Prioritising Approvers

[jkrholmes]

I have a simple flow where a response to a form in PowerApps is sent to approvers. It only requires one approval. However, I have 6 approvers in total, 3 of which are supposed to be used when the other 3 are off site. Is there a way to set it up so it is initially sent to the official 3 approvers and then sent to the other 3 if the first 3 do not respond in a given amount of time?

[v-xiaochen-msft]

Hi @jkrholmes ,

Unfortunately, the approval connector doesn't have the out of the box priority functionality.

Best Regards,

Wearsky

[ManishSolanki]

Hi @jkrholmes 

One possible solution is to first initiate the approval with 3 approvers and set the timeout of that action. Add another approval action for another set of approvers and configure it to run if previous approval action times outs. This way you could achieve what you are looking for.

If this helps & solves your problem, please remember to give a 👍 and accept my solution as it will help others in the future.

Thanks

[jkrholmes]

Could you provide more information as to how I would do that?

[ManishSolanki · Accepted solution]

Hi @jkrholmes 

You could set up the flow as explained below:

In the first approval, click ellipses (...) and select Settings from sub menu:

Scroll down to "Time out" settings and enter the time out value. Here I have set it to 2 mins for testing purpose but for days you could use P7D (ISO 8601 format).

PT2M

Pls modify the time out period as per your need.

Next, add parallel branches. The left branch will be executed when approved by first three approvers. In right branch, add another approval action and set another set of approvers. We will configure this action to run when previous approval action times out. Click ellipses (...) & choose 'Configure run after' from sub menu:

Uncheck default value and check only "has timed out" value. Click Done to save the changes:

Please add the required action in left and right branches as per the need. You could also merge the branches for subsequent common actions.

If this helps & solves your problem, please remember to give a 👍 and accept my solution as it will help others in the future.

Thanks

[jkrholmes]

Thanks for the detailed explanation. I have not had the chance to test it yet as the approvers are away but the flow seems satisfactory and I will update if the tests do not work.