Overview: Delegating Your Oracle Approval Worklist

Most transactions generated in the Oracle Financial System must be approved by a person(s) with appropriate financial authority before they are considered complete. Oracle uses workflow to manage the transaction approval process. There is a feature in Oracle that allows you to delegate or share your approval workflows.

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Oracle Vacation Delegation and Worklist Access Functionality

Oracle Financials allows both vacation delegation (selecting someone to act on your behalf for a specified period of time) and the ability to give someone access to your Worklist (typically, to allow colleagues with similar authority to act for each other at any time, or for emergency back up). Approval workflows may be delegated to different people by Oracle module (e.g., Expense Requests, iBudgets, iJournals, Labor Distribution, PCard and iProcurement) or you may delegate workflows for all Oracle modules to the same person. FYIs, end routes and Core Journal approval authority cannot be delegated.

Available Tools and Resources
An audit trail is maintained to record who actually approved each transaction. In addition, a Vacation Query provides a history of vacation delegation and Worklist sharing assignments. The Vacation Query also displays active delegations and Worklist assignments so that originators can identify who is available to act on a transaction. The Vacation Query can also provide a list of transactions that were handled by others on the person's behalf.

The following resources are available to help you use the vacation delegation and Worklist access features of Oracle Financials:

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Rules for Delegating and Sharing Your Oracle Approval Worklist


It is your responsibility to select the right person to whom to delegate or share your Worklist. The person who established your authority in Authority Manager does not do this for you. You must pick appropriate people, communicate your expectations to them, and ensure they will be able and available to take actions in a timely manner. If they are planning a vacation and delegate to someone else, YOUR transactions will also delegate to that person!

Follow these rules when delegating or sharing your approval worklist:

  • The individual you select must have some signature authority within Oracle Financials. This ensures they are known to the system as having completed required training. If you want to delegate to someone who is not currently an Oracle approver they must first be granted some approval authority through Authority Manager and complete required training. This data is typically updated in Oracle by the next day. Reference How To: Grant, Change, or Revoke Financial Authority to Others.
  • If you have been granted a "Special" approval authority by Central Offices (e.g. DPA Screening or Tax-Exempt Alcohol), you may only delegate approval authority (or share your Worklist) to someone who also has this special variety of approval authority. If you have both of these authorities, the person to whom you delegate must also have both authorities. If selecting another DPA and/or Tax-Exempt Alcohol approver to handle all your workflows would not be appropriate during the time you are away, you must contact the Central Office that granted this authority to you and ask them to temporarily remove it. The Property Management Office grants DPA requisition approval and Procurement grants Tax-Exempt Alcohol Requisition approval. After temporarily removing your special approval authority, you may then delegate (or share your Worklist) with any approver. Once your delegations have expired, you can contact the appropriate Central Office to request that your special approval authority be reinstated.

Authorized approvers are expected to follow University policy when reviewing and approving financial transactions. Reference Policy Notes: Responsibilities of PTA Owners and Financial Approvers and Policy Notes: Code of Conduct.

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Workflow Types and Delegation

Approval authority is defined in terms of the types of transactions you can approve, within what organizations, for what specific Projects, Tasks, and Awards, and within what dollar limits. The Approval you have been granted through Authority Manager dictates whether you will be selected as an approver by the Oracle Financials system. Once selected you are added to “workflow” for the transaction type. Vacation Delegation allows you to delegate the ability to act on the workflow.

Oracle Workflow Type Approval Granted through Authority Manager Special Notes About Delegation
All All as noted below To streamline the delegation process, you CAN grant “All” Oracle Workflows to an individual and then pull specific types out as exceptions to be handled only by you and not others.
iBudgets Budget Control –––
iJournals

• Expense Journal
• GL Journal

 Both iJournal approval authorities use the same workflow. You CANNOT delegate Expense Journal approval authority to one person and GL Journal (revenue journals) to another person.

• Expense Requests (Expense Reports, Advances, Non-PO Payments and Petty Cash)
• PCard
• iProcurement

 Requisitions Requisition authority is split into more specific workflows by Oracle module and CAN be delegated differently. For example, you can delegate Expense Requests workflows to one person and PCard and iProcurement Requisition workflows to another person.
Labor Distribution Adjustment Labor Distribution –––
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