Paper-based approval had real virtues that are easy to overlook when replacing it. The document, the notes written on it and the signature all travelled together, and anybody holding it could see the whole story. A paperless system that stores an image and records a click has replaced the least important of those three, and teams notice the loss within weeks.
The document, visible at the moment of decision
An approver looking at a summary line is approving a number. The invoice itself should be one click away and ideally on the same screen, along with the purchase order and the match result. This is not a nicety: it is the difference between an approval that means something and one that is a formality performed at speed.
The annotations, as structured notes
Paper carried scribbles: query raised, checked with the site, price agreed with the supplier. Those notes are genuinely useful and they should become structured comments on the record rather than marks on an image. Structured means searchable, reportable and attributable, which is more than the scribble ever was.
The signature, as an attributable act
A recorded approval with a name, a timestamp and the value approved, held outside anybody's personal mailbox. This is where paperless is unambiguously better, provided the record lives in the organisation's system. An approval by email reply reproduces paper's weakest property, which was that the evidence lived wherever the document happened to end up.
Questions people ask about paperless invoice approval system
Do we still need to keep paper originals?
According to your retention policy and until you are confident the digital copy is complete. Decide it as policy rather than case by case.
Is an electronic approval as good as a signature?
For internal authorisation purposes most organisations treat a recorded, attributable approval as equivalent or better, since it carries a timestamp and cannot be backdated as easily.
What about approvers who prefer paper?
Usually the objection is to a poor screen rather than to the medium. Showing the invoice itself alongside the decision resolves most of it.