What you need to know
Some tasks need an approval from Legal, Accounting or Executive before they can be done. You give it on the task's card, in the record's Work panel, with Approve. An approval covers the documents on file as they are now. If a PSA amendment arrives later, on the work or on the work of the property's engagement, the approval goes stale, and it is asked for again.
You can name exceptions: things that will still be open when the work goes out, each with the person who owns closing it. A task can wait for more than one approval; each job gives its own.
Before you start
- You must have been given that approval on Workflow roles. For Legal, you also need a bar admission on the Staff List. For an Accounting or an Executive approval, any executive may give it with no grant. Managing the project does not allow it, and being on the task is not enough. You may approve your own work. You must also be able to open the work.
- The approval must be requested first. If its row under Needs says Not asked, a person on the task, or a manager of the work, selects Request beside it, once the task is under way.
- Read the documents on file first. The approval says that you read all of them.
- An approval you can give is not on your My Tasks unless you are on the task. Open the property or engagement: in its Work panel, the task shows Needs your approval.
Before you do this
An approval cannot be taken back from the Work panel. It stays until a new PSA amendment, on the work or on the work of the property's engagement, makes it stale. Approve only when you have read every document listed.What to do
- Open the property or engagement. In its Work panel, open the task that says Needs your approval.
- Under Needs, on the row for your approval, such as Legal approval, select Approve.
- Under Documents read, check the list. Every document received with a file is listed and ticked, and so is every PSA amendment received without one, ending in no file. On a property's work, the PSA and its amendments received on the engagement's work are listed too. Two documents of the same name show the date each was received. If you did not read one, read it first: the approval cannot go out with a box unticked.
- Under Exceptions, look at what is written in: the outside parties' sign-offs that are not finished. Pick an owner for each one, or remove it with ×. A kept one resolves itself when the party's answer comes in.
- To add an exception, type it in Exception (Enter another exception), pick its Owner, and select Add.
- Select Approve as Legal (or Approve as Accounting, Approve as Executive).
Confirm it worked
The approval's row leaves Needs. When every approval the task needs is given, the card shows Cleared, with the number of open exceptions, and lists each exception with its owner. When one is closed, mark it resolved: Mark an exception resolved, or reopen it.
If it did not work
- A message says “This property was deleted on 10/06/2026; its work is paused until it is restored.” The work's property or engagement was deleted, and nobody can change its work until the record is restored. See A project or its tasks disappeared.
- The approval is not recorded, and red text under a field says what is missing: Tick once read under a document, or Required under an owner. See “Approve as …” does not approve.
- There is no Approve: you have not been given that approval, the approval is not requested yet, or the task is not active.
- A message says “Legal approval is for a person given it on Workflow roles who holds a bar admission.” or “Accounting approval is for an executive, or a person given it on Workflow roles.” The Executive message reads the same, with Executive for Accounting. Ask a person who may give that approval, or ask a company administrator to give it to you on Workflow roles. The Legal message can also read “Legal approval is for a person given it on Workflow roles.” or “Legal approval needs a bar admission on the Staff List as well.”
- A message ends “Read it again and approve once more.” A document arrived, or left, while the dialog was open; an outside party you kept answered; an exception you kept was marked resolved; or an exception you left out was reopened. The list is read again: a new document shows unticked until you tick it, a finished or resolved item is gone, and a reopened exception is listed again.
- The card shows Stale: new amendment: a PSA amendment arrived after the approval, on the work or on the work of the property's engagement. Approve again, even when the task is done. The dialog opens with the exceptions still open from the earlier approval; a resolved one is not listed. Remove any that no longer applies: the card then shows it as “Removed when Legal approved again”.
Good to know
How approvals, outside parties' answers and exceptions fit together: Approvals, sign-offs and exceptions.