Review approval requests

Find, approve, or deny requests that need reviewer action.

What this does

The Approval Requests page lists pending and historical requests such as ownership changes, document deletion, group deletion, user actions, and agent template submissions. Reviewers inspect details, comment, and approve or deny eligible requests.

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Review approval requests walkthrough

Recording planned. Show review approval requests end to end and explain why this task helps a user.

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Upload the recording to YouTube or Microsoft Stream.
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Add the watch URL to this slot in docs/_data/media.yml.

Why you would use this

Approvals create a checkpoint before sensitive actions execute. Use this page when a request can affect another user, remove shared content, or publish a template. Microsoft 365 outgoing actions also appear here so a saved email or invitation remains recoverable when its chat response is interrupted.

Before you start

You must have reviewer access for the request type.
Agent template approvals depend on enable_agent_template_gallery; see Agents settings.
Safety and feedback review roles may be governed from Safety settings.

Steps

Open Approval Requests.
Use Search approvals… to find a request.
Set Pending Only or All Statuses.

The Approval Requests page with the search box, the Pending Only status filter, the request type filter, and the results table, shown here with an empty queue.

Use All Types to filter by request type.
Open the request action from Actions.
Review Request Details, including Request Type, Target, Requested By, Date, and Reason.
Add a comment and select Approve & Execute or Deny Request.

Screenshot needed

Review approval requests step 7

Capture the review approval requests task at this step in SimpleChat with realistic sample data and redact secrets.

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Drop the file at that path and it replaces this card automatically. No other change needed.

For templates, use Agent Template Approvals and its status filters.

Microsoft 365 outgoing actions

From 0.261.038, the Microsoft 365 outgoing-actions section references the same records as Chat and workflow activity, not a second executable request. Only the data owner can review the complete content and send or cancel. Other approval-reviewer roles do not grant permission to send another person’s email or invitation.

Manual actions wait for Send. Delayed actions offer Send now and Cancel while still pending. Refreshing this page, reconnecting, or reaching zero on a countdown does not send anything. A status-refresh failure remains visible instead of being presented as an empty inbox.

Cancel leaves an existing Outlook draft and does not recall a sent message. Email Send also retains the draft; do not send it a second time from Outlook. For an unknown outcome, inspect Outlook before preparing a replacement. Source-sharing, analysis, and workflow Run as approvals remain separate decisions. See Microsoft 365 data and approvals.

Verify it worked

The request status changes in the table. Approved executable requests complete the requested action, while denied requests remain recorded with the decision.

Troubleshooting

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
You cannot approve a request	You are not an eligible reviewer	Ask an eligible reviewer or admin to handle it.
Completed requests are hidden	The status filter is Pending Only	Change it to All Statuses.