Set up approvals for payroll

Summary

Use this article to learn more about the Payroll Approvals feature, where admins can request to have payroll be approved by another admin before submitting.

Solution

If more than one admin helps with payroll, the Payroll Approvals feature can help. When it’s turned on, one admin can ask another to approve a regular payroll before it’s sent.

Payroll approvals are only available for regular payrolls—we do not support them for other payrolls types (e.g., off-cycle, bonus, etc).

The admin who needs to approve it will see a task on their Home page and can choose to approve or decline.

This feature is free and works with all Gusto plans.

Turn on payroll approvals

How you turn on payroll approvals for regular payrolls depends on your company's Gusto plan type. If you choose to use payroll approvals, it will automatically disable Payroll on AutoPilot® for the payroll (if in use).

Available to all plan types

Sign in to Gusto.
Click the Pay section.
At the top of the page, click Settings.
Go to the "Approvals" section and click Edit next to "Payrolls need approval".
Click Yes and select Save.
- If your company has multiple full access admins, select a primary approver from the dropdown and click Save.
  - This is the team member responsible for approving and submitting payrolls, but all admins with full access can approve and submit payroll.
Admins can now request approval before submitting a regular payroll.
- We do not support payroll approvals for other payrolls types (e.g., off-cycle, bonus, etc).

Available to only Plus/Premium

You can turn on payroll approvals through editing an employee’s role permissions.

Sign in to Gusto.
At the top right of your profile, click your name.
Click the Settings section.
Select the Permissions tab.
Click the employee's name and role under the "Role" column.
Click Edit in the "Role definition" section.
Update access to Limited and click Save.
Click Edit in the "Pay" section.
Under "Run payroll", select Edit access.
Click Save.

You can also turn on payroll approvals by adding a role in "Permissions".

Sign in to Gusto.
At the top right of your profile, click your name.
Click the Settings section.
Select the Permissions tab.
Click Add role and follow the steps.
Approvals will be turned on for regular payroll once you grant an individual payroll edit access.
- If your company has multiple full access admins, your primary admin will automatically be assigned as the primary approver.

Assign edit-only payroll permissions to an employee (Plus/Premium plan customers only)

After payroll approvals are turned on, edit-only permissions can be assigned to employees in one of two ways. Limited admins can also have edit-only permissions.

Assign edit-only payroll approval permissions to an employee (option one)

Sign in to Gusto.
At the top right of your profile, click your name.
Click the Settings section.
Select the Permissions tab.
Select the employee.
Click Edit in the "Pay" box.
Under "Run Payroll", select Edit access.
Click Save.

Assign edit-only payroll approval permissions to an employee (option two)

Sign in to Gusto.
Click the Pay section.
At the top of the page, click Settings.
Find the "Approvals" section and click Manage.

Functionalities by permission type

Use the table below to learn more about what actions a user can take depending on their permission level.

Functionality	Description	Users with ability
Enable or disable payroll approvals from Pay settings	Turn payroll approvals on or off on the Pay settings page.	Full access admins
Edit payroll	Prepare and edit a payroll.	Full access admins Limited access admins with edit-access payroll permissions
Request payroll approval	Request approval for payroll. Requesting approval will “lock” the payroll in its current state and does not allow further edits until it's approved or rejected.	Full access admins Limited access admins with edit-access payroll permissions
Submit payroll	Submit a finalized payroll.	Full access admins
Approve or reject a payroll approval request	Approve or reject a payroll approval request.	Full access admins
Receive the "Review request" to-do notification	Receive a to-do notification to review a payroll once an approval request is submitted.	Full access admins
Receive the "Update payroll" to-do notification	Receive a to-do notification to update a payroll if their request was rejected.	Full access admins Limited access admins with edit-access payroll permissions
Complete and approve tasks from our Assurance Team	Complete Assurance tasks when presented, such as connecting Plaid, submitting wires, and choosing which company bank account payroll funds will be pulled from.	Full access admins
Submit Assurance task selection for approval	Make a selection for full access admins to approve, such as expediting wires when a payroll is late, and choosing which company bank account payroll funds will be pulled from.	Full access admins Limited access admins with edit-access payroll permissions
View the payroll activity log	View the payroll activity log from the Pay history page. Full access/limited access admins with full-access to payroll permissions can also view the activity log from the payroll approval flow.	Full access admins Limited access admins with full-access payroll permissions Limited access admins with edit-access payroll permissions

Run payroll: Request to have a payroll approved

Once approvals are turned on, admins with edit payroll access or full payroll access can request a regular payroll to be approved before submitting.

