changes	Click to save any modifications that were made to the travel authorization, but take no approval action. If the travel authorization approval process uses pooled approvers, another member of the pooled approvers list can access the travel authorization and take action. Note. If you as the approver do not have privileges to make changes, this button is hidden.
Budget Check	Click to access the Commitment Control page to budget check the travel authorization or view comments about the budget check. This link is available only if any of the accounting distributions contains a general ledger business unit that is enabled for Commitment Control. Note. If you make any changes to distributions or amounts, you must budget check the expense report again to reflect the changes in the commitment control ledgers.
Travel Authorization Detail	Click to access the Travel Authorization Detail page. This link appears only if the approver has privileges to modify the travel authorization.

Approving Travel Authorization Details

Access the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Details page (select Travel Authorization Details from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page).

The Travel Authorization Details page enables approvers to add additional transaction lines and modify existing transaction lines if they have the privileges to do so. Many of the fields on the Travel Authorization Details page are the same fields on the Travel Authorization Entry page, and are documented in the "Preparing Travel Authorizations" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that have properties that are unique to the approval process are documented in this section.

See Entering Travel Authorization Information and Detail Expense Lines.

View Associated Reservations

Click to access the View Associated Pending Reservations page to view the travel itineraries associated with the travel authorization. This link appears only when a pending travel reservation is associated with a travel authorization, and if the Use Travel Services check box is selected on the Installation Options - Expenses page.

Details

Select	Use in conjunction with the Copy Selected and Delete Selected buttons.
Expense Type	Select an expense type to add an expense item.
Date	Select the beginning date for the expense type.
Amount	Displays the amount for the expense type. When adding a transaction line on the Approve Travel Authorizations - Travel Authorization Details page, the approver must click the * Detail link to access the Authorization Detail page for the expense to enter the transaction amount data.
Currency	Displays the currency associated with the expense transaction amount.
Payment Type	Select how the expense item is paid.
Billing Type	Select Billable, Nonbillable, or Internal. If you use PeopleSoft Project Costing, billing codes are required to identify expense items that are both billable and charged to PeopleSoft Project Costing ChartFields. PeopleSoft Expenses sends the information to PeopleSoft Project Costing, and PeopleSoft Project Costing passes these items to PeopleSoft Billing for processing.
* Detail	Click to access the Authorization Detail for [expense type] page and enter additional information for the expense transaction line.
Add:	Options are: Entries from My Reservations: Select to access the Add My Pending Reservations page. Select available pending travel itineraries from which to create new travel authorization transaction lines. Note. The Entries from My Reservations option is available only if you select Use Travel Services on the Installation Options - Expenses page. See Adding and Associating Travel Reservations to Travel Authorizations. New Expense: Select to add one blank line to the Details grid. Multiple Expenses...: Select to access the Add Multiple Expenses page and select expense types to add to the travel authorization.

Approving Travel Authorization Detail Lines

Access the Approve Travel Authorization - Authorization Detail for [expense type] page (click the Expense Type link on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page).

Line Added by Approver

Displays the operator ID and the date on which the approver added the line during the approval process.

Accounting Detail

Click to access the Approve Travel Authorization - Accounting Detail page to view, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines, depending on the privileges allowed for the approver. Approvers can modify the general ledger or project-related ChartFields, general ledger business unit, or distribution split amount. If you change the distribution split amount, the total must equal the original amount of the expense transaction.

Approve Authorization

Deselect the check box if you do not approve the expense line.

Viewing Travel Authorization Exception Comments and Risks

Access the View Exception Comments and Risks page (select View Exception Comments from the More Options drop-down list box on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page).

For each travel authorization line item, PeopleSoft Expenses displays the associated expense type, exception, and comment. You can review explanations for line items that do not follow organizational expense policies, for example, line items not using preferred merchants or exceeding expense location amounts. Click the expense type in the Expense Type column to access the View Expense [expense type] page.

If the system determines risk for the transaction, the approver can view the risk level, the risk criteria that triggered the risk, and the details of the risk.

Viewing Approval Comments

Access the View Approval Comments page (click the Approval Comments icon in the Action History grid on the Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary page).

The View Approval Comments page displays comments that approvers have made for the travel authorization request.

Approving Cash Advances

This section provides an overview of cash advance approvals and discusses how to approve cash advances.

Understanding Cash Advance Approvals

Based on the approval rules that you set up, cash advances can be paid as soon as employees submit them, or they can go through one or more checkpoints for review. If your organization requires auditing, approvers must approve the cash advance before it is eligible for auditing.

From the time the employee creates a cash advance until it is ready for payment, the cash advance's approval status changes, depending on the action taken in each step of the approval process. PeopleSoft Expenses immediately sets a cash advance to Paid status if the cash advance source does not generate a payment.

Approvers use the Approve Transactions - Overview, Approve Transactions - Cash Advances, or Approve Cash Advance Report page to approve, hold, send back, save changes to, or deny authorizations. The Approve Cash Advance Report page is similar to the page that employees use to prepare cash advance requests.

