Payhawk allows you to create and customize workflows based on expense types, approvers, and approval conditions that match your company’s specific requirements. The system also provides clear visibility into each step of the workflow and the users involved in the approval process.
You can define fallback rules to ensure the approval process continues in exceptional cases, such as when an employee without an assigned Team manager submits an expense that would normally require their manager’s approval.
In Payhawk, you can define approval workflows for card requests and transactions, reimbursements, bills, purchases, and more.
Workflows for expense types
Based on the lifecycle of expenses in Payhawk, you can customize the workflows for the bills, reimbursable expenses, and card transactions at your company.
If all steps for the expense type workflow are enabled, the lifecycle for a bill will include the following steps:
(Submit) An expense is first submitted by the expense owner.
(Approve) It is then approved by an employee assigned as approver in the expense approval workflow, as defined by a Payhawk administrator at your company.
(Review) Next, a reviewer reviews the expense details to ensure they comply with company policies.
(Pay > Confirm details) Following the review, employees with the appropriate permissions confirm the payment details.
The Confirm details and Authorize steps implement the 4-eye principle, where an authorized employee confirms the payment details while another one authorizes the payment.
If the bill expense is scheduled, the payment execution method is set at this stage.
By default, the payment can be set either for immediate execution or for the due date of the expense. However, it can also be set to a specific date.
(Pay > Authorize) Employees with payment rights then authorize the expense for payment.
If the payment is set to immediate payment execution, it will be paid immediately after authorization.
If the payment is scheduled, it will be authorized and automatically paid on the specified date (due or specific).
For more information, see the article on setting approval workflows for expense types.
Workflow steps for bills
For a bill, the steps are Submit, Approve, Review, and Pay with Pay, including the Confirm details and Authorize steps, thus implementing the 4-eye principle.
Workflow steps for card expenses
Card expenses have the Submit, Approve, and Review steps only, as they have already been paid.
Workflow steps for reimbursable expenses
For a reimbursable expense, such as mileage or per diem, the steps are Submit, Approve, Review, and Pay with Pay, including the Confirm details and Authorize steps, thus implementing the 4-eye principle.
By default, the Confirm details step for reimbursable expenses is set to automatic (Payhawk system), but can be modified by a Payhawk administrator.
Workflows for purchases
If all steps for the purchase workflow are enabled, the lifecycle for a purchase will include the following milestones:
(Submit) A purchase request is first submitted by the owner.
(Review) The purchase is then reviewed by an employee assigned as a reviewer in the workflow, as defined by a Payhawk administrator at your company.
(Approve) Next, an approver approves the purchase details to ensure they comply with company policies.
(Receive) Following the approval, employees with access to the purchase can upload receipt notes for the goods received.
(Invoice) Following the approval, employees with access to the purchase can upload invoices for the delivered goods or services.
(Pay > Confirm details) Authorized employees at your company will then confirm the payment details.
The Confirm details and Authorize steps implement the 4-eye principle, where an authorized employee confirms the payment details while another one authorizes the payment.
(Pay > Authorize) Employees with payment rights then authorize the purchase for payment.
(Close) If the auto-closing of the purchases is not enabled or there are discrepancies between the purchase quantity or amount and the billed and/or delivered ones, purchases will allow authorised employees to manually close them.
Workflows for card requests
If allowed, employees can submit requests for new physical, virtual, and single-use cards. You can then define who can approve card requests and who can issue the cards.
