Guides

Approval Chains

Define custom approval rules to ensure payments are reviewed by the right people before being sent to the bank.

Approval chains let you configure who must approve payments based on your internal policies. When a payment is created, all approval chains are evaluated. If the conditions for a given chain are met, its approval steps are added to the payment.

  • A single payment can trigger multiple approval chains.
  • Within a specific chain, the same user cannot approve more than one step.
  • The same user can approve multiple steps across different chains for the same payment.
  • Changes to approval chains only apply to new payments. Existing payments will keep their original approval steps.

How to configure an approval chain

  1. Navigate to Approvals > Approval Chains
  2. Click Actions > Create Approval Chain (top-right corner)
  3. Set up the basic information:
    1. Give the chain a recognizable name (e.g. manual payments, internal transfers)
    2. Optionally define conditions that must be met for this chain to apply (e.g. creator role, entity, payment type)
    3. Click Select Approval Steps
  4. Configure approval steps:
    1. Choose Automatic Approval if no approval is required
    2. Select the currency to use for evaluating approval limits (foreign currencies will be converted using the rate at time of payment creation)
    3. Set the number of required approvals
    4. For each step, assign roles and amount limits — at least one role is required for an unlimited amount
    5. Optionally define an automatic approval limit for small payments
    6. Click Review Approval Chain, then Create Approval Chain to save
  5. The chain is now active and will be applied to all newly created payments that match its conditions

Approval conditions

Approval conditions control whether a chain should be triggered for a payment. All defined conditions must be met for the chain to apply.

Creator role

The condition is met if the role of the user creating the payment is or is not one of the specified roles.

Entity

Used to trigger on payments where the source or destination account belongs to a specified entity.

  • Credit transfers: the source account entity is or is not in the list
  • Direct debits: the destination account entity is or is not in the list

Bank

The condition is met if the initiating account's bank is or is not any of the specified banks.

  • For credit transfers: the source account
  • For direct debits: the destination account

Type of payment

Used to trigger the chain only for credit transfers or direct debits.

Internal or external

Used to limit approval chains to either internal transfers or external payments.

Approval chain types

Approval chains can be configured to either require user approval or automatically approve qualifying payments.

Automatic approval

The payment will be automatically approved if the trigger conditions are met.

Approval steps

Control who is required to approve the payment.

  • Roles – Users with one of the listed roles must approve this step
  • Allow creator approval – Enable approval by the user who created the payment (disabled by default to support four-eyes principle)

Fallback approval chain

As a safeguard, a fallback approval chain exists. It is triggered if no other chain's conditions are met.
Only the approval steps can be modified. By default, the owner role is required to approve each payment.

Approval chain examples

Below are a few example setups with screenshots from the Atlar dashboard — click the images to expand them. If you need help designing your approval flows, contact your Delivery Manager or reach out via our contact page.

Approval chain with approval limits

The approval chain below applies to all payments and defines multiple tiers of approval:

  • Payments under 10,000 EUR are automatically approved
  • Payments from 10,000–100,000 EUR require approval from a Treasury Analyst, Head of Treasury, or CFO role
  • Payments from 100,000–250,000 EUR require approval from the Head of Treasury or CFO
  • Payments above 250,000 EUR require approval from the CFO

Approval chain with entity condition

The approval chain below applies only to payments from the entity Demo Sweden AB. Approval limits:

  • Payments under 100,000 SEK require approval from the Treasury team
  • Payments above 100,000 SEK require approval from the CFO

Conditions can be combined to build chains specific to your organization’s structure, including filters on role, entity, internal/external status, and more.

Approval chain for ERP-initiated payments

In the example below, all payments initiated via NetSuite are automatically approved by the owner role, regardless of amount.

You can create similar chains for payments initiated through other external systems (e.g. a back-office tool or the Atlar API).

Note: When creating a dedicated approval chain for ERP-initiated payments, be sure to exclude the relevant role from other approval chains to keep flows separate.

Updated 8 days ago

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