Payment Approvals — Reviewing Payment Proofs
Review and approve customer payment proofs — bank transfer receipts uploaded against orders — and release or reject the order that depends on them.
Payment Approvals is the queue of customer payment proofs waiting on a human. When a guest pays by bank transfer and uploads the receipt, the order does not proceed until someone checks the money actually arrived. You approve it and the order releases, or reject it and the customer is told why.
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Why this queue exists
Card payments confirm themselves. A bank transfer does not — the customer uploads a screenshot of a transfer they say they made, and only your bank can confirm it. This queue is the human step in between: nothing is dispatched or cooked on the strength of an unverified receipt.
Common Tasks
How to Review a Payment Proof (approve payment, check transfer receipt, verify payment)
The core review. Confirm the money arrived before releasing the order.
Required permission: Payment approval (owner or manager level)
- Go to Sales → Payment Approvals in the left sidebar, or open Payment Approvals in the staff app
- Open a pending item and read the Customer, the amount and the uploaded proof
- Check your bank for a matching credit — the amount, the reference and the timing
- Approve it if the money is there
Result: The payment is recorded, the order is released to be fulfilled, and the customer is notified.
Note: Check the bank, not just the screenshot. A screenshot shows a transfer was initiated, not that it cleared — and it is trivially editable.
How to Reject a Payment Proof (reject payment, receipt not valid, money never arrived)
Decline a proof you cannot verify.
Required permission: Payment approval (owner or manager level)
- Go to Sales → Payment Approvals and open the item
- Reject it, giving a reason
Result: The order is held, and the customer is told it was rejected and why. Their app shows Receipt rejected by staff.
Note: Give a reason the customer can act on — *amount does not match* or *no matching credit received* lets them fix it. A bare rejection generates a phone call.
How to Clear the Queue at the End of a Shift (pending approvals, outstanding payment proofs, check the queue)
Approvals gate real orders, so the queue should not sit.
- Go to Sales → Payment Approvals
- Work through everything pending
- Confirm it reads No payments awaiting approval
Result: No customer is waiting on an order that is already paid for.
Note: Check it at least once a shift. An approval left overnight is a customer who paid and got nothing, which is worse than a declined payment.
This queue is an active-work list
Items here can legitimately sit for a while — a customer may transfer in the evening and the credit appear the next morning. The queue is bounded by status rather than date, so nothing ages out of view.
Troubleshooting
A customer says they paid but their order is not moving
Cause: Their payment proof is still awaiting approval.
Fix: Check Sales → Payment Approvals for their submission and review it. Until it is approved the order is deliberately held.
The amount on the proof does not match the order
Cause: Partial payment, a transfer fee deducted, or the wrong order paid for.
Fix: Reject with the mismatch as the reason so the customer can correct it. Approving a short payment leaves a balance that will surface later in Collect Payment.
I cannot see the Payment Approvals screen
Cause: It is restricted to owner-level access.
Fix: Approving payments releases goods, so it is deliberately limited. Ask an account owner to review, or to grant the access if the responsibility is genuinely yours.
A payment was approved in error
Cause: The proof looked valid but the money never arrived.
Fix: The amount will remain outstanding against the customer. Track it in Collect Payment and collect it there rather than trying to unwind the approval.