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Approving and returning expense reports in the portal

Learn how to approve and return expense reports in the Payhawk web portal.

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Written by Payhawk
Updated over 2 weeks ago

As an approver in your company's workflows, you can approve and return expense reports to their expense owners in the Payhawk web portal.

Approving expense reports from the Expenses app

Approvers assigned as approvers in your company’s workflows can approve expense reports.

  • Approving an expense report also approves all the individual expenses it contains. These expenses will then be submitted according to the defined workflow. The entire report will be automatically approved once the final expense in the report has been approved.

To approve an expense report:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > Approve.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on Approve.

Approving expense reports from the Payhawk Inbox

To approve an expense report from your Payhawk Inbox in the web portal:

  1. Go to Inbox > Requests > Pending.

  2. Select the desired expense report.

  3. Click on Approve.

Returning expense reports to employees from the Expenses app

Approvers, reviewers, Payhawk accountants, and administrators can return expense reports to the employee (expense owner).

If you are assigned as an expense approver, you can return an expense report to the expense owner in the following way:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > Approve.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on its three-dot menu and select Return to employee.

  4. In the dialog that opens:

    1. Under Comment, enter the reason for your action.

    2. Click on Return.

If you are assigned as an expense reviewer, you can return an expense report to the expense owner in the following way:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > Review.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on its three-dot menu and select Return to employee.

  4. In the dialog that opens:

    1. Enter the reason for your action.

    2. Click on Return.

Returning expense reports to employees from the Payhawk Inbox

To return an expense report to the employee from your Payhawk Inbox in the web portal:

  1. Go to Inbox > Requests > Pending.

  2. Select the desired expense report.

  3. Click on Return.

  4. On the screen that opens:

    1. Under Comment, enter the reason for your action and any details you expect the employee to provide before re-submitting the expense.

    2. Click on Return.

Returning expense reports for review

As a Payhawk administrator, you can return both unpaid and paid expense reports for review.

Once an expense report has been reviewed but not paid, you can return it for review in the following way:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > Pay > Confirm details.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on Return for review.

If the payment details of the report have been confirmed:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > Pay > Authorise.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on its three-dot menu and select Return for review.

To return an expense report for review after it's been paid:

  1. In the Payhawk web portal, go to Expenses > All.

  2. Select the desired report.

  3. Click on Return for review.

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