Approval Flow Time out setting should only count weekdays

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Posted on by DublinOH_User

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Hello:

when setting the time code for an approval workflow action - how can we ensure that only weekdays are being counted? If the Time out is P3D, how can we make sure if the flows triggers on a Friday that the time out will be on a Wednesday and not Monday.

The flow where I need to use this is very complex so code efficiency would be important.

Appreciate any help

DublinOH User

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David_MA 12,982 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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The duration in a timeout uses the ISO 8601 duration format standard, which does not directly support excluding weekends. To achieve this, you can use the `dayOfWeek(utcNow())` expression to get the current day of the week, where Sunday is represented by 0 and Saturday by 6. You would then need to calculate the number of days to add to this number to account for weekends. This involves determining how many weekend days fall within your desired duration and adjusting accordingly. For example, if you need a duration of 3 days but want to exclude weekends, you would:

Use `dayOfWeek(utcNow())` to get the current day.

Calculate the total number of days, including weekends.

Adjust the duration by adding extra days to skip over weekends.

This process requires custom logic to handle the weekend exclusion, but it is doable. Once you have the adjusted duration, you can create a variable and use it in the ISO 8601 format, such as `P3D`.

I have this note where I tried this, but I don't know if I got the expression to work. You could start with this, which I think I was trying to allow 10 business days:

if(or(equals(dayOfWeek(addDays(utcNow(), 10)), 6), equals(dayOfWeek(addDays(utcNow(), 10)), 0)), 12, 14)

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lbendlin 8,479 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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what's your definition of "weekday"? What should happen if the workflow starts on a "not weekday" ?

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DublinOH_User 150 on at

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Thank you for the replies. However this is the situation...

We have a 3 stage approval with each level of approval having a different time setting. The solution suggested of using a variable to adjust the flow run sounds a little complex.

If I understand

I would have to use the complete date of the approval response to configure "some kind of wait action" that has to find the day of the week for the most recent approval, and either run or wait based on the day week???

Or

I would have to use the complete date of the approval response to find the day of the week for the most recent approval and if that date is for example a Friday then wait 2 days, or if its Monday skip the wait action? Is the wait action in a scope?

DublinOH User

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