Pages Used to Approve Cash Advances

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Overview	EX_ALLTXN_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Overview Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Overview	Approve travel authorizations on the summary approval page.
Approve Transactions - Cash Advances	EX_ADV_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances	Approve cash advances.
Travel & Expenses - Cash Advance Report - Approve Cash Advance Report	TE_ADVANCE	Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Approve Transactions - Cash Advances page.	Approve cash advances.
Travel & Expenses - Cash Advance Report - View Risk Details	EX_EXCPTN_COMM_CA	Click the Risk Detail link in the Report Information group box on the Travel & Expenses - Cash Advance Report - Approve Cash Advance Report page. Click the Risk button on the Summary Approval page.	View risk details for cash advance transactions. If the system determines risk for the transactions, the approver can view the risk level, the risk criteria that triggered the risk, and the details of the risk.
Cash Advance - View Approval Comments	TE_APRVL_COMMENTS	Click the View Comments button on the Approve Cash Advance page.	View comment history.

Approving a Cash Advance

Access the Approve Cash Advance Report page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Cash Advances).

The fields on the Approve Cash Advance Report page are the same as the fields on the Create Cash Advance Report page and are documented in the "Preparing Cash Advances" chapter of this PeopleBook. Fields that are unique for the approval process are documented in this section.

See Preparing Cash Advances.

User Defaults

Click to access the Employee Profile - User Defaults page to view the employee's defaults and preferences.

Details

Line Added by Approver

Displays the operator ID of the approver that added the transaction line to the cash advance. This field appears only if a new transaction line is added during the approval process. Otherwise, this field is hidden.

Note. Approvers must have the privileges to add transaction lines during the approval process.

Date Added

Displays the date that a transaction line is added to the cash advance during the approval process.

Pending Actions

This section displays the names of the approvers, auditors, and project managers who need to review and approve the cash advance.

Action History

PeopleSoft Expenses displays the transaction submittal and approval activities that have occurred, as well as the approver's name and the date on which he or she took action.

Click the View Approver Comments button to access the View Approver Comments page and view comments that an approver made regarding the cash advance.

Comments

Enter a comment. When you select to return the cash advance request to employees upon denial, the system displays the comments to the employees when they access the cash advance. After employees resubmit returned cash advance requests, the system displays comment history only to approvers.

Approve	Click to approve the cash advance. This action changes the status to Approved for Payment and the cash advance is ready for payment processing. If more than one approver is required, the status changes to Approval in Process until the last authorized approver approves the expense report for payment.
Send Back	Click to return the cash advance to the employee for correction or revision. This action changes the status to Pending. If you send the cash advance back to the employee, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field.
Hold	Click to place the cash advance on hold and change the status to Hold by Approver. Holding a cash advance claims the transaction for the approver. If a pool of approvers exists, each of whom can approve a transaction, placing the transaction on hold means that only the holding user can take action on the transaction, and the transaction is removed from the pooled approver's queue.
Deny	Click to deny the cash advance and change the status to Denied. If you deny the cash advance, you must also provide an explanation in the Comments field. The system does not route denied cash advance requests to subsequent approvers and the employee cannot resubmit it.
Save Changes	Click to save any modifications that were made to the cash advance, but take no approval action. If the cash advance approval process uses pooled approvers, another member of the pooled approvers list can access the cash advance and take action. Note. If the approver does not have privileges to make changes, this button is hidden.

Approving Expense Transactions Using Email

This section lists common elements and discusses how to:

Approve expense reports using email.
Approve time reports using email.
Approve time adjustments using email.
Approve travel authorizations using email.
Approve cash advances using email.

Note. If you approve an expense transaction using an online page, and then approve the same expense transaction using email, the system sends an email message. This message indicates that the transaction is no longer pending approval.

Common Elements in This Section

Approve (check box)	Deselect the check box if you do not approve a specific line.
Exception/Risk Criteria	Displays expense exceptions and risk criteria that are defined on the risk template for the transaction.
Approver Comments	Enter comments for the approval transactions. This field is required if you select Deny or Send Back in the Action field.
Action	Select the action to be taken for the entire report. Options include: Approve, Deny, and Send Back.

Approving Expense Reports Using Email

Access the Expense Report Approval email.

Approving Time Reports Using Email

Access the Time Report Approval email.

Approving Time Adjustments Using Email

Access the Time Adjustment Approval email.

Approving Travel Authorizations Using Email

Access the Travel Authorization Approval email.

Approving Cash Advances Using Email

Access the Cash Advance Approval email.

Viewing Approval Errors

This section provides an overview of approval errors and discusses how to view approval errors.

