Reviewing & Approving Expense Reports

Once a volunteer submits an expense report (see Expense Reports), a treasurer or other officer approves or rejects it in BeeKeeper. This article covers that review, approval, and payment workflow.

Viewing Pending Reports

1. Go to Expense Reports to see all submitted reports
2. Click the Status column header to sort, grouping reports at the same stage together
3. Review reports awaiting action

A submitted report sits at one of three stages before you approve or reject it:

You never set these by hand — a report moves to In Review the moment you request a review, and to Reviewed once that review closes. If your organization doesn’t use Electronic Sign-Off, every report simply stays Pending until you approve or reject it.

If your organization uses Team Edition and a report is charged to a team with its own contacts, it shows as waiting on that team first - before it ever reaches this list as something for you to decide. See Team Approval below.

Reviewing a Report

For each report, verify:

• [ ] Reporter information is complete
• [ ] Each expense has a receipt
• [ ] Receipts are readable and match amounts — the AI Receipt Verification badges can help (see Expense Reports)
• [ ] Expenses are appropriate for the organization
• [ ] Total is within budget/policy limits

If your bylaws call for a second person to sign off before a report is paid, see Sending a Report for Board Sign-Off below — you can request that review before or after you approve.

Approving a Report

Submitters now say how they’d like to be paid when they submit their report (Check to pick up, Check mailed, an electronic payment through whichever service your organization uses, or Direct Payment to Vendor) — see Expense Reports. Your organization decides which of these it offers, and which electronic service to name, under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods. When you open Approve, BeeKeeper pre-selects the option matching their request, so most of the time all you need to do is confirm it. You can still change it to anything your organization offers - the submitter’s choice is a request, not the final word.

If everything looks good:

1. Open the report
2. Click Approve
3. Confirm or change how you’d like to handle payment:
   • Approve only: Marks the report approved without creating a check or journal entry; you’ll record payment separately
   • Write a check: BeeKeeper creates a journal entry recording the payment from a selected account, and you can enter your own check number
   • Print a check: BeeKeeper creates the journal entry and queues a check for printing from the selected account - the check number is assigned automatically when you print it (only available for accounts with check printing enabled)
   • Pay with your P2P service (labeled Zelle, PayPal, Venmo, or Cash App, whichever your organization has chosen): BeeKeeper creates the same balanced journal entry as writing a check, and records the confirmation number you enter as the entry’s reference - shown in your register as, for example, “Venmo 123456” so it’s never confused with a check number. This option only appears once an admin has turned on P2P Payment Platform under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods - it’s off by default for every organization.
4. The submitter is notified via email

If a report requested Direct Payment to Vendor, the check and journal entry are made out to the vendor’s name and mailing address instead of the submitter’s - it isn’t a reimbursement, it’s the organization paying the merchant directly. This option only appears if an admin has turned on Direct Payment to Vendor under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods, and a report using it can only include a single receipt.

You can approve or reject a report at any of the three stages — Pending, In Review, or Reviewed — as long as the Approve button isn’t grayed out for the reason below.

If the Approve Button Is Grayed Out

If your organization uses Electronic Sign-Off and a board review is still open — or a reviewer rejected the report — the Approve button is disabled with a tooltip explaining why. This stops a report from being paid out from under an in-progress or failed sign-off. Once the review is resolved (or withdrawn), the button becomes available again.

Team Approval (Team Edition)

If your organization uses Team Edition and a report is charged to a team that has at least one contact, that contact sees it first - on their own team page, with two buttons: Yes, this is ours or Not ours. Saying yes sends the report straight on to you, in your normal queue. Saying no ends the report the same way one of your own rejections would, with their reason carried to the submitter - “not ours” is an answer, not a stall.

Either way, it’s never the payment decision - a contact confirming a report just means it reaches you; you still approve, reject, and decide how it’s paid exactly as you would any other report. If a team has nobody set up to answer for it, this step is skipped automatically and the report comes straight to you, same as always.

