Workflow for Approvals Not Sending Deny Emails and Comments

I was asked to create a form that would filter approvals by departments and then through a few levels of approval. - I used conditional paths to branch into departments via a selection on the form itself. This worked but has created a complicated web of branches.

I believe I have the workflow mostly laid out correctly (though I found out one of the approvals needs to shift a bit in the process), and I have been trying to test the final approval emails.

I have read on here that you must make comments required and that you can not only require deny comments. This is fine for my needs, though I would prefer to require comments for denials only.

I have set up both paths (approve and deny) to combine into single branches and then meet one of two emails - one for "your request was approved" and one for "... denied".

I have been testing this with my simplest branch, by changing the approval to my work email. I am receiving approved emails but NOT denied email.

Additionally, when I test the denial email, I can see it, but the comment is not showing up. I just see the "approval fields" just as they are shown on the email - this may be just because it is a test, but I am hoping that the "{10_comment}..." etc. will only show the supplied comment, as only one approver would have given a comment and denied the form.

Hi ACOM_Marketing,

Thanks for reaching out to Jotform Support. I understand the issue, but I’ll need a bit of time to work out a solution. I’ll get back to you shortly.

Thanks for your patience.

Hi ACOM_Marketing,

I understand you're encountering issues with your approval workflow, specifically with denial emails not being received and how approval comments appear in test emails.

Regarding the denial emails not being received, please first carefully check the connections in your approval workflow to ensure the Deny outcome correctly leads to your denied email element. Also, verify the recipient email settings within that email element and check the recipient's spam/junk folder. The most reliable way to test email delivery is by performing a live submission and denial. You can also review your account's email history to see if Jotform attempted to send the email and check for any errors

You can easily View Your Form Email Logs in your account settings. Let me show you how:

1. Go to the History tab on your Account Settings page.
2. Click on All Actions in the top-right corner of the History page, and in the dropdown menu that opens, scroll down to the bottom and select Emails.
3. Click on the External Link icon on the right side of the Form ID to open the email of the related submission.

Concerning the approval comments, the "Test Email" function often displays raw field tags (like 10_comment) as it lacks the live context of an approval action. In a live scenario, when an approval is denied with a comment, only the specific tag for that approver's step will be populated with their comment in the actual email sent. Regarding requiring comments for denials only, current functionality applies the "Require Comments" setting to both Approve and Deny actions for a given step; the ability to require it solely for denials can be noted as a feature request.

You can easily customize approval outcomes in Approval Request Emails using the Show/Hide Task Actions options. Let me show you how:

1. In Workflow Builder, click on the Approval Element field, then click on the Gear icon to open Approval Properties.
2. In Approval Properties on the right side of the page, scroll down and click Edit Email under Notification Emails.
3. Then, click on the Eye icon, in the window that opens, select the outcomes you prefer, then click on the Save button.

Give it a try and let us know if you have any questions.