Delegation Rules

Delegation rules record that one employee should approve requests on behalf of another — useful when a manager is on leave, on a long-term assignment, or wants to share approval load.

What you can do here:

• Create delegation rules when an approver is unavailable or wants to share workload
• Pick Temporary (date-bounded), Permanent (until revoked), or One-time (single request) delegations
• Limit the rule to specific modules, or let it cover everything
• Add a reason and optional notes for an audit trail
• Revoke rules early when the situation changes

Understanding Delegation

A delegation is a temporary transfer of approval authority. (Delegation = temporarily assigning your approval authority to someone else.)

Two roles:

In concept, when a request reaches a step where the delegator would normally approve and a matching active delegation exists, the delegate would receive it instead. As of the current build, this rerouting does not actually happen — see How This Actually Works below.

Delegation Types

Active Rules List

The main page shows every delegation rule that has been created. Each card displays:

The About Delegation Rules card at the bottom of the page summarises the three delegation types as a quick reference.

How to Create a Delegation Rule

1. Go to Settings > Workflows > Delegation Rules
2. Click + Add Rule in the top-right
3. Fill in the three tabs in order: People, Duration, Details
4. Click Create Rule

Step 1 — People

Step 2 — Duration

Delegation Type

Three button cards. Pick exactly one:

For Temporary delegations:

Modules

Eight checkboxes that limit the delegation to specific modules. Helper text: “Select specific modules or leave empty to delegate all”.

Step 3 — Details

How to Revoke a Delegation

Rules can’t be edited once created — the only action on an existing rule is Revoke. To end a rule before its scheduled end date (or to cancel a Permanent / One-time rule):

1. Find the rule in the Active Rules list
2. Click the ⋮ menu at the right end of the rule’s card
3. Select Revoke

Common Scenarios

“Our regional manager is going on 10 days’ leave and wants someone else to approve their team’s leave requests while they’re away — how do I set that up?” Creating a Temporary delegation rule here (Delegate from the manager, Delegate to the covering person, dates matching the leave, Leave module ticked) records the intent and shows up as an active rule for that window — but it does not currently make those leave requests actually arrive in the covering person’s queue (see How This Actually Works). Until this is fixed, arrange coverage directly: have the manager keep checking their own pending approvals remotely, or have the covering person coordinate with them and act as a Specific User step / manual workaround if your process allows it — don’t assume the requests will simply show up for the delegate.

“We set up a delegation but need to change who the delegate is — how do I edit it?” You can’t edit an existing rule — there’s no Edit option, only Revoke. Revoke the current rule from its card’s ⋮ menu, then create a new rule with the correct delegate. This only changes what the Active Rules list shows; it has no effect on actual approval routing either way (see How This Actually Works).

“The person we delegated to is also going to be out during that time — can we chain the delegation to a third person?” Don’t chain them (A → B → C) — set up two separate, direct delegation rules instead: one from the original approver to whoever is actually covering, for each real gap. Chained delegations aren’t a supported pattern here per this page’s own guidance. (This is forward-looking advice for how the feature is meant to behave — see the caveat above about rerouting not currently working at all.)

How This Actually Works

• Creating, listing, and revoking rules all work exactly as this page describes — that part of the feature is real. What’s not real yet is the payoff: an active rule is not consulted anywhere in the approval/workflow engine when it decides who a pending or new request routes to. The delegator keeps receiving everything themselves, regardless of any rules pointing away from them.
• This applies to every delegation type and every module — Temporary, Permanent, and One-time rules are all stored the same way and are equally unconsulted by request routing today.
• The Active Rules list and Expired badges are accurate reflections of the stored rule, not of any real routing effect — a rule showing as currently active only means its dates say so, not that anything is being rerouted because of it.

Best Practices

1. Set up delegations in advance — create the rule a day or two before the absence begins, so the record and audit trail are in place before you go (remember: this alone won’t reroute anything today — see the caveat above).

2. Inform the delegate — let them know they’ll be receiving requests, what kind, and any guidance you’d like them to follow.

3. Be specific with modules — if the delegate only needs to handle Leave during your vacation, tick only Leave. Don’t delegate Payroll or Hiring approvals unless they have authority for those.

4. Document the reason clearly — “Annual leave 15–25 Mar” is more useful in audits than “Out of office”.

5. Review permanent delegations annually — they don’t expire on their own. Audit them once a year to remove ones that are no longer needed.

6. Don’t chain delegations — if A delegates to B and B is also out, set up two separate rules (A→C and B→D) instead of relying on cascading delegations.

Delegation vs. Approval Chains

Use Delegation Rules when a specific approver is unavailable. Use Approval Chains to define your organisation’s standard approval routes.

Related Pages