Master Data · Daily operations · 8 min read

Propose and approve a bank or tax change

Change a party's bank account or tax registration through a request that a second person approves against the exact proposal.

Before you begin

Bank accounts and tax registrations of a party are never edited directly. One person proposes the change and a different person decides it. This protects payments from diversion and invoices from wrong tax numbers.

• To propose you need mdm.steward.
• To approve a bank change you need mdm.finance.approve; for a registration, mdm.tax.approve. A finance approver cannot decide a tax request and the reverse.
• The person who proposed a request cannot decide it. This also applies to administrators and superusers: 'Somebody other than the person who prepared this change must decide it.'

Propose a bank account

1. Open Master Data > Master Data > Parties and open the party.
2. On Registrations & banks press Propose next to bank accounts.
3. Enter the Bank (required).
4. Enter the IBAN or the Account number; one of them is required. The IBAN is checked for its country, length and check digits: 'That IBAN does not pass its check digits.'
5. Enter the SWIFT / BIC if you have it (8 or 11 characters) and the Currency (three letters; it is not checked against the currency list).
6. Leave Beneficiary empty to use the party's legal name.
7. Enter the Proof (letter or statement reference), required.
8. Press Propose.

The message is 'Proposed as MCR-000001; somebody else decides it under Change requests.' Nothing is added to the bank accounts yet.

Propose a tax registration

1. On the same tab press Propose next to registrations.
2. Choose the Type (default VAT), the Country and the Number. Spaces are removed. A UAE VAT number is 15 digits starting with 1; a Saudi one is 15 digits starting and ending with 3. Example: 100123456700003 (test value).
3. Enter Valid from and Valid to if known. A Valid to before the start is refused.
4. Press Propose.

A party may hold only one active registration per type and country. A second is refused: 'The party already has an active VAT registration in AE; retire it, or propose a change to it.'

Decide a request

1. The approver opens Master Data > Master Data > Bank and tax changes. The tabs are Awaiting decision, Approved, Rejected and All.
2. Open the request. The dialog shows the full proposal and its 16-character fingerprint (the full SHA-256 hash is stored). Full bank numbers show only with partner.bank.reveal; otherwise the last four characters.
3. Press Approve this exact proposal, or press Reject and give the reason (required, up to 500 characters: 'Say why it is rejected.').

What happens next

• Approved bank request: a new active bank account is created with the approval time and the hash. If it replaces an older account, the old one is retired. A bank account is never edited in place.
• Approved registration: the registration becomes active; if it is the VAT number, every released partner of the party gets the new tax id, in every company.
• Rejected: nothing is applied and the reason is kept.
• Both are listed in Master Data > Reports > Sensitive changes with who requested, who decided and when.

Good to know

• The approval is bound to the proposal's hash. If the proposal is not the one on record, the decision is refused: 'The proposal you are approving is not the one on record; reload it and review it again.'
• If you propose a second change for the same account before the first is decided, the first becomes stale (visible under All) and only the newest can be decided: 'This request is already stale.'
• Proposing two new bank accounts for one party at once makes the first stale too, because both have an empty target. Propose one, wait for the decision, then the next.
• A decided request cannot be decided again: 'This request is already approved.'
• The screen has no withdraw button for a request you proposed by mistake. Ask the approver to reject it with a reason.
• Wrong approver messages: 'Deciding a bank account change needs mdm.finance.approve.' and 'Deciding a registration change needs mdm.tax.approve.'