Understanding Withdrawing Request Approvals

Users who have approved a request can withdraw their approvals while the request is still In Flight. For serial policies, when a user withdraws an approval all subsequent approvals are also removed from all approval policies associated with the request.

Considerations

• The user must have contributed an Approve action to the request.
• The request must still be In Flight.
• The request submitter cannot withdraw their approval. They must recall the request to make changes to it.

When an approver withdraws an approval from a request, the withdrawer's approval is removed from all policies associated with the request. For serial policies, all subsequent approvals are also removed from all policies associated with the request. This may affect policies that the original withdrawer was not a part of.

Note:

For parallel approval policies, withdrawing an approval does not affect the other approvals, regardless of whether those other approvals were given before or after the approval that was withdrawn.

Serial Policy Approval Withdrawal Example

Suppose you had two serial approval policies. For policy 1, Alex, Barry, and Anita approved the request. For policy 2, Casey, Anita, and Amy approved the request (bold means an approval has been given):

Approval Policy 1 (Serial)

1. Alex
2. Barry
3. Anita
4. Henry

Approval Policy 2 (Serial)

1. Casey
2. Anita
3. Amy
4. Denise

Next, Barry withdraws his approval from policy 1. Now the policies look like this (bold means an approval has been given):

Approval Policy 1 (Serial)

1. Alex
2. Barry
3. Anita
4. Henry

Approval Policy 2 (Serial)

1. Casey
2. Anita
3. Amy
4. Denise

When Barry withdraws his approval from policy 1, Anita's approval is cleared in policy 1 as well, because her approval was subsequent to Barry's in the serial policy. But, Anita's and Amy's approvals in policy 2 are also cleared, even though Barry withdrew his approval in a different policy. And if Anita or Amy are approvers on any other policies associated with the request, those approvals are also cleared, and so on.

After all approvals are cleared, approvers are calculated and invitations to approve are sent out again. Approvers whose approvals were not cleared (Alex and Casey in the above example) are not invited again, as their approvals were not affected.

Note:

Approvers are calculated based on the current policies and permissions on the data chain objects in the request. Rarely, this may result in the approver who initially withdrew their request not being invited to approve again if a change was made after the withdraw action.