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Route equipment requests to procurement with proper sign-off

Let staff submit an equipment request by form, get it approved by their manager over email, and only reach procurement once someone with budget authority has said yes.

30 minIntermediate13 steps
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What this looks like

One step on screen at a time. Read it, do it, tap Next.

Route equipment requests to procurement with proper sign-off

Step 1 of 13

01 / 13Form Trigger

Capture the request with a form

Create a workflow and add an n8n Form Trigger with fields for the requester's details, their manager's email, the item, its cost, and the reason for the request.

Checkpoint

Submitting the form produces one item with all six fields filled in.

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Before you begin

Tick these off as you sort them. Stopping halfway to create an account is how a fifteen-minute build becomes an hour.

0 of 9 ready

Ticks are saved on this device, so you can come back to them.

  • Have ready

    An n8n Form or Google Form capturing requester name, email, manager's email, item, cost, and reason.

  • Account

    Managers reply to this address, so use one that's monitored and won't get flagged as spam.

  • Have ready

    Columns for Requester, Manager, Item, Cost, Status, and RequestDate, giving you an audit trail of who approved what.

  • Permission

    Know exactly where approved requests should land before you build the final step, rather than guessing at it.

  • Know-how

    Some teams route anything under a set amount straight to procurement without manager approval. Decide this before building the branch.

  • Time

    Most of the build is straightforward; the fiddly part is parsing a manager's free-text email reply reliably.

The basics — ticked once, remembered everywhere

  • Account

    Either the hosted version or a self-hosted install. Everything here works the same on both — the only visible difference is the shape of your webhook URLs.

    Create a workspace
  • Know-how

    Adding a node, connecting two of them, and pressing Execute. If any of that is new, the free primer covers it in about ten minutes.

  • Credential

    You will paste at least one secret during setup. A password manager beats a notes app, and it stops you pasting a live key into a chat window by accident.

The shape of the workflow

The nodes you will end up with, left to right, in the order you add them.

Form TriggerGoogle SheetsIFGmailGmail TriggerCodeSwitchGmail
The finished Route equipment requests to procurement with proper sign-off workflow on the n8n canvas4 things to set here
  1. 1Form Trigger — the trigger — everything starts here
  2. 2Google Sheets — Log the request as pending
  3. 3IF — Branch on cost, if you use a threshold
  4. 4Gmail — Email the manager for approval
The finished workflow on the n8n canvasTap to enlarge

Skip the node hunting

Import a starter file with every node for this build already on the canvas, named after its step and wired in order, each one carrying a sticky note with the values to enter. You still connect your own accounts and fill the fields — that is what the walkthrough takes you through — but you never start at a blank canvas.

In n8n: Workflows → Import from file.

Included with the library

What you will build

Jump straight to any step, or print the list and tick it off beside your n8n tab.

  1. 1Capture the request with a form
  2. 2Log the request as pending
  3. 3Branch on cost, if you use a threshold
  4. 4Email the manager for approval
  5. 5Wait for the manager's reply
  6. 6Read the manager's decision
  7. 7Branch on the decision
  8. 8Forward approved requests to procurement
  9. 9Notify the requester either way
  10. 10Update the log and activate
  11. 11Submit a request and reply Approve
  12. 12Submit a request and reply Reject
  13. 13Reply with something ambiguous, like 'let me think about it'

If something goes wrong

Everything ready?

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