If a report is stuck waiting on a contact who hasn’t responded, an admin can push it through from the report’s Actions menu rather than leaving a volunteer’s reimbursement stuck on one unresponsive coach. The override is recorded in the Activity Log.

See Team Edition for how to add contacts to a team.

Rejecting a Report

If there are issues:

1. Open the report
2. Click Reject
3. Provide clear explanation:
   • What’s missing?
   • What needs correction?
   • Can they resubmit?
4. The submitter is notified

Undoing a Decision

Approved something too early, for the wrong amount, or by mistake? An approval or a rejection can be taken back, as long as the money hasn’t really moved yet.

1. Open the expense report
2. Scroll to the Actions section and click Undo Decision
3. Confirm

The report goes back to your queue exactly as it was before you decided — Pending, or In Review or Reviewed if you’d also sent it out for board sign-off. You can then approve or reject it again.

Undoing an approval also deletes what that approval created: the journal entry, and any check still sitting in the print queue. That’s the point — it’s a clean reversal, not an adjustment on top of the original.

A few things worth knowing:

• The submitter is not notified. They see the report’s status change on their tracking page, but no email goes out. They’ll hear from BeeKeeper again when you make your next decision.
• Undoing a rejection works the same way, and there’s nothing to delete — a rejection never created a transaction, only a status and a reason.
• Only admins see the button. Editors can approve and reject, but undoing a decision is limited to admins.
• Everything is recorded. The undo appears in the report’s Activity Log, so the history shows what happened rather than hiding it.

When Undo Isn’t Available

Once the payment has actually settled somewhere, undoing would leave your books inconsistent, so BeeKeeper stops offering it and tells you why instead:

Why You Can’t Just Delete the Transaction

A transaction BeeKeeper created from an approved expense report can’t be deleted or voided from the account register on its own — the three-dot menu on that row won’t offer Delete. That’s deliberate: removing the transaction by itself would leave the expense report saying it had been paid with nothing in your books to match it. Undo Decision removes the two together, which is why it lives on the report rather than in the register.

Example: Paying a Vendor in Two Installments

A common reason to undo: you approve a report for a vendor’s full invoice, but you’re only paying half now and half after the event.

Approving the report records the whole invoice as though it had already been paid, while your bank feed brings in only the deposit you actually sent — so the same expense lands in your books twice, at two different amounts.

The fix is to undo the approval and let the bank feed do the work:

1. Undo Decision on the report, which removes the full-amount transaction
2. Leave the bank feed’s deposit transaction alone and categorize it to the right expense account
3. When you pay the balance later, categorize that payment the same way
4. The two payments add up to the invoice, and each one is dated when it actually happened

Leave the report sitting in your queue until the event is settled. One caution: don’t re-approve that same report while the bank feed is also bringing in the payments, or the full amount gets recorded a second time on top of the installments. If you do want the report marked approved for your records, use Approve only, which marks it approved without creating another transaction.

Processing Payment

After approval:

1. If you used the write-check, print-check, or electronic payment option during approval, the journal entry is already created - and, for a printed check, it’s waiting in the account’s check print queue
2. Otherwise, write a check or initiate payment manually
3. Record the journal entry in BeeKeeper if not auto-created

Finding the Receipts Later

That transaction is already backed by the receipts the submitter uploaded - you don’t need to save or re-attach anything. Anywhere you look at the transaction, you’ll find a View Receipts link straight to the expense report:

• In the account register, the row shows a green receipt icon in the Attachment column instead of the usual upload prompt
• Opening the transaction’s details shows a View Receipts button
• Editing the transaction shows the same View Receipts link

Clicking any of these takes you to the expense report, where every receipt the submitter uploaded is shown - including any added after the report was paid. It’s a link rather than a copy, so it’s always the current, complete set. If you’d already attached your own file to one of these transactions by hand, that’s untouched; you’ll see both it and the receipts link together.

