Approval limits and hierarchies in Business Central

For organisations of any size, controlling who can authorise what is operationally fundamental. Business Central's approval limits and hierarchical routing structure who can approve which documents — and the workflow engine routes documents accordingly.

User approval setup. Each Business Central user record has an associated User Setup with approval-related fields:

• Sales Amount Approval Limit (LCY) — the maximum amount of sales documents this user can approve.
• Purchase Amount Approval Limit (LCY) — the maximum amount of purchase documents this user can approve.
• Request Amount Approval Limit — the maximum amount this user can submit (over this requires preventive approval).
• Approver ID — the user this user reports to for approval routing.
• Substitute — the user who acts on behalf during this user's absence.
• Unlimited Sales / Purchase Approval — boolean overrides for top-of-hierarchy users.

The fields together model the approval hierarchy and authorisation amounts.

The approval flow.

1. User creates a document (a purchase order, a sales quote, an expense report).
2. User clicks Send Approval Request.
3. Workflow evaluates routing rules based on the document, the user, the configured workflows.
4. Approval request created and assigned to the first approver — typically the user's Approver, picked up the hierarchy from the User Setup.
5. If the first approver's limit covers the document amount, they can approve.
6. If the amount exceeds the approver's limit, the request escalates to their approver.
7. The escalation continues up the hierarchy until an approver with sufficient limit is found.
8. Each approver acts (approve, reject, delegate) before the next step.
9. Once approved, the document is unlocked for posting.

The hierarchical routing is automatic — the platform walks the Approver chain.

Workflow templates. Microsoft ships approval workflows for common documents:

• Purchase quote / order / invoice approvals.
• Sales quote / order / invoice approvals.
• Payment journal approvals.
• Document approval for customer credit limits.
• Item creation / modification approvals.

Each template uses the User Setup hierarchy plus configured conditions. Templates can be customised — different threshold conditions, alternative approver assignments, multiple parallel branches.

Workflow user groups. Beyond hierarchical routing, workflow user groups define ordered or parallel sets of approvers. Useful when:

• A complex approval needs multiple roles (finance + procurement + technical).
• The standard manager hierarchy doesn't match approval requirements.
• Specific document types need specialist approvers (legal for contracts).

Groups can be configured with sequential routing (each in turn) or parallel routing (all approve in parallel; complete when all done).

Substitutes. When an approver is unavailable (holiday, illness, departure), the Substitute field on their User Setup redirects pending approvals to the substitute. Active during the absence window. Substitutes can be configured per user and updated as needed.

Escalation. Pending approvals can be configured to auto-escalate after a configurable delay — e.g. if the manager doesn't act within 48 hours, escalate to their manager. Prevents stuck approvals in long-leave scenarios where substitutes weren't configured.

Email and Teams notifications. Approvers receive notification of pending approvals via:

• Business Central role-center activity tile.
• Email with action links.
• Microsoft Teams card (with the BC Teams app installed) — approve/reject inline from Teams.
• Mobile app push notification.

The multi-channel notification helps approvals move quickly.

Approval audit. Every approval action records:

• Who approved (or rejected, or delegated).
• When.
• Comments left by the approver.
• The state of the document at the time of action.

The audit log is part of the document's history; auditors can reconstruct exactly how each posted document was approved.

Custom workflows. Beyond Microsoft's templates, custom workflows can be configured via the Workflow Designer:

• New triggers (custom document types, custom conditions).
• New response actions (call Power Automate flows, raise alerts, set additional fields).
• Complex conditional branching.

For workflows that need to cross systems or integrate with external services, Power Automate is typically the better tool — triggered by Business Central events, the flow handles the orchestration.

Common pitfalls.

• Approval hierarchies that don't match reality. Recent re-orgs invalidate the configured chain; documents route to the wrong people.
• No substitutes — managers go on leave, documents pile up unapproved.
• Approval limits set too low — every document escalates; the senior approver becomes a bottleneck.
• Approvers don't know they're approvers — no training; documents sit unactioned.
• Workflow proliferation — dozens of workflows with overlapping conditions, unpredictable behaviour.

Operational reality. Approval workflows are governance code — they enforce control discipline that prevents fraud, misposting, and unauthorised commitments. Configure thoughtfully, maintain actively, audit periodically.