Set Out-of-Office Status

Set Out-of-Office Status Version

This topic discusses:	Links to related topics:
Overview - Security Setting your out-of-office status Administrative approver queue Approver buddy limits	Getting department supply information View requisition details Create Order Guides Viewing a requisition that has been split Viewing requisitions that have been split out from the original Requisition approval processing Copy a requisition Add items to a requisition Edit a requisition Open a requisition from an Order Guide Print an Order Guide Report Make a par cart requisition Requisition file and non-file items Release a requisition for picking For administrators: Set up an approval group Import requisition information
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Current Release Notes

Overview

If you plan to be out of the office for a day or more, you may wish to notify others in your organization that you are away, and to designate an approver buddy to pick up your approval responsibilities. If you are an approver for requisitions, invoices, and/or check requests, documents that you normally approve are routed to the queue for your approver buddy instead of being routed to your approval queue. An approver buddy is specified for each buyer/approver in the user settings.

Security

You must be an approver to be able to set your out-of-office status.

Setting your out-of-office status is controlled by the "MyAdmin" role object. To change your out-of-office status, the setting is Modify. This setting is the default for approvers.
The role object "Approval" provides access to an approver's own approval queue (Requisitioning > My Approval Queue). The minimal setting is View.
The role object "Approval Admin" provides access to all approval queues (Requisitioning > All Approval Queues). The minimal setting to display all approval queues is Modify.

To access organization, department, or asset location data, the organization, department, or asset location must be included in a user's data profile.

To set your out-of-office status:

From the main Contents, select Misc. Functions > Change My Out-of-Office Status.

The My Out-of-Office Status panel is displayed (Figure 1).

Figure 1 - Set Out-of-Office Status

Complete the fields on the My Out-of-Office Status panel.
The Out-of-Office "approver buddy" fields only display the approver buddies relevant for a user based on the user's approval authorizations. You may see fewer fields than those in Figure 1.

If you are leaving the office, make sure that the Out of Office field is selected.
When you return to the office, select the Out of Office field again, so that it is blank.
If you need to identify your approver buddy, select an approver buddy in the Requisition Approver Buddy field, the Invoice Approver Buddy field, the Check Request Approver Buddy field, the Invoice Approver Buddy field, the Journal Voucher Approver Buddy field, or the Vendor Approver Buddy field, depending on whether you approve journal vouchers, invoices/requisitions, and or check requests.

Click Submit. The system sets your out-of-office status and reroutes invoices/requisitions and/or check requests that you normally approve to your approver buddy.

Out-of-Office Status Example

The out-of-office panel changes, depending on the type of approver you are. If, for example, you are not a Vendor Approver, you will not see the Vendor Approver Buddy field.

The My Out-of-Office Status panel is displayed, without Vendor Approval Buddy.(Figure 2).

Figure 2 - Set Out-of-Office Status without Vendor Approval Buddy

Administrative Approver Queue

A situation may occur at a medical center where the normal approver for a department's requisitions, invoices, or check requests is out of the office, and the person's approver buddy is also out of the office. In this case, documents could sit in an approver's queue for days...or longer...awaiting approval. To handle this situation, your system administrator can assign the role "AdminApprover" to the a user who will be able to view and approve/reject the documents. The "AdminApprover" role might be assigned to the Purchasing Manager, for example. In this way, documents that need approval will not linger without attention in a buyer's queue. See Set Up and Maintain Users for information on assigning role objects.

Approver Buddy Limits

After Release 7.11.1, your site may be set up for approver buddy limits, if your administrators wish.

With approver buddy limits, an ERP approver delegates approvals to a buddy approver who has the same or greater dollar approval limit. In designating an out-of-office Approver Buddy, a user selects a buddy approver from a list of approvers who have the same (or higher) approval limit.

This feature is enabled by a System Values setting, and approvers who may serve as buddy approvers are assigned dollar limits for invoices, requisitions, and/or check requests as appropriate.

Fields for requisition and invoice approval limits have been added to the User Profile edit panel Approver Limits tab.

On the Out-of-Office status panel, the select list from the prompt for an approver buddy only displays users with approval limits equal to or greater than the approver going out-of-office. The actual dollar approval limits for each user on the list are not displayed because that information remains confidential. Only the User ID and User Name appear.

Here is an example.

Imagine that the approver limits in Figure 3 are for user "NancyM." Next we will assign "NancyM" as a buddy to user JamesB (Figure 4).

Figure 3 – Approver Limits Tab on a User Profile

Figure 4 – Selecting an Approver Buddy for Invoices

The approver buddy select list (Figure 4) only contains users who have the same or higher approval limit ($2000.00) as the user who is going out-of-office (JamesB).

Select an approver buddy. The list closes.
On the My Out-of-Office Status panel, select Out-of-Office.
Click Submit. The user selected as an approver buddy will handle the approvals (in this case, invoice approvals) for JamesB until he returns to this panel and un-selects Out-of-Office.

Suppose instead of using the prompt to get a select list of approver buddies, you keyed a user into the Invoice, Requisition, or Check Request Approver Buddy field. The system checks that the user you selected is valid; that is, has an approval limit equal to or greater than yours. If not, an error message appears and you must designate another user, or chose from the select list.
Figure 5 is an example. The user (JamesB) has keyed in a buddy approver (ashaw) who does not have the appropriate approval limit of $2000.00 for invoices.