Working With Format Rules

Format rules affect reconciliation workflow, the requirement for reconciliation attachments, or the value of profile/reconciliation attributes. The rules are displayed on the Profile Rules tab in read-only form.

Rules evaluate transaction conditions only if the accompanying reconciliations already exist.

Available rules:

See Order of Precedence for Auto Reconciliation and Rules.

• Auto Approve Reconciliation—Automatically completes specified approvals only if specified conditions have been met.

  Examples of conditions that could apply to this rule:

  • The balance is outside a specified range.

  • The balance fluctuates more than a specified amount or percentage from some prior period.

  • The prior reconciliation has transactions or other conditions meeting specified criteria.

  • Attributes have specified values (including calculated attributes).

  When conditions are satisfied, the specified reviewer levels are marked complete, and workflow progresses to the next level, or the workflow is closed if no additional review levels exist.

  This rule can be rerun.

  To monitor which roles have been automatically completed via Format or Profile Rules, perform the following steps:

  1. From the Reconciliations screen, click Actions, and then Select Columns
  2. Select Auto Submitted to indicate that a Rule was automatically run, and the reconciliation was submitted.
  3. Select Auto Approved (Level 1) to indicate that a Rule was used to automatically complete that role.

  For example, if you have configured a Rule for the Reviewer 1 role to automatically approve when Unexplained Difference is 0.00, the column called Auto Approved (Level 1) will indicate that a Rule was used to automatically complete that role. On a related note, reconciliations that have been automatically reconciled using an Auto Reconciliation method will still remain as separate columns indicating if the reconciliation was Auto Reconciled and which Auto Reconciliation Method was used.

• Auto Submit Reconciliation—Automatically submits a reconciliation if specified conditions are met. Runs when Reconciliation status changes to Open with Reviewer.

  Examples of conditions that could apply to this rule:

  • The balance is outside a specified range.

  • The balance fluctuates more than a specified amount or percentage from some prior period.

  • The prior reconciliation has transactions or other conditions meeting specified criteria.

  • Attributes have specified values (including calculated attributes).

  When conditions are satisfied, the specified reviewer levels are marked complete, and workflow progresses to the next review level, or the workflow is closed if no additional review levels exist.

  This rule can be rerun.

• Prevent Reconciliation Approval—Prevents approval of a reconciliation based on attribute values, or other characteristics.

• Prevent Reconciliation Submission—Prevents submission of a reconciliation based on attribute values, or other characteristics.

• Require Reconciliation Attachment—Prevents submission of a reconciliation if an attachment has not been added to the main attachments section of the reconciliation; conditions may be established based on attribute values, or other characteristics that specify when the attachment is required.

  Example: Set the Preparer Duration based on the period frequency. The rule configuration supports when to set the value: "Before profile is copied to the period".

• Prevent Reconciliation Rejection—Prevents rejection by a reviewer under certain conditions. This rules runs when a Reviewer click Reject.
• Send Email on Update—Sends emails when a reconciliation is saved based on certain conditions being met.

  Note:

  This rule is designed to be run when a user takes an action on a reconciliation such as setting attributes, not for actions on the reconciliation that happen outside the Actions dialog such as resetting dates.
• Set Attribute Value — Sets an attribute value to a specified value based on the condition specified in the rule definition. This rule enables rules to be configured for standard attributes. This rule can be rerun.
• Create Alert — Creates an alert and assigns it, as specified by the rule definition.

To work with format rules:

1. From Home, click Application, then Configuration, and then Formats.
2. Double-click a format.
3. On Edit Format, select the Rules tab. You can view the following information:

   • Order—The order of precedence. See Order of Precedence for Auto Reconciliation and Rules

   • Rule—Name of the Rule.

   • Conditions—The choice of what conditions must exist before running the rule.

4. To create, edit, duplicate, delete, or reorder a rule, on the Rules tab, click the appropriate button and, if necessary, update the following:

   • Rule—Select a rule.

   • Description—Optional. Explain why you configured the rule and how the rule should be used.

   • Message (on some rules):

     • Message to Preparer—Define an optional message to the preparer on the prevent reconciliation submission rule and require reconciliation attachment rules.

     • Message to Reviewer—Define an optional message to the preparer on the prevent reconciliation approval rule.

   • Reviewer Level—Select All Levels to apply the rule to all reviewer levels or select specific reviewer levels individually. At least one reviewer level must be selected.

   • Select Create Filter and populate the conditions section or select Use Saved Filter, and then select a filter. The filter you select and configure for the rule determines the conditions that trigger the rule to apply.

   • Condition—

     • If you select Use Saved Filter, the Conditions section displays a read-only version of the conditions associated with the saved filter.

     • If you select Create Filter, the Condition section is enabled.

       Conjunction, Source, Attribute, Operator, and Value behave as they do for the existing advanced filter feature. When creating filters, you can use these attributes:

       • Any Reconciliation or Transaction attribute, including calculated attributes, that are classified as Reconciliation and Transaction attributes

       • Period Frequency

   When a condition includes columns that are based on currencies, and you select All, then all the listed currencies are included in the condition. If you configure additional currencies at a later date, these new currencies are automatically added to the condition.

   Note:

   When you make changes to a rule definition, the additional information is added to the audit log. You can view the changes both in the History tab as well as the Audit Report.

   To watch a video about using formats with rules, click this link: