People search for a Cognito Forms workflow when one submission needs to pass through several hands: reviewed, approved, sent back, then acted on. Whichever tool you use, the job is the same. This article answers one question: how do you route a form submission through review and approval steps so it never stalls with one person, and how do you build that routing on the levelpartner.ai platform, with the submission, the approvals and the client record in one place?
The job behind the search
An approval workflow takes a submission and moves it through a sequence of decisions. A discount request goes to a sales lead, then finance. A new supplier form goes to operations, then a director. A client's change request goes to the account owner, who approves or returns it.
The failure is almost always the same. A submission reaches someone who is busy or away, and it sits. Nobody else knows it is waiting. The person who submitted it chases by email, and the process quietly turns into a series of reminders.
What to check when choosing a tool for this
Whether you use a standalone form tool, a separate automation service or the platform, ask the same questions.
- Where does the submission live while it waits? If it is only in an email, nobody else can see its status.
- Can a step be reassigned when the approver is away?
- Does a waiting step chase the approver on its own, and escalate after a set time?
- Is the final decision written back to the client or project record, or does someone copy it across?
- How many separate tools does the chain touch? Every connection between two products is a place for it to break.
We do not describe other vendors' features here. Check their current documentation against this list.
Before you start
You need access to Sites, Automation and Opportunities. Draw the approval chain on paper first: who sees the submission, in what order, what each person can decide, and what happens on a rejection. Create a pipeline with one stage per approval step, plus "Approved" and "Returned". Make sure every approver is a user on the platform.
How to set it up
- Go to Sites, then Forms, and click + Create New Form.
- Add the fields each approver needs, including a request type choice.
- Save the form and submit one test request.
- Go to Automation, then Workflows, and click + Create Workflow.
- Choose Start from scratch.
- Click Add New Trigger and select Form Submitted.
- Under Form Is, pick the request form, then save the trigger.
- Add the Create Opportunity action with your approval Pipeline and first Pipeline Stage.
- Add the Assign to User action and select the first approver.
- Add Send Internal Notification, with To User Type set to the assigned user.
- Add a Wait step and choose The contact to take an action or Specific conditions.
- Switch on Timeout so stalled requests move on to a reminder.
- Repeat the assign, notify and wait steps for each later approval.
- Click Test Workflow, pick a test contact and click Run Test.
- Turn the toggle to Publish, then click Save.
How approvers use it
Each approver sees a task with the request in it. They open the opportunity, read the details and move it to the next stage or to "Returned". Moving the card is the decision. The workflow notices the move and hands the request to the next person, so nobody forwards emails.
Because every request sits in one pipeline, the person who runs operations can see at a glance where things are stuck. A column with eight cards in "Finance review" is a conversation to have this week, not a surprise next month.
Say discounts above a set level need a sales lead and then finance to sign off, and about 25 requests arrive each month. If a typical request currently waits six working days in inboxes, most of that time is idle. Give each step its own pipeline stage, a two-day timeout and a deputy to reassign to, and the worst case becomes roughly four days: two per approver before the timeout moves it on.
The running cost is small. Each approver spends the same time deciding as before. What disappears is the chasing, which in most firms is a few hours a week spread across several people.
Building every possible branch on day one. Approval chains grow exceptions faster than anyone can test them. Start with the common path and one rejection route, run it for a month, then add only the exceptions that actually happened.
When not to build an approval workflow
If one person can make the decision, do not invent a chain. A single assignment with a due date is enough. If the request is routine and the answer is always yes, skip approval entirely and let the workflow act. For confirmations of work already done, rather than requests waiting for a decision, procedure forms for internal processes are the better fit.
To make sure each answer the approvers need is stored properly, see building your first form and mapping its fields. If the request includes a third-party document, collecting and tracking required PDFs shows how to attach it. And for client enquiries that need routing rather than approval, read what to ask on an enquiry form.
Troubleshooting
The workflow does not move to the next approver. The wait step is watching the wrong stage. Check it waits for the opportunity to leave the current approval stage.
Approvers miss their tasks. Task notifications are switched off in their profile. Ask each approver to turn on notifications, or add an SMS or email step alongside the task.
Rejected requests disappear. There is no route for the "Returned" stage. Add a branch that notifies the submitter and asks for the missing information.
Two opportunities appear for one request. The submitter sent the form twice. Add a check for an existing open request from the same contact before creating a new one.
Frequently asked questions
Does the platform connect to Cognito Forms?
We do not list integrations we cannot confirm. Check the App Marketplace in your account for current connections, or rebuild the form in Sites so the whole chain runs in one place.
Can an approver approve from a phone?
Yes, as long as they can sign in on their phone. Moving the opportunity to the next stage is the approval, and that works on a small screen.
How many approval steps should a chain have?
As few as the decision needs. Two is common. More than three usually means a policy should be simplified rather than automated.
Can I see how long each step takes?
Yes. Add a workflow step at each stage that writes the date to a custom field, then compare the dates to see where requests wait longest.