Please note: The approval module is available starting from the Advanced plan. To have hours approved by customers, the Customer Portal Add-on is required.
How does approval work in TimeChimp?
Once an employee has submitted their hours, the person responsible (with the appropriate permissions) receives an email notification. These registrations are then ready to be processed.
Step-by-step: Approving or Rejecting Hours
Go to Reports (Overzichten).
Use the filters to set the status to 'Submitted' (Aangeboden).
Select the desired time registrations.
Click the Actions button.
Choose Approve or Reject.
Optional: Add a comment. If rejected, this comment is sent directly to the employee.
Save time with saved views
Apply a filter for the status 'Submitted' and enter your desired date range, then click Save View. Give the view a name, such as "Hours to Approve."
From now on, you can see all submitted hours with a single click without having to re-apply filters every time.
External Approval Workflow (via Customer Portal)
The options for an external approval workflow are as follows:
Internal - External: The manager approves the hours first, after which they are sent to the customer for approval.
External - Internal: The customer approves the hours first, followed by a final check by the manager.
External: Hours are only approved by the customer.
Submitting hours to a customer
Select the hours in the overview.
Click Actions and choose Submit to customer.
The customer's contact person will receive a unique link via email to approve the hours.
You can see whether the customer has agreed in the 'Customer Status' column in reports.
Tip: Group by customer view
To speed up the external approval process (as you must submit per customer), you can use the Group page.
Filter by status 'Submitted' and group by 'Customer'.
Save this view (e.g., "Submitted hours per customer").
You can now see exactly which hours are ready for each customer, allowing you to select and submit them efficiently.
Note: Don't see the status column? Check if you have 'Status' or 'Customer Status' toggled on under the Columns settings.
Information for your customer
If you want to explain to your customers exactly how they can view and approve hours, we have developed a specific article for them: "Working with the Customer Portal."
This article explains step-by-step how they can log in, view hours, and how to directly approve or reject hours within their own environment. You can send this link to your contact persons as an instruction manual.
Links to relevant articles: