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Insight Supplier bills and approvals 7 min read

MYOB supplier invoice approval without MYOB Advanced

By Renzo Demartini, Chartered Accountant · · Last reviewed

Drafted with AI, reviewed and spot-checked by me.

A bill arrives. AccountRight has no approval step. Rules check it is not a duplicate. Rules compare it with the order. Held. A person decides whether to create it. Approved, it is created in MYOB through the API. AccountRight has no approval step, so the checking comes before MYOB.
The build behind this topicfrom A$3,900

Supplier Bill Approval

Duplicate checks and a record of who approved what, in MYOB and Xero.

  • MYOB
  • Xero
  • SharePoint
See MYOB supplier bill approval
Fixed price · AUD · No GSTA person approves

If you want MYOB supplier invoice approval on AccountRight or MYOB Business, you will find there is no approval step. A bill is entered, and then it sits in your payables.1

The short answer: the approval feature you may have read about belongs to MYOB Acumatica, formerly MYOB Advanced.4, 5 On AccountRight you do not have to change software. Hold each bill outside MYOB, check it for duplicates and against its order, and send only the flagged ones to a person.

Workflow · supplier bill → MYOBDemonstration

The order for Job 2102, in MYOB. Supplier A (sample) has a purchase order for Job 2102 at $1,640.00.

Bill 7752 waits outside MYOB. AccountRight has no “awaiting approval” status, so the bill is not created yet.

MYOB · Order, Job 2102Order

Supplier A (sample)

Purchase order for Job 2102

  • Supplies, Job 2102Purchase order$1,640.00
Total
$1,640.00

Waiting for its bill.

Inbox · Bill 7752PDF

Supplier A (sample)

Supplier invoice no 7752

  • Supplies, Job 2102Bill 7752$1,840.00
Total
$1,840.00

Not in MYOB yet.

Plain rules compare them. Supplier, invoice number and amount are checked against what is in MYOB, through its API.

Checked by the rules Order in MYOB

Checked by the rules Bill 7752

Supplier

Order in MYOB: Supplier A

Bill 7752: Supplier A

Job

Order in MYOB: Job 2102

Bill 7752: Job 2102

Amount

Order in MYOB: $1,640.00

Bill 7752: $1,840.00

  • Supplier matches the order
  • Bill is $200.00 above the order

A person decides. The bill is $200.00 above its order. You choose: query the supplier or create the bill. The rules only bring it to you.

Held bills · Bill 7752

Held: mismatch Queried, not createdApproved by a person

Create bill 7752 for $1,840.00 in MYOB?

Purchase order was $1,640.00. The bill is $200.00 higher.

Queried. Nothing is in payables.Approved. Created in MYOB. The supplier may have added freight, or it may be a mistake. The bill waits outside MYOB until you decide.A person judged the $200.00 difference. Only now is the bill in payables, ready for whoever has the right to pay it.

MYOB · BillsSupplier A

Supplier A (sample)

  • Bill 7752Not created, waiting for the supplier–

Nothing sits in payables until a person has decided.

MYOB · BillsSupplier A

Supplier A (sample)

  • Bill 7752Created through the API, approved by a person$1,840.00

Paying stays with whoever has the right to pay.

End of the day Every supplier bill is held outside MYOB, checked for duplicates and against its order, and created in MYOB only after that. Only flagged bills wait for a person, with the reason beside them.

These are demonstrations. They use sample data and simulated Claude steps. Nothing connects to your accounts, sends a message or changes a record.

What AccountRight and MYOB Business give you

Bill statuses

Open (unpaid), closed (paid) or debit (negative purchase). No status for awaiting approval.

User roles

The Purchases role can’t use electronic payments to pay suppliers.

Left outside MYOB

Who approved a bill, and whether it was already entered.

MYOB’s help for AccountRight and MYOB Business lists bills as “open (unpaid), closed (paid) or debit (negative purchase)”, with no approval step.1, 2 The Purchases role “can’t use electronic payments to pay suppliers”.2 That separates entering bills from paying them. It is not an approval. Who approved a bill, and whether it was already entered, sit outside MYOB.

What MYOB’s help says about purchases and roles

MYOB’s help describes three kinds of purchase. A quote stores an estimate from a supplier and “can be changed to an order or a bill when you are ready to purchase”. An order is a purchase where nothing has been received yet. A bill is created when you have been charged, and recording it updates your accounts, including payables.1 It also says: “You first need to create the purchase as a bill in MYOB, then you can pay the bill”.1 There is no “awaiting approval” status in that list.

MYOB Business lists eight user roles: Administrator, Accountant/Bookkeeper, Sales, Purchases, Payroll, Banking, Contacts and Field. A user can have more than one role, and “Only users with the Administrator role can change other users’ roles and permissions”.2 There is one payment control in the role list: “Users with the Purchases role can’t use electronic payments to pay suppliers”.2

Where MYOB approvals do exist

MYOB Acumatica

Formerly MYOB Advanced. Bill approval is a feature you switch on, with one or several approvers.

AccountRight, MYOB Business

No approval step in MYOB’s help. Bills are open, closed or debit.

MYOB Acumatica (formerly MYOB Advanced) is MYOB’s ERP for mid-sized businesses.5 If you already run it, use its approvals. If you run AccountRight or MYOB Business, moving to an ERP for one control is a big step. The rest of this post is the alternative I built.

