Recently I got the question if it is possible to add a file attachment to a Purchase Order (PO) after the PO has been already approved by the Purchase Order Workflow.
The quick answer was No, because if you want to do any modification on the PO you need to start with “request change” on the PO Header. After activating the change request the standard behavior is to start the PO Workflow again.
But within the available rules and configuration options within “Purchasing policies” it will be possible to achieve to make minor changes an approved PO’s without running through the complete PO Workflow. The Purchasing policy “Reapproval rule for purchsase orders” allows us to define a list of PO Header and Line fields which require a reapproval. So changes on unimportant fields can be handeled different than changes on business relevant fields.
Within the PO Workflow we can create a condition to check whether one of the defined fields (e.g a business relevant field like quantity, price, discount, cash discount, …) has been changed. If one of that business critcal field has been changed the PO Header gets a flag (ChangeRequestRequired) activated. Within the PO Workflow we can query that field to route the Workflow to an autoapprove step if the flag is not activeted.
Let’s do it step by step.
Create a Purchasing Policy within Procurement module:
Create a new policy (or use existing) and assign to the desired legal entity:
Select these fields from PO Header and Line for which you want to run the full PO Workflow after a change request on the PO. Means for all other fields we can configure a autoapprove in the PO Workflow. The list of fields requireing a reapproval will be different in any businerss scenario.
The usabilty of this form is unfortunately not as good, but try to find the reapproval required fields on the left side (using the tree view) and assign to the right area on the form. Control what is selected on the right side is best in List View.
For changes on this fields the RequiresReapproval flag on the PO Header will be set to active and can be queried within the PO Workflow, means the PO Workflow will always be started by an new “Submit” after a change request.
In the PO Workflow we need to add at least a condition to route the Workflow to an autoapproval task. Additional I’ve added a condition whether a former instance regarding that PO exists.
This setup now requires to “request a change” for a PO after approval and to “Submit” the PO to the Workflow after the changes.
The regular PO Workflow starts and if one of the business critical fields was changed, otherwise the autoapproval is executed and the PO keeps approved after a short processing time needed by the Workflow processing batch. In this way we also have the Workflow history for the autoapproval and who has the change request submitted.
In this way we can do minor changes or even add attachments to a PO with very less approval effort, just submit PO again to the PO Workflow.
This post was first posted on the Business improvement blog on the 22.02.2024.