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Approve Expenses Via Email

Emburse Enterprise will email you expenses that require your approval. You may only approve or return all expenses via this method—any line-item adjustments must be made in Emburse Enterprise online.

Email Approval

From the email you may approve all expenses for payment or return all expenses to the expense owner with questions or comments simply by clicking the ACCEPT or RETURN button (users who receive HTML-formatted emails) or forwarding the email (users who receive text-only emails).

  • To approve or return only specific line items on a report, you will need to log into Emburse Enterprise to approve.
  • Click the VIEW RECEIPTS link at the bottom of the email to be taken directly to the report in the Emburse Enterprise app. You will be required to log in to the Emburse Enterprise app if you are not already logged in on the same browser.
  • Note: If the approval is no longer assigned to you, you will not be able to view receipts via the link in the email. For example, if you have already approved or returned this report, it will route to the next step in the approval process and the VIEW RECEIPTS link in the email will no longer work for you.
  • The exception would be if your organization has enabled “Allow Viewing Receipts On Approval Emails Without Authorization" via the Access Permissions admin screen. See Watcher Approval Feature for details.

Email approvals may only be sent from your primary Emburse Enterprise account email address, unless your organization has activated the ability to approve from any email address listed in your Account Settings.

There are two ways to route the expense by email:

  1. Click ACCEPT. This creates a new email that must be sent for the change to be reflected in Emburse Enterprise. To add questions or comments, simply type them in the body of the email, above the forwarded text, then click SEND.

Either of these is equivalent to clicking SUBMIT in Emburse Expense Enterprise online and instantly approves all line items on the report.

  1. Click RETURN. This creates a new email that must be sent for the change to be reflected in Emburse Enterprise. To add questions or comments, simply type them in the body of the email, above the forwarded text, then click SEND.

Either of these is equivalent to clicking RETURN ALL in Emburse Expense Enterprise online and instantly rejects all line items on the report.

Note: Certain mobile devices may autopopulate the email "From" field with the default email address for the device, rather than the email address to which the approval notification was sent. Be sure the "From" field contains your primary Emburse Enterprise account email address before you click SEND on your approval or return email.

Expense Report Approval Failure Notification

If you attempt to approve via email an expense that has since changed—for example, if the expense owner has recalled and resubmitted the report—you will receive an Expense Approval Failure Notification email alerting you to reattempt your approval via the most recent approval email notification for that report.

Watcher Approval Feature

Emburse Enterprise offers customers the ability to allow certain users to watch specific expense reports, line items or pre-approvals as they route through the approval process, even for items that are auto-approved. Based on criteria defined by your organization, certain users may be CCed on the approval email notifications. They receive the same notifications an approver receives, but for Watchers there are no APPROVE and RETURN buttons.

If you are interested in implementing this enhancement for your organization, contact us via Support.

For information on enabling watchers to view receipts via the links in approval emails, see "Enable Unauthorized Users to View Image Links in Approval Emails" in Access Permissions Admin Screen.

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