Approvals
Last updated Jun 20, 2025
How booking approvals work
If your company’s travel policy requires approval from your manager or executive from your company when booking travel on KAYAK for Business, this article summarizes all you need to know.
Booking travel with approvals enabled
As a traveler, you can search for and select flights, hotels, and rental cars as usual. During checkout, you will be prompted to choose an approver before completing for the items in your cart where Approvals are required.
Selecting an approver
At checkout, you will see a section to select an approver that can include up to 3 fields.
Approver (required)
You have the option to select:
- Your mapped approver – This is the default approver assigned to you by your company, typically your manager or an executive.
- A custom approver – If allowed by your company, you can manually select a different approver for this specific booking.
- Admins – Admin users can also be selected as an approver
Note to approver (optional)
You can include a note to your approver to ensure they understand the context of the booking.
Acknowledgement (required)
Travelers must acknowledge that booked items with declined approval will be canceled.
Immediate booking & approval window
Once your booking is submitted, the reservation is immediately placed to secure the selected travel option without any friction.
- Your selected approver is notified and has to review and approve or decline the booking within the void window.
- If the approver takes no action within the void window, the system follows the company’s Approval Settings, optimized by your company administrator.
Approval Settings: Keep or Cancel if no action taken
The administrator of your business account defines how the system handles approvals in case of no response within the void window:
- Keep booking: The booking is automatically confirmed. [Default setting]
- Cancel booking: The booking is automatically canceled.
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If you are an administrator, please visit this article for more information regarding Approval Settings.
If a booking is declined
If an approver declines a booking:
- You will receive a notification.
- The reservation will be automatically canceled.
- You may need to modify your travel details and rebook.
Approval via Slack
KAYAK for Business is directly integrated within Slack to make approval decisions a breeze.
Add to Slack: Click “Apps” on your Slack and search for “KAYAK for Business”, then add it.
Approval Notifications: As soon as someone requests approval, you’ll get a message and you can decide right from Slack.
Need help with a booking?
Enterprise customers
To get help from a dedicated travel agent, use the contact information at the bottom of your company’s KAYAK for Business search page.