Diagrammed, the AP approval process looks like a sequence of quick steps. Measured, it is minutes of work inside days of elapsed time, and nearly all of the difference is an invoice sitting somewhere it cannot progress. Three configuration choices address that directly, and none of them requires changing who is allowed to approve what.
Route to a person, first time
By cost centre and value, to a named individual rather than a group. Group ownership produces items everybody can see and nobody actions. Where a group is genuinely correct, assign one owner anyway and allow reassignment, because an item with a name against it gets progressed and an item without one waits.
Cover absence automatically
Delegation triggered by declared leave, plus a fallback after a fixed period regardless. Manual delegation is forgotten exactly when it is needed, because unplanned absence is unplanned. This single setting usually removes most of the long tail, and the long tail is what suppliers experience and remember.
Escalate rather than remind
A reminder repeating into the same silent inbox produces more silence. Escalation to a named alternative after a defined period makes elapsed time predictable, which is what lets you tell a supplier a date and keep to it. Configure the period deliberately rather than accepting a default nobody chose.
Questions people ask about ap approval process
Does this weaken the control?
No. The same people approve the same things; the difference is that the item reaches somebody who can decide rather than waiting on somebody who cannot.
How do we choose the escalation period?
From your payment terms working backwards. If terms are thirty days, an item waiting a week has already used a quarter of the available time.
What if the escalation target is also away?
Chain it to a default owner. An item that escalates into another empty queue has not escalated.