What Acumatica’s approval workflow covers

Its help says you can set up an approval workflow for bills, credit and debit adjustments, payments, cash purchases, prepayment requests and prepayments. One person can approve, or several, “in parallel” or “in multiple successive stages”. It must be switched on as the Approval Workflow feature. When bill approval for payment is set up, “all released bills are available for payment only after they are approved by an authorized person”.4

What I built on AccountRight

  1. 01 · ArrivesHeld outside MYOB

    Outside MYOB Bill 7745 Held

    • Supplier A (sample)$980.00
  2. 02 · DuplicatesRules flag a copy
    • Not in MYOB, open or closed
    • Supplier and number new
  3. 03 · MatchRules match the order
    • Matches the Job 2101 order
    • Supplier and amount agree
  4. 04 · If flaggedA person decides

    Bill 7752, $1,840.00Order was $1,640.00

  5. 05 · CreateCreated in MYOB

    MYOB Bill 7745 Created

    $980.00

    From the order, through the API.

At the end of the day Nothing sits in payables until it has passed the checks or a person has approved it.

I built supplier bill checks for a business on MYOB AccountRight. Because AccountRight has no “awaiting approval” status, the build holds each bill outside MYOB until the checks are done. Only the bills the checks flagged went to a person. Clean bills were created in MYOB automatically. Bills arrived by more than one route, so the same checks ran whichever way a bill came in.

The three checks in order, and what MYOB’s API gives them
  1. Flag duplicate bills. Before anything reaches MYOB, it checks whether this bill has already been entered.
  2. Match the bill to its purchase order or quote. A bill with no order or quote behind it, or one that does not agree with it, is not a clean bill.
  3. Create the bill in MYOB only after that, through MYOB’s API.

MYOB’s API supports this. Its reference for service bills lists GET, PUT, POST and DELETE, and says the API is available for AccountRight, new Essentials and MYOB Business files.3 A bill has a supplier invoice number field, and an Order field that is used “only if converting an existing service purchase order to a bill”.3 That is the link between the order and the bill.

A worked example on sample data

Two of three bills wait for a person, each with a reason

Bill amount, A$ · orange: held

7731 was entered on 3 October. 7752 is $200.00 above its order. 7745 is created from its order.

Illustrative figures, not client data.

Sample data, not a client’s. The duplicate check compares the supplier and the supplier’s invoice number with bills already in MYOB, open or closed, read through the API.3 The mismatch goes to a person with the reason attached: “Purchase order was $1,640.00. The bill is $200.00 higher.” Rules find the difference. A person judges it. The clean bill is created from the purchase order, so nobody retypes it. Only then is it in payables, ready for whoever has the right to pay it.

The three bills and what the checks did with each
Three sample bills from one supplier and what the checks do with each
Bill Amount Check Result
7731 $1,840.00 Supplier and invoice number already in MYOB, entered 3 October Flagged: duplicate. Not created. A person confirms and closes it.
7745 $980.00 Matches the purchase order for Job 2101 on supplier and amount Clean. Created in MYOB from the order.
7752 $1,840.00 Purchase order for Job 2102 was $1,640.00; bill is $200.00 higher Flagged: mismatch. Waits for a person.

The supplier may have added freight, or it may be a mistake. That is why a person decides.

What to agree before you build

  1. Which MYOB product and file. AccountRight, MYOB Business or MYOB Acumatica changes the answer.4
  2. What counts as a duplicate. Same supplier and invoice number is the usual rule. Decide on credit notes and re-issued invoices.
  3. What a match means. Supplier, amount, job or purchase order number. Agree a tolerance in dollars, if any, and who sets it.
  4. Bills with no order or quote. Rent and utilities never have one. Skip the match, or send them to a person.
  5. Who approves, and who pays. Keep them apart. The Purchases role already cannot pay electronically.2
  6. Where the approval record lives. Who approved which bill, and when, somewhere you can show your accountant.
  7. When MYOB is not reachable. The bill waits and someone is told. It is not lost and it is not created twice.

This is the checklist I would work through with you in the audit.

Where a person stays in charge

Rules check

Duplicates and matches against the order or quote, the same way every time.

You decide

Every flagged bill goes to a person with the reason attached.

MYOB records

The bill is created through MYOB’s API only after the checks. Paying stays with whoever has the right to.

The Supplier Bill Approval build is this pattern, set up for your MYOB or Xero file. It is a variant of Invoice Check, the Simpro to Xero invoice build, from A$3,900 (AUD, no GST charged), and your audit gives you the fixed quote for your setup.6 See all prices.

If you are not sure what your bills need, start with a Workflow Audit. It is a 60-minute call, a read-only review of your systems and a written report, with the top 3 things worth automating and a fixed quote for each. The audit is A$990 (AUD, no GST charged).6

Questions

Does MYOB AccountRight have an approval step for bills?

MYOB’s help for AccountRight and MYOB Business lists open, closed and debit bills and user roles, but no approval step. Approval workflow for bills is documented for MYOB Acumatica.

Can I approve supplier bills without moving to MYOB Acumatica?

Yes. Hold each bill outside MYOB, check it for duplicates and against its order, and create it through MYOB’s API only after that. Flagged bills go to a person.

Can the person who enters a bill also pay it?

MYOB’s Purchases role can’t use electronic payments to pay suppliers, so entering and paying can be kept apart. That is not an approval.

What does it cost to have the checks built?

The Supplier Bill Approval build is from A$3,900 and the Workflow Audit is A$990 (AUD, no GST charged).

Sources

Not sure which to fix first?

Get a free fit check by email and I will say whether it is worth automating. No call needed. The next step is a A$990 workflow audit: the top 3 things worth automating, with a fixed quote for each.

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Need more than one workflow? For strategy, board work and larger custom builds, I work through renzodemartini.com.

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