Note: This feature requires the Material Request & Approval module licensed at your site.
Material Request & Approval (MRAP) is a tool that helps prevent a bloated, expensive, redundant, and even hazardous inventory by implementing an organized system for evaluating all new materials before they are acquired by a facility. This evaluation process can be as simple or as comprehensive as your facility requires, and can address a wide variety of concerns about each new material, such as (to name just a few):
● The material's chemical composition
● Whether it contains substances cited as hazardous by regulatory listings
● Where and how it will be stored
● What methods and protective equipment are required to handle it safely
● Whether any other material would be an acceptable substitute
These concerns (and others) are addressed using MRAP tasks. An MRAP task is a short electronic form asking for specific information about the requested material (such as its chemical composition). The user performs the task by finding and entering the required information. As each task is performed, the data on the requested material becomes more complete until an informed decision can be made to approve or reject the request. This evaluation process involves two main parties:
● Requester: The person requesting the new material. This person identifies the material and may be required to perform certain MRAP tasks ("requester tasks") to provide additional details about it. Automatic emails from Comply Plus confirm the successful submission of the request and inform the requester when the final decision is made to approve or reject the request.
● Approvers: The people responsible for addressing material requests. They view the newly submitted request and its information, select and perform additional MRAP tasks ("approver tasks") to gather and record all necessary information about the requested product, and then make the final decision to approve or reject the request. Automatic emails from Comply Plus inform the approvers when a new request is submitted.
This process can also be viewed in terms of request status. As a request progresses, its status changes to reflect is current stage in the process. Your system can include any number of request statuses (to indicate specific conditions and variations as necessary), but every status belongs to one of five status groups and indicates the stage of that group:
● New Request: Requester has created the request but not yet submitted it. Completion of requester tasks may be required before request can be submitted.
● Open: Request is submitted and its list of approver tasks is determined. Approvers are free to perform—or are already performing—these tasks. The final approver task is always the final decision on the request: approval or rejection.
● Approved: Request is approved.
● Rejected: Request is rejected.
● Closed: Request is aborted (usually prior to its final approval or rejection) for any reason appropriate to the facility.
See the following topics for more information on the operations involved in implementing this process:
● Configuring Material Request & Approval: Before any new material requests are submitted, configure the tasks and other elements required for a complete working MRAP process.
● Requester Operations: Learn the operations required for requesters and how to perform them.
● Approver Operations: Learn the operations required for approvers and how to perform them.
● MRAP Task Types: Learn the wide variety of available MRAP tasks and how to perform each type.
● Searching Requests and Tasks: Search your site's past and current requests and tasks using a wide variety of available criteria.
● Other MRAP Operations: Learn other MRAP operations outside the request submission and evaluation process: editing a request, viewing/printing a request summary, and more.
