ANTE User ManualPayroll Approvers
Payroll Approvers is a configuration screen under Manpower → Configuration. It decides who signs off a payroll run before it can move from For Approval to Approved in the Payroll Center.
Out of the box, approval goes to the Director of your HR department, and one director's approval is enough. If your company needs more sign-offs — for example Finance Director first, then the CEO — you can point payroll at your own multi-stage approval flow.
Accessing Payroll Approvers
- Click Manpower in the sidebar
- Open Configuration
- Select Payroll Approvers
Choosing the approval flow
The Approval flow dropdown at the top of the page holds your choice:
| Option | What it means |
|---|---|
| Default — HR Director Approval (built-in) | One approval stage. The payroll run goes to a Director in your Human Resources department. This is what applies until you choose otherwise. |
| One of your own flows | Any active approval flow you have built for payroll. Use this when one approval is not enough, or when a different person or department should sign off. |
Pick an option and click Save. The change applies to the next payroll run you submit — runs already waiting for approval keep the flow they started with.
Customize flow opens the selected flow in the workflow editor, where you can add stages, change who each stage goes to, and rename the steps.
Checking who will actually approve
The Approval stages card underneath lists every approval stage in the selected flow, the rule it uses (for example Director — Human Resources), and the names of the people who currently match that rule.
This list is checked against your real employee records, so it is the fastest way to confirm that payroll can actually be approved before month-end.
A stage highlighted in red means no one in your company currently satisfies that rule — for example, the flow expects an HR Director but nobody holds that position. Fix it by giving the right person a Director position in the Human Resources department, or by choosing a different flow. Payroll keeps working in the meantime: the built-in flow falls back to another HR member, then to a company administrator, so a run is never left with nobody able to approve it.
How approval works day to day
- HR opens a payroll run in the Payroll Center and clicks Submit for Approval. The run moves to For Approval.
- The approver receives an approval task and can decide from either their task list or the payroll run itself.
- While the run is waiting, the payroll summary shows an Approval status panel naming who it is waiting on and what each stage has decided.
- Approve moves the run to Approved, ready to post. In a multi-stage flow only the last approval does this.
- Send back returns the run to For Review. A reason is required, and HR sees it so they know what to correct.
Whoever submits a payroll run cannot approve it — the Approve button stays disabled for them and explains why. This keeps preparation and approval in different hands. The one exception is a company small enough that the submitter is the only person who could approve; that case is allowed and recorded.
A second, separate exception: anyone with full system access, or whose role sits at the very top of your company's role hierarchy (level 0), can approve or send back a run even when they are not the assigned approver — including one they submitted themselves. This is disclosed on screen before they confirm, notifies the approver being overridden, and is written to the audit log every time. See Deciding outside the normal routing (override) on the Payroll Summary page for the full detail.
A run can also reach For Approval with no approval flow at all — for example one that predates your company's approval flows, or whose flow was cancelled after submission. The Payroll Summary page offers a Start approval flow button to recover it and route it to whoever is configured above; see No approval flow (stranded runs) on the Payroll Summary page.
Permissions
| Requirement | Detail |
|---|---|
| View the page | Your role must grant Payroll Approvers configuration access |
| Change the flow | Your role must also grant Payroll Approvers update permission — without it the dropdown and Save button are read-only |
| Approve a payroll run | Decided by the flow, not by a permission: only the person the flow routes the run to can approve it |
Troubleshooting
| Issue | What to check |
|---|---|
| I can't find Payroll Approvers in the menu | Open Manpower → Configuration. If it is still missing, you may not have permission — contact your administrator. |
| The Approve button is greyed out on a payroll run | Hover it — the tooltip says why. Usually the run is waiting on someone else, or you are the person who submitted it. |
| A stage shows "Nobody currently matches this rule" | Assign the required position (for the built-in flow: a Director in Human Resources), or select a different approval flow. |
| Submitting payroll says no approver could be resolved | The selected flow has a stage nobody can fill. Open Payroll Approvers, check the Approval stages card, and fix the highlighted stage. |
| The Payroll Summary page says "No approval flow for this run" | The run reached For Approval with no approval flow attached (it predates approval flows, or its flow was cancelled). Someone with the Submit for Approval permission needs to click Start approval flow on that page to route it to the approver configured here. |
| I saved a new flow but the current run still uses the old one | Runs keep the flow they were submitted with. Return the run to For Review and submit it again to pick up the new flow. |