Invoice approval workflow in billing management stuck at finance approver step after role reassignment

ERP Workday
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1

We recently reassigned finance approver roles due to organizational restructuring, and now invoice approval workflows are getting stuck at the finance approver step. The workflow shows “Awaiting Action” but the new finance approvers don’t see the approval tasks in their inbox.

Here’s what we changed: moved finance approval responsibility from the “Finance Managers” security group to a new “Finance Approvers - Billing” security group. We updated the user assignments and verified that the new approvers have the correct roles. However, invoices submitted after the change are not routing to them.

Interestingly, if I manually reassign a stuck task to one of the new approvers, they can see it and complete the approval. This suggests the security permissions are correct, but the automatic routing logic isn’t working. The business process definition for invoice approval still references the old “Finance Managers” group - could that be the issue? How do we update the workflow routing to use the new security group without disrupting in-flight approvals?

system 2

Let me provide a comprehensive solution that addresses business process routing, security group assignment, and workflow task reassignment:

1. Business Process Routing Update: The core issue is that your Invoice Approval business process still references the old security group. Here’s how to update it properly:

Navigate to Configure Business Process > Invoice Approval > Approval Steps

  • Locate the “Finance Approval” step
  • Click Edit on the step configuration
  • Under “Route To”, you’ll see it’s currently set to “Security Group: Finance Managers”
  • Change this to “Security Group: Finance Approvers - Billing”
  • Important: Before saving, scroll down to “Effective Date” and set it to tomorrow’s date

Setting a future effective date ensures the change only affects new workflows, not in-flight ones. This is critical for maintaining the integrity of currently running approvals.

2. Security Group Assignment Verification: Even though permissions look correct, verify these specific settings for the new “Finance Approvers - Billing” group:

Required Domain Permissions:

  • Billing Management: View and Modify
  • Invoice Management: View, Create, Edit, Approve
  • Workflow Tasks: View and Action

Required Business Object Access:

  • Customer Invoice: Full Access
  • Supplier Invoice: Full Access (if applicable)

Required Functional Area:

  • Financial Management > Billing > Approve Invoices

Also verify that all members of the new security group have these assignments active. Sometimes during reorganizations, individual user security assignments get missed.

3. Workflow Task Reassignment for In-Flight Approvals: For the 47 stuck invoices, use this approach:

Temporary Bridge Solution:

  • Add all members of “Finance Approvers - Billing” to the old “Finance Managers” group temporarily
  • This allows them to see and action the stuck tasks immediately
  • Process all 47 stuck invoices over the next few days
  • Once all in-flight workflows are complete, remove them from the old group

Alternative - Bulk Reassignment:

If you need immediate resolution:

  • Navigate to Workflow Tasks > Reassign Tasks
  • Filter for: Business Process = Invoice Approval, Status = Awaiting Action, Step = Finance Approval
  • Select all 47 tasks
  • Reassign from “Finance Managers” to “Finance Approvers - Billing”
  • This immediately moves all tasks to the new group

4. Validation and Testing: Before fully implementing:

a) Test in your sandbox environment:

  • Create a test invoice
  • Submit it through the approval workflow
  • Verify it routes to the new security group
  • Confirm the approver can see and action the task

b) Monitor the first few production workflows:

  • After the business process change goes live, watch the first 5-10 invoices closely
  • Verify routing is working as expected
  • Check that notification emails are being sent to the right people

5. Communication and Documentation: Notify your finance approvers about:

  • The change effective date
  • What they should see in their inbox
  • Who to contact if tasks don’t appear
  • Expected timeline for processing stuck workflows

Common Pitfall to Avoid: Don’t deactivate the old “Finance Managers” security group until you’ve confirmed:

  • All in-flight workflows are complete (check Workflow Status report)
  • New workflows are routing correctly for at least one week
  • No other business processes reference the old group

Run a report of all active workflows filtered by security group to ensure nothing else is using “Finance Managers” before deactivating it.

This phased approach minimizes risk and ensures business continuity while transitioning to the new security group structure.

This draft is based on general Workday knowledge. It has not been verified against your specific version and environment. Practitioners: verify the steps and share your experience below.

3

Yes, that’s definitely your problem. The business process routing rules are still pointing to the old security group. You need to update the Invoice Approval business process configuration to reference the new “Finance Approvers - Billing” group. However, be careful with in-flight workflows - any changes to the business process won’t affect workflows that are already running.

4

Before you update the business process, make sure your new security group has all the necessary permissions. The group needs not just the approval permissions, but also read access to billing data, access to the invoice business object, and the ability to view workflow tasks. Check the security group configuration and compare it with what the old Finance Managers group had. Missing permissions could cause tasks to be invisible even if routing is correct.

marycoder 5

Confirmed this resolves the stuck workflow — updating the ‘Route To’ security group in Configure Business Process > Invoice Approval > Finance Approval step immediately rerouted pending tasks.

7

I compared the security group permissions and they look identical. Both groups have the “Approve Invoices” permission and access to the billing management domain. The fact that manual reassignment works suggests permissions are fine. My main concern is about updating the business process - will that cause issues with the 47 invoices currently stuck in workflow? Should I manually reassign all of those before making the business process change?

8

You have two options for handling in-flight workflows. Option 1: Use the Workflow Task Reassignment utility to bulk reassign all stuck tasks to the new security group, then update the business process for future workflows. Option 2: Keep the old security group active temporarily, add the new approvers to it, process the stuck workflows, then switch the business process and deactivate the old group. Option 2 is cleaner and less risky. The key is not to deactivate the old security group until all workflows referencing it are complete.

9

Mark’s Option 2 is the best approach. I’d also recommend checking if you have any conditional routing rules in the business process that might be affected. Sometimes invoice approval workflows have conditional logic based on invoice amount or business unit that could complicate the security group transition.

10

Another thing to verify is the workflow step configuration itself. Sometimes the routing rule is defined at the step level rather than using the security group directly. Check if the finance approval step has a “Route to” configuration that specifies individual positions or roles instead of the security group. That would override the group assignment.