Sending a Report for Board Sign-Off

If your bylaws require a second (or third) person to formally sign off on a reimbursement before it’s paid, use Electronic Sign-Off:

1. Open the expense report
2. Scroll to the Sign-Off section and click Request Review
3. Pick who should review it and whether everyone needs to agree or any set number is enough
4. Click Send

Each reviewer gets an emailed link and answers Sign Off, Reject, or Abstain — no BeeKeeper account needed. While that review is open, or if it comes back rejected, the Approve button stays disabled. Once it’s signed off, the reviewers’ names print right on the expense report PDF in place of a blank signature line.

The report’s status follows along on its own: it reads In Review while your reviewers are deciding, and Reviewed once the round closes — however it closed. Withdrawing the request puts the report back to Pending, since nothing was actually decided.

See Electronic Sign-Off for the full walkthrough, including how to resend a link, withdraw a request, and what happens if something on the report changes mid-review.

Sign-Off is on by default; an admin can turn it off under Settings > Update Settings > Advanced Options.

Activity Log

Need to leave a note for your board, or flag something about a submission without emailing the person who submitted it? Every expense report has an Activity Log near the bottom of the page - a single timeline of everything that’s happened to the report (submitted, approved, rejected, edited, reviewed) merged with your team’s discussion about it:

1. Open the expense report
2. Scroll to Activity Log and type your comment
3. Click Comment

Comments in the Activity Log:

• Are never emailed or shown to the submitter - they’re for your team’s (and any reviewers’) eyes only
• Show who wrote each comment and when
• Can be deleted by the person who wrote them (look for the delete option on your own comments)
• Update instantly for anyone else viewing the report at the same time

Use them to record things like “Called the vendor to confirm this receipt” or “Board approved this at the March meeting” without cluttering the submitter-facing status and emails.

Email Notifications

BeeKeeper sends automatic email notifications:

• On submission: Confirmation to the submitter with report details
• On approval: Notification to the submitter that their report was approved
• On rejection: Notification with the reason for rejection

Sending a report out for board sign-off does not email the submitter — the In Review and Reviewed stages show on their status page, but they only hear from BeeKeeper when you approve or reject. Undoing a decision doesn’t email them either. Activity Log comments are never included in these emails.

Tips for Treasurers

• Process timely: Volunteers shouldn’t wait weeks for reimbursement
• Be consistent: Apply the same standards to everyone
• Communicate: If rejecting, explain clearly how to fix
• Track patterns: Notice if certain areas overspend budget
• Use the Activity Log: Keep a running record of anything worth remembering about a report, without emailing the submitter

Tips for Organizations

Set Clear Policies

Document and share:

• What expenses are reimbursable
• Maximum amounts or limits
• Required documentation
• Submission deadlines
• Approval process

Train Volunteers

At the start of the year:

• Show how to submit reports
• Explain receipt requirements
• Share the submission URL
• Designate who to contact with questions

Budget for Accuracy

When creating budgets:

• Anticipate reimbursable expenses
• Don’t assume volunteers will donate costs
• Include realistic estimates

Limitations

• No batch approval (each report reviewed individually)
• Undoing a decision is available to admins only, and only while the payment hasn’t been printed, reconciled, voided, or closed into a past fiscal year
• Activity Log comments can only be deleted by the person who wrote them
• Direct Payment to Vendor reports are limited to one receipt
• An organization must always offer at least one payment method to submitters - it can’t turn every option off

Common Questions

What’s the difference between Pending, In Review, and Reviewed? Pending means the report is waiting on you. In Review means you’ve sent it to board members for sign-off and they haven’t all answered. Reviewed means that round is finished and the report is back in your hands. If you don’t use Electronic Sign-Off, you’ll only ever see Pending.

A report I sent for review says “Reviewed” but the Approve button is still grayed out. Why? Reviewed only means the round finished — it doesn’t say what your reviewers decided. If one of them rejected the report, the Approve button stays disabled so it can’t be paid over their objection. Hover the button to see the reason, and check the Sign-Off section for who said what.

