Adding and Editing Approver Groups
- 23 Jun 2023
- 5 Minutes to read
- Contributors
- Print
- DarkLight
Adding and Editing Approver Groups
- Updated on 23 Jun 2023
- 5 Minutes to read
- Contributors
- Print
- DarkLight
Article Summary
Share feedback
Thanks for sharing your feedback!
One of the biggest challenges sellers and sales organizations face is non-standard pricing, where products are discounted depending on a variety of factors such as customers, products, seasonality, inventory, etc. Often, sellers have to discount products to meet buyers' budgetary restrictions during negotiations.
Mobileforce CPQ provides a comprehensive approval process for product pricing and discounting which has the following highlights:
- Rules to control discount levels and approvals
- Guardrails to ensure discounts are always within the specified ranges
- Simple approval mechanisms to over-ride discount levels
- Ability of business users to set up the approval rules and approvers: without having to rely on time consuming IT resources.
- Automated approval process tied together with quoting, to ensure business processes are followed when discounting products
- Approval tiers, chain of control, alternate approvers, and approval automation and simplification directly via email or via CPQ.
In Mobileforce CPQ, approvals are specified at three different granularities
- In Approver Groups: where the chain of command for approvals is established. This includes business roles such as Sales Managers, Sales Directors, VPs, Finance, etc
- In Products: where approval rules are established at a product level
- In Quote Templates: where organization level approval rules and guardrails are specified.
These are described below.
Mobileforce CPQ allows admins to specify a group of one or more users that can approve a quote, if required by a company's approval rules. Additionally, admins can configure an escalated approvals workflow.
Example:
An example of an escalated approvals workflow: A seller sends a quote for approval, which first goes to their manager. If the manager approves the quote, it is then sent to the Vice President, and then, if approved a second time, to a CEO.
Additionally, admins can authorize additional approvers who are not notified in the regular approval workflow, but can login to the Mobileforce CPQ application and approve requests on a contingency basis (for example, when a regular approver is unavailable).
Admins can create, edit and manage approver groups from the Approver Groups page, accessible from the CPQ Setup page.
Creating approver groups
From the Approver Group page, click Add. Additionally, you can click the 
button to edit existing approver groups.
Editing Approver Groups
To edit an approver group, from the Approver Group page, click the button for the desired entry, where you can then modify the options.
Note
Additionally, you can:
- Click the
button to copy an existing group, and then click the 
button to modify it. - Click the
button to delete an existing group.
button to copy an existing group, and then click the 
button to delete an existing group.In the General section, do the following:
- Enter the name of the group (required)
- Enter the group description
When you save the group, Mobileforce CPQ automatically populates the metadata values (such as Created Time) for the group.
Configure escalated approvals
Using Mobileforce CPQ, admins can configure escalated approvals by specifying the numerical approval level in the Level field. Mobileforce CPQ requests approval from groups with lower Level values, before requesting approval from groups with higher approval levels.
Example:
For example, if your business model requires initial approval is to be obtained from the sales manager before requesting approval from the VP of Sales, then you could set the Level value or the manager approver group to 1, and the Level value for the VP approver group to 2.
In this model, Mobileforce CPQ will not send an approval notification to the VP of Sales until the sales manager has approved the quote.
By default, this value is set to 0. If you do not require additional approval for this approver group, do not change the value.
Approvers options
The Approvers section allows you to specify who can approve a quote. Approvers can be individual users (specified through email addresses) or through roles.
Approvers are classified in two groups:
- Notified Approvers: Mobileforce CPQ sends email messages to these approvers informing them of the quote to be approved.
- Additional Approvers: Mobileforce CPQ does not send email messages to these approvers. This feature allows you to specify users who can approve requests on a contingency basis. (For example, a C-level executive who can approve a quote when the VP of Sales is unavailable).
Mobileforce allows you to specify approvers using three methods:
- User Emails: Specify the user(s) who can approve the quote in a comma separated list of email addresses.
- User Roles: Specify the Mobileforce CPQ role(s) who can approve the quote. Please note that all users with this role (currently or in the future) are granted this authority.
- Dynamic Expression: Enter a form expression that returns a comma separated list of email addresses who can approve the quote.
Access Control options
Specify the following options:
Active: Specify whether the group is currently active. By default, the setting is set to Yes. To deactivate the group, the setting should be set to No.
Editing Groups
To edit a group, from the Approver Groups page, click the button for the desired group, where you can then modify the options.
Note
Additionally, you can:
- Click the button to copy an existing group, and then click the button to modify it.
- Click the button to delete an existing group.
Activating and Deactivating Approver Groups
You can easily activate and deactivate approver groups from the Approver Groups page.
- Click the
button to deactivate an active group. - Click the button to activate an inactive group.
button to deactivate an active group.Note:
By default the Approver Groups page does not display inactive groups. Click Show Inactive to list all groups, regardless of status.
Designing Approver Groups
When designing Approver Groups, admins must not only mirror the approval structure of their organization, but also consider how this structure is to be used in the Approval Rules for Quote Templates, Product listings, or both.
Example:
An organization can require approval levels for specific products, such as a construction equipment company requiring legal approval to sell commercial vehicles to a residential customer. In this case, the admins would create an Approver Group for the legal department and design approval rules for the applicable products.
Another organization may give their sales team freedom to provide percentage discounts, but increased discounts require higher levels of approval. In this case, the admins would create Approver Groups for Managers, VPs, and CEO, and design approval rules for the quote template.
Product Listings
Admins should configure Approval Rules for a Product when their organization requires specific or unique approval for one or just a few products. These rules are specified on the Approval tab of the Product screen. For more information, see Products
Quote Templates
Admins configure Approval Rules for a Quote Template to mirror their organizational approval requirements for all proposals or all proposals that use a specific quote template.
Unique approval requirements could indicate to an Admin that creation of multiple quote templates is required.
Example:
A company many have approval requirements for quotes for commercial customers that are different than for their residential customers. Admins could create a specifc Quote Template for commercial customers, and then design the rules for them.
Was this article helpful?
