Troubleshooting approval issues

You may encounter some issues in an approval cycle of Service Request Management. See the following sections to troubleshoot issues encountered during approval process.

Note

All plug-ins are child plug-ins of arplugin. The core AR Server issues, other plug-ins, network or database issues may affect approval or all plug-ins, and must be addressed first as they maybe the root of the approval issues.

Related topics

From the AR System online documentation:

Troubleshooting Approval Server Open link

Approval Server configuration file settings Open link

Troubleshooting ITSM Util plug-in issues Open link

Troubleshooting Ad hoc, Level or Group, and Management Chain approval issues

See the following table for troubleshooting issues related to Ad hoc approvals, Group approvals, and Management chain approvals:

Approval type	Symptom	Scope	Resolution
Ad hoc approval	Approval process is bypassed.	No approvers are found during the approval process.	Make sure that in Approval Chain, either select the Use Request Manager checkbox, or the workflow sets the value for z1D_Approver. Configure Ad hoc group by using a dynamic group with the z1D_Approver. For more information, see the Dynamic approval/approver based on Question response knowledge article.
Level or Group approval	No approvers are available for Level or Group approvals.	None of the users in the defined support group have the Request Approver functional role.	Open the relevant support group in the `CTM:Support Group` form and make sure that the users of the support group have the Request Approver functional role and the value of Assignment Availability is set to Yes.
Level or Group approval	You get System Error.	Service request with Level or Group approval goes to Rejected status.	See if the Currency defined in the rule for the Level process is causing the issue. For more information, see the Service Request with Group/Level Approval going to Rejected status knowledge article.
Management Chain approval	No approvers are found for the Management Chain approval	In CTM:People record, Manager's Name and Manager's Login ID is not defined.	In CTM:People record, make sure the Manager's Name and Manager's Login ID is defined.

Troubleshooting Approval Chain issues

When Approval Chain is created, it generates a filter with prefix zAPRxxx. When troubleshooting issues with approvals not working in an Approval Chain, first confirm that the approval chain filter is fired on the server side logs as shown in the following extract:

> /* Thu Apr 27 2017 03:24:38.3940 */ <Filter Level:1 Number Of Filters:352> Checking "zAPR:LaunchApproval-SRM:Request_chain11" (970)
> 0 : Push Fields -> "APR:Approval Chain Status"
> <deferred from filter zAPR:LaunchApproval-SRM:Request_chain11>
> Form Name01 (1000000101) = SRM:Request
> Permission (303798101) = 1000000001;
> Chain ID (303772600) = IDGAA5V0GFHORAO477TLO3LW46WYZV
> Request (8) = 000000000002624
> Status (7) = 0
> /* Thu Apr 27 2017 03:24:38.3950 */ Start filter processing (phase 1) -- Operation - CREATE on APR:Approval Chain Status - <NULL

The filter name will contain the Approval Chain title.

See the following table to troubleshoot some of the issues that you may encounter for approvals in an Approval Chain:

Symptom Scope Resolution

The service request remains in the Waiting Approval Status with no approvers defined.

The zAPRxxx filters do not meet their qualifications.
No approvers are attached to the Request.

Collect the server side logs to confirm if the appropriate zAPRxxx filter is passing qualification as expected.
If more than one approval chain meets the qualification, update the approval chain qualifications so that only one chain matches per request.

If SR Type Field values are used in the Approval Chain qualification, it might be necessary to create another Approval Chain that uses an Auto Approval rule (if certain values mean that an approval isn't necessary). For example, this might be necessary when using a qualification like 'SR Type Field 1' = "Hardware". In that case, another chain must be created to handle the qualification like 'SR Type Field 1' != "Hardware".

The service request doesn't move to Initiated Status.

After the approval process is complete.

Check the server side Filter or SQL or API logs for calls to the ITSMUtil plugin. The Filter that calls the plugin is APR:AVD:RunITSMUtilPlugin. The Approval Server logs might show the following if there is an issue with this plugin:

Cannot establish a network connection to the AR System Plug-In server (ARERR 8760)
<APPR> (Thu May 19 2016 07:57:36.3380) <servername> (9999) REMEDY.ARF.ITSMUtil : RPC: Miscellaneous tli error - System error (Connection refused)
<APPR> (Thu May 19 2016 07:57:36.3380) Update failed.Update on approval detail record failed for prepending state

Logging from the Filter APR:AVD:RunITSMUtilPlugin will look like this in server-side logging:

<FLTR> <Filter Level:1 Number Of Filters:53> Checking "APR:AVD:RunITSMUtilPlugin" (500)
<FLTR>     --> Passed -- perform actions
<FLTR>         0 : Set Fields
<FLTR>              z1D_FieldValueString (303786500) = 7=4000
<FLTR>         1 : Set Fields
<FLTR>              Plugin result code (301639400) = 0
<FLTR>              Plugin result message (301385500) = OK
<FLTR>         2 : Goto Guide Label
<FLTR>         Skip actions, goto guide label Label2

If there is an issue with the ITSMUtil plugin, make sure that the configuration is correct for this plugin in the both, ar.conf and pluginsvr_config.xml files. Compare the working and non-working environments, and make updates as needed. If you make any updates to the plugin, make sure you restart the AR Server to reflect the changes.
If you get the following error, it might be an issue with the Application Service password:
Plugin result code (301639400) = 2
Plugin result message (301385500) = ERROR (623): Authentication failed;
For more information, see the Service Request approvals are not working as expected knowledge article.

Troubleshooting Approval server issues

See the AR System online documentation for the following common problems that can occur when using Approval Server:

Issues	Reference
Approvals are not processed or other unexpected behaviors occur	Troubleshooting when approvals are not processed or other unexpected behaviors occur
Performance issues	Troubleshooting performance issues while processing approvals
Plugin-in issues	Troubleshooting plug-in issues with approval server
Approval server fails to process records from Application Pending form	Troubleshooting when approval server fails to process records from Application Pending form

For information about how to enable Approval Server debug logging, see Approval server logging.

Troubleshooting approval issues

Troubleshooting Ad hoc, Level or Group, and Management Chain approval issues

Troubleshooting Approval Chain issues

Troubleshooting Approval server issues

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