Oracle Approvals Management (AME) Interview Questions & Answers

Question 1. Does Oracle Hr Need To Be Fully Installed To Use Ame?

Answer :

First, customers using any of the financials products but not Oracle HR also install “Shared HR,” which is a “lite” version of the HR product that includes the common entities that are needed by all applications. These include organizations, locations, jobs, positions, and people. AME will work with Shared HR. Customers do not need to apply the HR Family Pack if they do not install any of the HRMS applications. They will need to set up the people, jobs, or positions that they want to include in their approval rules.

Question 2. Does Ame Support Parallel Approval?

Answer :

In 11.5.10 only serial approval is supported.  Parallel approval is supported in R12.

Question 3. Can Approval Rules Be Defined And Leveraged Across Multiple Products?

Answer :

Yes, approval rules can be defined once and be‚ leveraged across multiple products, requiring less maintenance work. Additionally approval rules can be easily extended without having to customize the application or the workflow.

Question 4. How Do I Enable The Approval Engine For My Requisitions?

Answer :

This is done in the Setup Document Type Form in Core Purchasing.

The following Approval Transaction Types are seeded and supported:

• PURCHASE_REQ = Purchase Requisition
• INTERNAL_REQ = Internal Requisition
• RCO = Requestor change order

Question 5. What Does Voting Regime Mean?

Answer :

Voting Regime is region that can be setup in AME when creating an Approval Group. There are four choices available in the Voting Regime region.

They are:

• Series
• Consensus
• First Responder Wins
• Order Number

Question 6. All Of The Rule Types Supported?

Answer :

List of Rules Types are listed below with Explanation:

List-Creation Exception Standard creation of approval list, excluding a specified condition

Example: Have requisitions between $0 and $1000 approved by up to at most 3 levels except in the Deliver to Location V1 New York).

List Modification creates a standard list-creation rule with some type of modification to that rule.

Example: If two rules are required such as:

Invoice amount > $10K go up to VP lst

Post List Approval Group – This approval group will be appended to the end of the chain of authority approval list.

Question 7. Can Different Approval Rules Be Setup In Ame Across Different Operating Units?

Answer :

No. Approval Rules setup in AME will be used across all Operating Units.

If it is necessary to not have rules work in a particular Operating Unit, there are two ways to do this:

• Turn off AME in that particular Operating Unit.
• Create a rule that excludes that particular Operating Unit from the rule.

1. Based on a attribute for operating unit and having different rule with conditions such that different rule will be applicable for different operating unit.
2. Using a dynamic group in rules: The group used returns appropriate user based on operating unit.

Question 8. What Functional Limitations Exist When Using Ame?

Answer :

The following features cannot be used with AME based Requisition Approval Workflow:

• Notification Timeouts with Reminders.
• The Forward Documents form cannot be used with Notifications pending approval that were sent via Requisition Approval Workflow with AME.
• The Notifications that are sent only have Approve and Reject response actions. Forward and Approve and Forward are not available at this time.

Question 9. What Is Ame?

Answer :

• AME is a simple to use Rules Engine for Defining Approval Policy.
• AME is generic engine can be used where no integration currently exist, even with non EBS modules.
• Standardizing on one engine reduces costs for customer as well as consulting since only one set of skills required.
• None or only minimal coding required to setup rules.

Question 10. When Can It Be Used By Ame?

Answer :

AME can be used to derive lists of approvers based on user defined rules and maintain a history of approver’s statuses when:-

1. Transferring employees from one division/cost centre to another
2. Authorizing expenses
3. Paying invoices
4. Approval of Purchase Requisition
5. Much more – review EBS Module Integration List

Question 11. What Are The Ame Module Integration List?

Answer :

• 11i8/9 11i10
• E-Records (ERES) User Management iSupplier
• Quoting ODM – BOM Sourcing
• Accounts Payable ODM – Engineering iProcurement
• Credit Management ODM – Inventory R12
• iExpenses ODM – Quality Mgt E-Tax
• Lease Management ODM – Receiving Grants
• iRecruitment ODM – WIP Core Pay
• Training Administration (SS) AR – Credit Memo Public Sector
• Self Service HR (4.1) Internal Controls Mgr Proposals
• OPM – Inventory OTA – Learner UI Distribution
• OPM - New Product Dev OTA – Manager UI GL-Journals
• OPM – Process Execution iAssets (Transfer) Account Planning
• OPM – Quality Mgt. Deal Registration Service Contracts
• Oracle Partners Mgt Referral Management Collections
• AR – Credit Mgt PO - Requisitions Incentive Comp

Question 12. Business Processes For Transactions And Approvals Create Transaction Manage Approvals And Notifications?

Answer :

• Approve
• Reject
• Return

Question 13. How To Assign The Role Of Ame?

Answer :

Login as ‘System Administrator’ (not a responsibility) & navigate to ‘User Management > Users > Query the user and click Update > Search & Add the AM Admin roles as shown below.

Question 14. How To Grant Transaction Type Access To Users Of Ame?

Answer :

• AME restricts access to transaction types using Data Security. Grant users access to the transaction types using the Grants page.
• Login as ‘Functional Administrator’ responsibility & click on ‘Create Grant’.

Question 15. Explain About New Transaction Types Ame?

Answer :

A new transaction type can be created using ‘Approvals Management Administrator’ responsibility.

Question 16. Setup Details Approval Process Of Ame?

Answer :

The approval process for the newly created transaction type can be setup using ‘Approvals Management Business Analyst’ responsibility.

Question 17. Explain About Attribute Of Ame?

Answer :

• Attributes are the base element for an AME Rule. Attribute values are retrieved from the EBS Applications database.
• AME is seeded with attributes relevant to the transaction type and the user can create new attributes in AME for use in AME rule.

Question 18. What Is Condition?

Answer :

• Conditions identify values and value ranges for some or all of the attributes available.
• AME rules refer to these conditions to determine if a particular rule is applicable for the specific document (requisition) being approved.
• There are 2 types of conditions – Regular & List Modifiers.

Question 19. Explain About Action Type Is Ame?

Answer :

• An action type is a collection of actions having similar functionality.
• Every action belongs to an action type. Action types are enabled or disabled for a particular transaction type.
• Voting method (or regime) decides how the responses to the action types are treated.

Question 20. Approver Group Of Ame?

Answer :

• It is an optional setup. Required only when additional approvers are required for particular conditions.
• The rules defined for the transaction can be based on Approver Groups, Jobs defined in HR setup, or Positions defined in HR setup Additional approvers are added here.

Question 21. Explain The Limitations Of Ame?

Answer :

• Terminations (of the initiators) are not handled efficiently though AME would rebuild the chain of approval after each approval.
• Not possible to create custom AME responsibilities because of RBAC limitations other than the 2 seeded responsibilities – ‘Approvals Management Administrator', 'Approvals Management Business Analyst'.
• It is not possible to have ‘Notification Timeouts with Reminders’ within AME.

Question 22. Can Ame Send Notifications?

Answer :

AME doesn't have any feature to send notifications. It is responsibility of calling application of sending notification, capturing the response and updating AME with response.

Question 23. Instead Of Customization Oracle Workflow Can I Do Customizations In Ame?

Answer :

• I heard people saying this..But it all depends on what customizations.
• You can move only the customizations around identifying the approver and sending notifications.
• Assume you are using normal routing approval method (without AME) and there is a customization for the Requisition to be approved by the department head in case the amount more than 10000$ we can’t move only this customization to AME.
• If the requisition system is moved to AME then only we can handle this requirement with a AME rule and avoid customization.