Conditional fields are a way to ensure approval requests get performed only on the transactions you want and only go to the people you want. With conditional fields, you set a specific condition (e.g., when a "Tracking Code Option" field contains "Operations") to get the granularity you need. When the data from Xero meets the conditions you set, it creates an approval request and sends it to the configured Panel. If a conditional field is not meet, then no further actions are performed.

Conditional fields are an optional part of setting up a Xero integration but they're a great way to make sure approval requests are only made for certain items. For instance, you can set up a conditional field to only create approval request for items over a certain amount or only for transactions with a certain reference ID.

This guide is to be used in conjunction with the Setting up Xero Integration guide to add further detail around creating and managing conditional approvals with this integration.

Login to the Approval Donkey Dashboard 

Navigate to the Settings page.  

Select the Settings icon and then‘Settings’.

Note: Your organisation name should be showing, if not please complete the Xero Integration set-up.  

The Xero Settings page will show. 

Tip: Its best to work from left to right line by line.   

Choose the Xero transaction you are wanting to create an approval workflow for.

Note: you can create multiple lines for the same transaction e.g. more than 1 line for Invoices.

Choose the field you want to lookup or reference from the data that comes through with the transaction you have selected e.g. Invoice data.

Note: See the Appendix for a full list of available fields.  

Choose the condition or logic you want to apply to the specific field you have selected for each transaction type.

Note: See the Appendix for a full list of condition types.  

Enter the value you want to apply to the condition selected. This can be any character e.g. text or number but should generally be something that is available as a field.  

Note: Use a semi colon (;)  as the delimiter for the value field when adding conditions in the Xero mapping?

You may add +And conditions to any workflow. This means for a request to be sent to the Panel all +And conditions need to be meet. If they are not meet then the request is not sent.

You can add as many +And conditions as you like to create really customised approvals workflows. In this example any Bills over 200 with the line item tracking option of 'GL' will be routed to the Management Panel.

Finally choose the Panel you want to route this workflow too. This means whenever the conditions for this workflow have been meet the Panel members will receive an approval request.Don't worry if you haven't set-up all your Panels yet, you can come back to this step anytime.  

Click Save and its all set-up.

So for this example whenever the amount due on an Invoice is over $99.00 an approval request will be automatically sent to the ‘Management’panel whenever it is ‘Submitted for approval’ in Xero.  

As per this example you can add as many lines or workflows as you require for handling all your approval requirements. Note: See below examples for how Approval Donkey handles some conditions.  

The following examples aim to show how certain workflows with associated conditions are treated by Approval Donkey and the rules and reasoning for this. We have shown Invoices in the examples below however the rules are the same for all transactions (Invoices, Bills Purchase Order and Credit Notes).

In this scenario there are two workflows both created for Invoices with differing conditions set to route to the same Panel ‘Management’. 

Notes:
The reason why only one approval request is created when two conditions are meet is so we don’t get duplicate approval requests going to the same Panel.

In this scenario there are two workflows both created for Invoices with differing conditions set to route to different Panels ‘Management’ and ‘Stakeholder Approvals’  

Notes:
We recommend creating conditional field workflows that minimize the chance of two (or more) requests being created, this may mean using the same field and condition but with opposing conditions, as shown below.

Use this scenario when you want to set a defined amount for when to send requests to a particular panel. In this scenario the limit is 100 (do not include $’s etc in the Value field). 

Notes:We recommend offsetting Greater than and Less than conditions as above because if an Invoice was sent for exactly 100 it would be ignored, all others would go through OK.

Use this scenario when you want to set an If Or based workflow. For example IF e.g. the general ledger code 'GLCode' is present send to this Panel, OR when it is not present send it to this Panel. 

Note:
The flexibility of these types of scenarios can be used to create really elaborate workflows that perfectly meet and automate your approval workflows.