Sign in to Gusto.
Click the Pay section and select Run payroll.
Find the correct pay period and click Run payroll.
Edit the columns and data in the spreadsheet as needed.
When everything looks good, click Review summary.
Review the withdrawal amount and payroll summary.
Click Request approval.
- Admins with full payroll access will receive an email to approve the request.
The payroll will no longer be editable while an approval request is active. If you need to make any changes, click Cancel this request.
- Admins with full payroll access will receive an email that the request has been canceled.

Run payroll: Review a payroll approval request

Admins with full payroll access can approve or decline a payroll approval request. They can also make edits, which takes them through the usual payroll flow.

There are two ways to access the approval request:
- Click Let’s do it from the email notification.
- Click the Pay section and select Run payroll—find the payroll labeled "This payroll needs to be reviewed".
Review the payroll summary and click Submit payroll, Edit payroll, or Decline request.
- If you submitted payroll or declined the request, the admin who requested the approval will receive an email and a to-do notification on their Home page to update the payroll.

Payroll approvals in the Payroll activity log

The following events related to payroll approvals will be recorded:

Turned payroll approvals on/off
Gave <employee> edit access (Plus/Premium customers only) / full access / no access to payroll
Requested payroll approval
Canceled approval request
Declined approval request
Submitted payroll

There are two ways to view the Payroll activity log:

Click the Pay section and select Pay history. Then, click Payroll activity log from the top-right corner.
In the payroll approval request, click See the activity log in the top-right corner.

Turn off payroll approvals

There are a few ways to turn on payroll approvals, depending on your company's Gusto plan type.

Available to all plan types

Sign in to Gusto.
Click the Pay section.
At the top of the page, click Settings.
Go to the "Approvals" section and click Edit next to "Payrolls need approval".
Click No and select Save
- If there are unresolved approval requests, you'll need to cancel them before payroll approvals can be turned off.
- (Plus/Premium customers) If ther's at least one edit access admin, you'll need to change their permission to No access or Full access before you can turn off approvals.

Available to only Plus/Premium

Sign in to Gusto.
At the top right of your profile, click your name.
Click the Settings section.
Select the Permissions tab.
Click the employee's name with edit access and select Edit in the "Payroll" box.
Approvals will be turned off for this user once you change their payroll access to No access.
- To turn it off completely, you must still turn approvals off in Pay settings (the way listed above).

FAQs

Q: What should the approver do if they're going out of the country and cannot run payroll?

A: There are a few ways an admin can handle this:

The admin can turn off the approvals feature before they leave. All admins will then be able to submit payrolls while they're gone. Upon returning, the admin can turn the approvals feature back on.
The admin can assign someone else a full access role or full access payroll permissions. This admin will then be able to approve and submit payrolls while they're gone. Upon returning, the admin can update the role and permissions back to what they were before.
The admin can have everyone on the team in a full access role with full access payroll permissions, and train their team to submit payroll approval requests.
- This requires no change in roles/permissions when the admin leaves.

Q: If I turn on payroll approvals, will Payroll on AutoPilot® still automatically submit payroll for me?

A: No. If you turn on payroll approvals, it will automatically disable Payroll on AutoPilot® for the payroll (if in use).

Q: Can I use payroll approvals for all payroll types?

A: No. For now, they're only supported on regular payrolls. We do not support payroll approvals for other payrolls types (e.g., off-cycle, bonus, etc).

Keywords: payroll approvals request a payroll approval