Overview:
Review, approve, or reject invoices based on predefined workflows. Learn about notifications, adding comments, and walk through a scenario.

Review, Approve or Reject Invoices:

1. Begin by going to Finances > Actuals Invoices.

2. Click in the row for the Invoice to review all the billing items in the invoice. Note that any invoices that have your name in the NextReviewer column require your approval. when a user has unreviewed invoices assigned to them they will receive a daily email with useful information and links to review. 

3. Notice the invoice information on the bottom left hand side of the invoice review page. This section contains the assigned signature authority flow, next reviewer, matter subtotals, invoice date, and invoice totals.

4. Notice that any Warnings can be viewed at the top of the review screen. The warning can be ignored if the amounts are correct. 
5. Click the History tab to view information for each file upload, invoice approval, and invoice rejection. The event, who caused the event, the number of rejected billing items, total billing items, and invoice amounts at the time of the event are included.

6. Review History as needed. Click the Changes tab to review changes made during the most recent invoice import. Clicking a row in this section will bring the selected billing item into view and highlight it.

You may also navigate between changes by using the control at the top of the invoice section.  Use the blue up and down arrows to navigate between changes to quickly review the invoice.  The change navigator also contains the number of approved, rejected, unreviewed, and total billing item counts.

7. Select the Billing Item(s) you wish to approve or reject.
8. Click the Approve Items button to approve or Reject Items button to reject. If you reject a billing item the invoice cannot be approved. You must reject the invoice and wait for a second revision to be uploaded for the review process to continue. 

9. If you rejected the invoice, once the invoice is fixed and re-imported it will update the existing invoice. Once all items in an invoice are approved, the invoice can be overall approved by clicking the Approve button. 

Adding Comments:

10. To add an overall invoice comment, click the Add Comment button on the right hand side of the page.

11. Enter your comment in the Add Comment window.
12. Click the OK button. 

13. To add a billing item specific comment, click the Three Dots within the billing item row.
14. Select Add Comment to enter your comment in the pop-up window as shown above. 

Note:

• You can also add a billing item rejection comment using the modal that appears after rejecting a billing item.
• You can add an optional invoice rejection comment using the modal that appears after rejecting an invoice. 
• You can add an optional invoice approval comment using the modal that appears after approving an invoice.

Notifications:

When an actuals invoice is rejected the law firm will be notified via email.  The notification will specify the rejected invoice and any comments made on the rejected items or on the overall invoice.  This notification can be customized by navigating to the Tasks > Notifications page and editing the content of the “InvoiceReview: Rejected” notification.  Do not remove the “{Invoice.ReviewHTML}” form field or the useful rejection info will not be included in the email.

When an invoice is fully approved the law firm will be notified by email.

When a user has unreviewed invoices assigned to them they will receive a daily email with useful information and links.

Scenario:

For the following scenario we will be using the signature authority flow found below: 

This signature authority flow specifies three levels of review.  When the invoice is imported it will first be assigned to Paul Brown who will do the “Initial Review” step.  The first reviewer is required to review each billing item in the invoice.  Any subsequent reviewers can review each billing item as well or simply sign off on the total.  In the example flow, Paul Brown is required to review the invoice regardless of the total invoice amount.  Once Paul Brown approves the invoice, it will then be assigned to Patrick Green, but only if the total amount exceeds $10,000.  That is because Paul Brown was given the approval amount max of $10,000.  Patrick Green may then approve or reject the invoice.  If the invoice amount is greater than $15,000 then it will be assigned to Gregg Hart.  If Gregg Hart approves the invoice it will be fully approved.

To review all the billing items in an invoice, you must click on it's row in the table to go to the Reviewing Actuals Invoice page.

In the example invoice, the forecast ($8,000) for PA320 has been exceeded by the actuals ($10,300).  This is a warning and can be ignored if the amounts are correct.

In the example case, it will be rejected since the forecast is accurate.  We will add a comment to the rejection of this billing item.

Once the item has been rejected the page will change in the following ways:

• The item rejection comment has been added to the pane on the right hand side of the page.  The small chain icon will highlight the billing item that the comment was added to.
• The billing item has a red rejection status with an icon that displays the rejection comment on hover.
• The “Reject” button under the “Invoice Actions” has been enabled.

Since the invoice contains a rejected item it cannot be approved.  You must reject the invoice and wait for a second revision to be uploaded for the review process to continue.

When the sample invoice is rejected, an overall rejection comment can be added and a final popup will show what emails (if any) received the invoice rejection notification. The actuals invoices table will now appear as below.

A sample rejection email is below:

Once the invoice is fixed and re-imported it will update the existing invoice and appear as below.  The item that exceeded the PA320 forecast displays with a strikethrough text format to show that is has been deleted from the new invoice revision.  Any changes made to items that were not deleted will be displayed as red text.

Now that all items in the invoice are approved, the invoice can be overall approved.  Since Paul Brown's approval amount max is greater than the invoice amount, the invoice will be fully approved once he approves it.  The following email will be sent to the invoice's law firm to notify them that it has been fully approved. 

This is the end of the invoice approval process for our example scenario.