Understanding Approval Errors

When errors occur as a result of an action taken by an approver, the summary approval page initially refreshes and displays a red flag icon in the Errors column to indicate that the transaction is in error from the approval process. Approvers click the Errors tab to view error messages. PeopleSoft Expenses displays an error message for each transaction. The transaction can have multiple errors, but the first error condition that prevented the transaction from being processed is the message that PeopleSoft Expenses displays. The error conditions handled are:

Error in budget checking: Indicates that a transaction has encountered an error in the budget checking process. Approvers must resolve the cause of the exception before performing another budget check.
Accounting date is invalid: Indicates that the transaction's accounting date is in a closed period.
Approval action not allowed for your profile: Indicates that the approver performed an approval action on the Approve Transactions pages that he or she is not authorized to use.
Transactions must be budget checked prior to approval: Indicates that you must run the budget checking process before you can approve the transaction. This condition applies when an approver selects and tries to approve transactions that must be budget checked prior to approval.
Processing error – please contact your administrator: Indicates that some type of programming error occurred.

Page Used to View Approval Errors

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Transactions - Errors	EX_ALLERROR_APPR	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Approve Transactions, Errors Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Errors	View approval errors.

Viewing Approval Errors

Access the Approve Transactions - Errors page (Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Approve Transactions, Errors).

Description or Transaction ID

Click the link to access one of the following pages, depending on the transaction type:

Expense Report Summary page.

Approve Cash Advance Report page.

Travel Authorization Summary page.

Time Report Summary page.

Modifying Approved Transactions

This section lists the pages used to modify approved transactions.

Note. The pages used to modify approved expense transactions are the same pages used to approve the transactions.

See Approving Expense Reports, Approving Time Reports, Approving Time Adjustments, Approving Travel Authorizations, Approving Cash Advances.

Pages Used to Modify Approved Transactions

Page Name	Definition Name	Navigation	Usage
Approve Expense Report - Expense Report Summary	TE_SHEET_LINES	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Expense Reports tab. Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Expense Reports tab.	Modify approved expense reports. Use this page to modify expense reports after they have been approved for payment, but not staged for payment or paid, unless they have a budget header status of Error and no accounting has been created for them. You can edit descriptive information, expense report line items, and accounting details. Only accounting and distribution fields can be modified for expense reports that are staged for payment or paid, and have a budget header status of Error.
Approve Travel Authorization - Travel Authorization Summary	TE_TAUTH_LINES	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Travel Authorizations tab. Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Travel Authorizations tab.	Modify travel authorizations after they have been approved.
Approve Cash Advance Report	TE_ADVANCE	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Cash Advances tab. Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Description or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Cash Advances tab.	Modify cash advances after they have been approved for payment, but not staged for payment or paid.
Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary	TE_TIME_LINES	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Period End Date or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Time Reports tab. Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Period End Date or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Time Reports tab.	Modify time reports after they have been approved.
Approve Time Report - Time Report Summary	TE_TIME_LINES	Manager Self-Service, Travel and Expense Center, Approvals, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Period End Date or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Time Adjustments tab. Travel and Expenses, Approve Transactions, Modify Approved Transactions Click the Period End Date or Transaction ID link on the Overview or Time Adjustments tab.	Modify time adjustments after they have been approved.

Managing Workflow

This section discusses how to:

Manage notifications.
Reassign approvals.
Reroute approvals

Managing Notifications

The approval framework is responsible for sending notifications based on the definitions set up on the Approval Transaction Registry page. The "Delivered Workflows for PeopleSoft Expenses" appendix lists the notifications.

Reassigning Approvals

The Reassign Work feature enables administrators to move approval transactions from one approver's queue to another. This can be necessary if an approver is on leave, but has not defined an alternate approver in his or her absence. This feature can be used to reroute a transaction that was sent to the wrong approver.

Reassignment can be done only for the transaction that is pending approval or held in the approver's queue.
When reassigning a transaction to an approver who has already approved the transaction, the system automatically approves the transaction.
When reassigning a transaction to an approver who is already one of the regular approvers for the transaction, the transaction appears only once for that approver.

Rerouting Approvals

You can reroute transactions to a different approver if you use the rerouting feature in the approval configuration. Rerouting is also referred to as escalation. A professional services organization can set escalation to occur if an approver has not performed his or her approval for a transaction within the duration specified in the transaction definition. For example, if a duration of one day is set for a project manager for time reports and a specific time report has been in the project manager's queue for a day with no action taken, the system routes the transaction to the approver designated in the transaction definition. The escalation process must be enabled and running for this to properly occur.

PeopleSoft FSCM PeopleBook: Approval Framework, "Using the Notification and Escalation Manager"

Itinerary ID	Displays the itinerary ID as a link enabling you to drill down to the details of the confirmed travel reservation.
Expense Type	Displays the expense type for the itinerary line item associated with the expense report. Click the link to drill down to the details of the itinerary.
Travel Date	Displays the date on which the travel itinerary line item occurred.
Amount	Displays the total amount of the travel reservation in the transaction currency.

Line Added by Approver	Displays the operator ID and the date on which the approver added the line during the approval process.
Accounting Detail	Click to access the Approve Travel Authorization - Accounting Detail page to view, add, or modify accounting details for expense transaction lines, depending on the privileges allowed for the approver. Approvers can modify the general ledger or project-related ChartFields, general ledger business unit, or distribution split amount. If you change the distribution split amount, the total must equal the original amount of the expense transaction.
Approve Authorization	Deselect the check box if you do not approve the expense line.