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PayPunch moves each pay period through a defined payroll workflow: a client company submits its payroll, you (the bookkeeper) review and approve it, it goes to QuickBooks via the IIF export, and the liabilities are marked paid. This page explains the lifecycle; Approving Payroll covers the buttons you click at each step.
Payroll submissions

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The Payroll Submissions page

Open Payroll from the sidebar to see Payroll Submissions — every client company’s submission for review. Summary cards show Total Submissions, Pending Review, Approved, Paid, and Urgent (within 24 hours of a deadline). The table lists each submission’s Company, Pay period, Status, Total hours, and Submitted date, and is sortable. Use the Search box to find a company and the Status dropdown to filter (All Statuses, Submitted, Reviewing, Approved, Paid, Completed).

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The submission lifecycle

A submission moves through these statuses:
StatusWhat it means
DraftStarted by the client, not yet submitted
SubmittedClient submitted; waiting for your review
ReviewingYou’re reviewing the submission
Summary SentA payroll summary was sent to the client
Customer ApprovedThe client approved the summary
ApprovedYou approved the payroll
In QuickBooksThe IIF was generated/sent to QuickBooks
PaidLiabilities marked paid
CompletedThe cycle is closed
When a submission is rejected or has changes requested, it returns to Submitted so the client can correct and resubmit.

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How a pay period flows

1

Client submits

A client company submits its time data for the pay period. The submission appears in your Pending Review queue as Submitted.
2

You review

Open the submission to see the per-employee breakdown of regular, overtime, and PTO hours and pay totals.
3

You decide

Approve, Reject, or Request Changes — see Approving Payroll.
4

Export to QuickBooks

Generate the IIF file and send it to QuickBooks. This moves the submission to In QuickBooks. See IIF Export.
5

Mark as paid

Once liabilities are paid, mark the submission Paid, closing the cycle.

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Workflow history

Every submission keeps a Workflow History timeline recording each action (submitted, approved, rejected, changes requested, marked paid), who performed it (admin or client), the status transition, the timestamp, and any comment — so you always have a clear audit trail.
Approving or paying a submission automatically locks its pay period so the underlying time entries can’t change after the fact. See Pay Periods & Locking.