I approved a report by mistake. Can I take it back? Yes — open the report, scroll to Actions, and click Undo Decision. The transaction it created is deleted and the report returns to your queue so you can approve or reject it again. See Undoing a Decision for when this isn’t available.

There’s no Delete option on a transaction in my register. Why not? If BeeKeeper created that transaction from an approved expense report, it can’t be deleted or voided on its own — that would leave the report claiming it had been paid with nothing to back it up. Open the expense report instead and use Undo Decision, which removes both together.

Does undoing a decision email the person who submitted the report? No. They’ll see the status change on their tracking page, but BeeKeeper only emails them when you approve or reject.

Will the submitter see the comments in the Activity Log? No. Comments are only visible to your team and any reviewers inside BeeKeeper - they’re never emailed and never shown on the submitter-facing status page.

Can I delete someone else’s comment? No, only the person who wrote a comment can delete it.

Can members get reimbursed electronically? Yes. Turn on P2P Payment Platform under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods and pick which service your organization actually pays through - Zelle, PayPal, Venmo, or Cash App (Zelle is the default). It’s off by default for every organization. Once it’s on, submitters can request it as their payment method, and you’ll see it pre-selected under that service’s name when you approve - just confirm and enter the confirmation number from your bank.

Can I turn off check pickup or mailed checks as something submitters can request? Yes - uncheck Check (Pick up) or Check (Mailed) under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods. You’ll always need to leave at least one payment method checked, so a submitter always has a way to ask to be paid. This only changes what submitters can request - you can still write or print a check at approval time either way.

What is Direct Payment to Vendor, and why does the check say the vendor’s name instead of the submitter’s? It’s for expenses where your organization is paying a merchant directly rather than reimbursing a volunteer - for example, an order a volunteer placed on the organization’s behalf. Because it isn’t a reimbursement, the journal entry and check are made out to the vendor, not the person who submitted the report. Turn it on under Settings > Update Settings > Expense Report Payment Methods; a report using it is capped at one receipt.

A report from before this shipped doesn’t show a payment method - is anything wrong? No. Reports submitted before payment method requests existed simply show “not specified.” Nothing was lost, and you can review, approve, and pay them exactly as before.

Are there spending limits? BeeKeeper doesn’t enforce spending limits - that’s set by your organization’s own policy. Treasurers should check submissions against that policy before approving.

A report shows it’s waiting on a team - what do I do? Nothing yet - it’s waiting on one of that team’s own contacts to say Yes, this is ours, which happens automatically if your organization uses Team Edition and the report was charged to a team with contacts. Once they answer (or if the team has nobody set up to answer), it lands in your queue like any other report. If it’s stuck, an admin can override it from the report’s Actions menu. See Team Edition.

Why is the Approve button disabled? Either a board review requested through Electronic Sign-Off is still open, or a reviewer rejected the report. Hover the button to see which. Withdraw or resolve the review to unlock it — see Electronic Sign-Off.

The transaction for a paid expense report shows an upload icon instead of a receipt link - why? Two things both have to be true for the receipts link to show up: the transaction needs to be tied to an expense report, and that report needs at least one receipt attached to one of its line items. You’ll see the upload icon instead of the link if either one isn’t the case. Most often that’s because the report was paid a different way (for example, it was marked Approve only and the payment recorded separately, so there’s no expense report tied to that transaction) - but it also happens, entirely normally, when the linked report simply doesn’t have any receipts on its line items yet, which is common for a report a treasurer keyed in by hand for a paper reimbursement request, or an older report from before every line required a receipt. In that case, just open the expense report and attach the receipt there, or attach a file straight to the transaction instead - either one works. If a report does have receipts on its line items and was paid with Write a check, Print a check, or an electronic payment, but its transaction still shows the upload icon, let support know the report number.