Understand approval routing

See how policy order, conditions, stages, fallback coverage, and current invoice values select reviewers.

How a route is selected

Active company policies are evaluated against the current invoice values and available validation outcomes. Policy order matters. Additive matches can contribute stages together; an exclusive match stops lower-priority policy evaluation.

When no policy supplies a route, Clerked sends the work to the company’s fallback reviewer: one person or one group, chosen under Settings > Company > Approval policies > Fallback reviewer. A missing or inactive employee can also affect who is eligible to act.

How a route progresses

Stages define who may decide and whether people act in sequence or under the configured group rule. The invoice shows the route and current stage. A stage completes only when someone assigned to that stage acts on it: when the same person or group appears on two stages, they decide at each, and a decision on an earlier stage does not complete a later one. In review, issues can stay open while the invoice moves between review stages; they must be cleared before the last review stage can submit it for approval. Delegation can make another person eligible during a defined period without changing the policy itself.

When a route changes

Autosave keeps an invoice in its current step and leaves the approval route intact. Clerked records the material values that approvers reviewed as the approval basis. Your company’s invoice settings decide which fields are material.

Active approvers can make corrections without leaving approval. Only the person who can approve the current step can change material fields or lines while the invoice is with them; other editors can change the remaining fields and return the invoice to AP for anything else. Supported edits autosave and validation feedback refreshes immediately. Non-material changes leave the decision controls unchanged. Changes that need another review add a Changes require review from AP chip beside the approval route. Click it to see the affected fields. Return to AP becomes the available decision instead of Approve. When you return an invoice:

• Clerked requires a reason and rechecks the current approver and material basis.
• If all review-requiring changes were undone, Approve is restored. You can still return the invoice with feedback without changing its data.
• If material values changed, the invoice returns to AP validation and then starts fresh approval from the first stage.
• The next Submit routes by your company’s policies on the corrected values unless the submitter changes the route on that Submit; a route picked by hand on an earlier cycle is not reused.

Returning an invoice does not remove your ability to read it. You can stay on its detail page or reopen it later to see the feedback and progress. That history does not let you edit or approve it again: those actions follow the current assignment and your permissions. In Tasks, completing your review advances to the next task instead.

The same applies to a reviewer whose step was replaced and to a delegate who decided for someone else. They keep the invoice, and while they hold review permission they can return it to AP, even after the route changed or the coverage period ended.

Clerked performs the same basis check before export so an out-of-band change cannot bypass approval. Editing a policy affects future route calculations and does not rewrite stages already in progress. For an exceptional routing override, use the invoice’s supported override path or contact support with the current and intended route.