Time Sheet Approval or Require Approval of Self-Reported Hours allows organizations to require administrator approval of volunteer hours reported for a specific project. This provides an additional review step before submitted service hours are considered approved.

When creating or editing a project, organizations with this functionality enabled can choose whether reported hours require approval on a project-by-project basis.

This functionality is included with an Enterprise subscription and is available as a paid add-on for Professional subscriptions. If you have a Professional subscription and would like to add this functionality to your plan, please contact your Client Success Manager for more information. If you're unsure of your current subscription level or whether this feature is already available with your plan, your Client Success Manager can also help confirm your subscription and available features.

How It Works

When Require Approval of Self-Reported Hours is enabled for a project, hours reported by volunteers are submitted for review rather than being immediately approved.

The general workflow is:

1. A volunteer reports hours for the project.
2. The reported hours are submitted for approval.
3. An administrator reviews the submission.
4. The hours are approved or otherwise resolved by the administrator.

Projects that do not have this setting enabled continue to use the standard reported-hours workflow.

Project Configuration

The approval requirement can be configured individually for each project.

When creating or editing a project, enable Require Approval of Self-Reported Hours to require approval for volunteer-reported service hours associated with that project.

This allows organizations to have different hour-reporting workflows across their projects. For example, an organization may require approval for projects where volunteer hours must be independently verified while allowing volunteers participating in other projects to report their hours without an additional approval step.

👉 For instructions on configuring time sheet approval, see: Edit Project Setup

Volunteer Experience

Volunteers report their service using the normal hour-reporting process. For projects requiring approval, their submitted hours remain subject to administrator review.

This allows organizations to add verification without introducing a separate hour-reporting process for volunteers.

Administration

The approval requirement is enabled individually for each project, making it useful for organizations that only need additional oversight for certain programs or types of service.

For example, you may want to require approval when:

• Volunteer hours must be independently verified
• Service hours are used for awards, certifications, or other requirements
• A program has specific reporting or compliance requirements
• Administrators need to confirm service before accepting reported hours

Administrators can then review submitted hours through the reported-hours approval process.

👉 For instructions on reviewing and approving submitted self-reported hours, see: Self-Reported Hours Approval Administration

Best Practices

Requiring approval of self-reported hours is especially useful for:

• Programs where volunteer service must be verified
• Projects with formal hour-tracking requirements
• Service used for certifications, awards, or recognition
• Programs where administrators need to validate volunteer participation
• Projects where accurate service-hour reporting is particularly important

To keep the approval process manageable:

• Enable approval only for projects where verification is necessary
• Establish a consistent process for reviewing pending hours
• Make sure the appropriate administrators understand who is responsible for reviewing submissions
• Review pending submissions regularly so volunteers' service records remain current
• Communicate the approval process to volunteers when they are expected to report their own hours