You can streamline your volunteer time review process by setting up automatic approval for volunteer hours, reducing the amount of manual work necessary.
Permissions
Any administrator can request changes to auto-approval settings. Anyone with the volunteer manager or volunteer rewards manager user role can review submissions that require manual approval.
Enabling automatic approvals
There are three options available for approving volunteer hours:
- Manually review and approve all submissions: This is ideal for maintaining complete control over approving tracked time.
- Automatically approve all submissions: This is the best option for open programs and small admin teams who don't have much time to process reviews.
- Automatically approve submissions within a set limit: This allows for a hybrid approach where submissions at or below a predefined number of minutes are automatically approved, while those exceeding the limit require manual review.
If you use a set limit, tracked time at or below your auto-approval limit is automatically approved. Submissions that exceed the limit require manual review before any rewards are issued. They appear in the Submissions Pending Review queue with a status of Needs Review until manually reviewed and approved.
This flexibility enables you to efficiently manage volunteer hours, saving time while ensuring accuracy and control where needed.
When tracked time is auto-approved, the volunteer is informed via email. If they earn rewards, these show up in their giving account immediately.
Reviewing submissions that exceed the auto-approval limit
If your program uses automatic approval within a set limit, submissions that exceed that limit need manual review before rewards are issued.
- Select Manage to enter Benevity Volunteer as an administrator.
- Go to Volunteer on the Management Toolbar and select Approve Volunteer Time.
- Filter the list to show submissions with a status of Needs Review.
- Select Details for the submission you want to review.
- Review the submission against your company's guidelines and select Approve or Reject.
Note: When submissions are waiting for review, Review Volunteer Time appears on the volunteer admin landing page as a shortcut that takes you directly to the filtered list.
Approved submissions move out of the pending review queue and the volunteer receives an email notification. If you reject a submission, add a personalized note before sending the notification.
Requesting changes to auto-approval settings
To change your auto-approval settings, contact support and our technical services team will assist you.
If you want to automatically approve all submissions within a set limit, make sure you include the maximum amount of tracked time you are willing to auto-approve.