RITM stuck in a state of Waiting Approval

[michelle kirk]

Yesterday I had a response back with regards to this issue we are currently seeing on our platform 

The behavior you're describing is not typical Out-of-the-Box (OOB) for ServiceNow. When a Request Item (RITM) is canceled, OOB functionality should ensure that the status of the RITM is updated appropriately, and it can also affect the Request (REQ) and associated tasks.

In OOB ServiceNow, if a user manually selects the Cancelled state for a RITM, the following behavior is expected:

• RITM Status: The RITM should transition to a Cancelled state, not remain in Waiting for Approval.
• Request (REQ): If all associated RITMs within a request are canceled, the request itself should move to a Cancelled state.
• Approval Workflow: Approvals associated with the RITM should either be canceled or transitioned to a final state, like "Rejected" or "Closed".
  
  

  OOB, when a Request Item (RITM) is canceled:

  • The system typically checks whether the Request (REQ) has other active RITMs.
  • If all associated RITMs are in a canceled or closed state, the Request is also transitioned to a Cancelled or Closed state.

I had a response with 

The behavior you're describing is not typical Out-of-the-Box (OOB) for ServiceNow. When a Request Item (RITM) is canceled, OOB functionality should ensure that the status of the RITM is updated appropriately, and it can also affect the Request (REQ) and associated tasks.

In OOB ServiceNow, if a user manually selects the Cancelled state for a RITM, the following behavior is expected:

• RITM Status: The RITM should transition to a Cancelled state, not remain in Waiting for Approval.
• Request (REQ): If all associated RITMs within a request are canceled, the request itself should move to a Cancelled state.
• Approval Workflow: Approvals associated with the RITM should either be canceled or transitioned to a final state, like "Rejected" or "Closed".
  
  
  

OOB, when a Request Item (RITM) is canceled:

• The system typically checks whether the Request (REQ) has other active RITMs.
• If all associated RITMs are in a canceled or closed state, the Request is also transitioned to a Cancelled or Closed state.

Our Managed Service Provider has now come back with the following which seems to contradict if I am reading it correctly to what Service Now are stating

We have never been able to cancel at REQ level only at RITM level. 

It is correct, that if a Request (REQ/sc_request) is cancelled then this will cause a downward cascade transaction that will result in all associated Requested Items (RITM/sc_req_item) and any outstanding approvals (sysapproval_approver) ending up in a state that reflects that they have also been cancelled. Unfortunately the reverse transaction is not a supported operation i.e. You cannot cancel an approval and result in an upwards cascade transaction to cause the Request and Requested Items to be cancelled. The only operation supported within ServiceNow for an approval is for the record to be approved or rejected.

ServiceNow does support the arbitrary change of state of an approval record, but only the values of approved and rejected have any actual effect on an underlying workflow. For example - Someone might choose to change an approval record from 'Requested' to 'Not yet requested' and then back to 'Requested' - this operation is often used when the approval email needs to be re-triggered if it has accidentally been deleted or lost in an inbox.

Could you please clarify what is OOB functionality with regards to when someone uses the State of Cancelled instead of the approval/rejected on the RITM, should the RITM be cancelling the whole request or stay stuck in waiting approval, which I don't understand why anyone would want that feature, as you would then have alot of requests still in a state of Open, or is what our Platform provider stating true ?

[Brad Bowman]

It seems like what they called out is cancelling the approval - updating the State on the approval record to 'Cancelled' instead of 'Approved' or 'Rejected', which is something end users should not be able to do, for the reason that it does not cancel or do anything to the RITM record.  Is this the situation you asked about, or was the RITM updated? 

[michelle kirk]

Hi

so my question is why is there an option to cancel if then the RITM doesnt change to a cancelled state but stays in work in progress ?

I have attached what we are seeing 

[Brad Bowman · Accepted solution]

The Approval form is used system-wide for task table (and tables that extend the task table) and non-task-related approvals, so out of the box they make this State available as it could be applicable in some scenarios.  You can remove certain values if approving for an RITM, or just make this field read only so the users have to click the Approve or Reject button.  You could also try to build into your flow/workflow the condition that the approval is cancelled and the path the RITM should take in such a case, if you want your approvers to be able to cancel the approval and the request instead of rejecting it, which may go back to the submitter to revise then re-submit for approval, or however your workflow handles rejections.

[michelle kirk]

Thank you that is clear now I will accept the solution