Workflow & Approval Automation

The problem

The F&O workflow engine is solid at what it was designed to do: route a document through a configured sequence of approval steps. What it does not do well is cope with the messy reality of people.

An approver goes on leave and forgets to set a delegate, so twelve purchase requisitions sit untouched for a fortnight. A requisition escalates on a timer that was configured once, three years ago, against an org chart that has since been reorganised twice. Delegation in standard F&O is set per user per workflow scope, so a finance manager covering two colleagues has to configure it by hand and remember to remove it. Nobody can answer the question "where is my requisition and who is sitting on it" without opening the workflow history on the individual record. And an approver on a factory floor or in an airport has to log into the full client to approve a single expense line.

The result is a workflow configuration that is technically correct and operationally slow. Documents age, month-end waits on three people, and the workflow itself becomes the bottleneck it was meant to remove.

What ECOSIRE builds

We build a workflow augmentation layer as an X++ extension package for Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management. It sits on top of the standard workflow engine — we do not replace it, and we do not overlayer it. Your existing workflow configurations keep working; this adds the routing intelligence, timers, and visibility around them.

Rule-based delegation

Instead of per-user, per-scope delegation set by hand, we build a delegation rule table: delegate by originator, by legal entity, by workflow type, by document amount band, by financial dimension, or by any combination you need. Rules carry effective from and to dates, so a delegation set for a two-week absence expires on its own. Chained delegation is handled with a configurable depth limit and loop detection, so a delegate-of-a-delegate cannot route a document in a circle.

Out-of-office routing

An out-of-office register captures planned absence per user. When a work item is assigned to someone marked out of office, the layer reassigns it immediately according to the delegation rules rather than letting it queue until they return. Where you want the absent approver to still see what happened while they were away, a catch-up view lists everything routed around them.

Escalation timers

Escalation is driven by an aging engine running as a recurring batch job. Each workflow type and step gets its own timer configuration: warning notification after N hours, escalation to a named role or position after M hours, with hours measured against a working calendar so a Friday afternoon submission does not escalate over the weekend. Escalation targets can be a specific user, a position in the org hierarchy, a role, or the next level up the reporting structure.

Mobile approvals

Approvers get a mobile approval surface delivered through the Power Platform — a canvas app talking to F&O over data entities and OData, with the approval action routed back through the standard workflow API so the audit trail is identical to an approval performed in the client. The approver sees the document header, the lines that matter, the ledger dimensions the amount will hit, attachments, and the workflow history, then approves, rejects, requests change, or delegates. Push notification and email routing are configurable per user.

Workflow analytics

Every work item transition is recorded into an analytics table: assigned to whom, when, how long it sat, whether it escalated, whether it was delegated, and how it was finally resolved. That data is exposed as data entities and surfaced in a workspace and in Power BI. You get cycle time by workflow type, by approver, and by legal entity; a live aging view of everything currently open; bottleneck identification showing which step and which approver accumulate the most waiting time; and an escalation frequency report that tells you where your timers are wrong.

Administration and governance

Delegation rules, out-of-office entries, and timer configurations are all maintained in F&O forms with standard security. Every automated reassignment and escalation writes an audit row explaining which rule fired and why. Security is delivered as duties and privileges layered onto standard role-based security, so a user who can maintain delegation rules for their own team cannot silently reroute another division's approvals.

Who this is for

Organisations running F&O with workflow across multiple legal entities and a real approval population — purchase requisitions, purchase orders, vendor invoices, expense reports, journals, and free text invoices all routing through people who travel, take leave, and change roles. It suits finance and procurement leaders who can see that approvals are slow but cannot prove where the time goes.

It is a poor fit if you have a single legal entity, three approvers, and workflows that already complete same-day.

How delivery works

1. Scoping call. We walk through your live workflow configurations — which document types, which steps, who approves what, and where things actually stall. We agree which capabilities are in scope: delegation rules, out-of-office, escalation, mobile, analytics, or a subset. 2. Fixed quote. You receive a written scope covering the workflow types, rule dimensions, escalation model, mobile surface, and reporting, with a fixed price. 3. Build. We develop the X++ extension package against a sandbox on your F&O version, with the Power Platform components built against your tenant. 4. Install in test. The deployable package goes through your LCS pipeline into your sandbox. We configure your real delegation rules and timers, run your actual approvers through the mobile surface, and tune until the routing behaves the way your organisation works. 5. Production. After your sign-off in test, the same package is promoted through your LCS pipeline to production, with the delegation and timer configuration migrated. 6. Support. A support window from go-live covers defects, rule and timer tuning, and questions from your approver population.

Lead time is typically one working week from signed scope, depending on how many workflow types are in scope and whether the mobile surface is included.

What this is not

There is no pre-built package to download and no trial, because nothing exists ready-made. What exists is the engineering capability, a clear scope-to-quote process, and the delivery sequence above. Everything is built for your workflows, your org structure, and your F&O configuration.