The Price Approval System (PAS) developed for ITC, a multi-billion dollar conglomerate, represents a significant advancement in managing complex pricing workflows across their paper business unit. This case study outlines how this highly dynamic system streamlines price approvals across multiple plants, sales offices, and stakeholders throughout India, dramatically improving efficiency and decision-making.

Business Challenge and Context

Before the implementation of the Price Approval System, ITC faced significant challenges in managing price approvals for paper products sold from multiple manufacturing plants to diverse customers across India. The approval process involved numerous stakeholders with varying levels of authority depending on factors like product category, customer type, and sales region. This complexity resulted in delayed approvals, inconsistent pricing decisions, and administrative inefficiencies that impacted both sales performance and customer satisfaction.

The Price Approval System was designed to handle the intricate approval workflows required for each sales office in India, accommodating the highly variable hierarchy of stakeholders involved in pricing decisions for ITC's paper products.

Every pricing request follows a unique approval path based on product type, sales region, customer category, discount level, and other business parameters. The system needed to dynamically adjust these approval routes while maintaining compliance with corporate policies.

Hierarchy management interface showing configurable approval flows

System Architecture and Implementation

The PAS was built as a centralized platform that integrates with ITC's existing enterprise systems while providing a flexible workflow engine. The system's key architectural principle was to separate the approval rules from the core application, allowing business users to reconfigure approval hierarchies without requiring technical intervention or code changes. This design choice proved crucial for accommodating the diverse and evolving approval requirements across different sales offices.

Role-based access control dashboard with configurable user permissions

The system employs a sophisticated role-based access control (RBAC) model that defines not just who can approve price requests but also under what conditions they have authority. This granular permission structure supports the variable approval hierarchies while maintaining security and auditability.

Key Features and Capabilities

By early 2023, the PAS was fully operational across all of ITC's paper business units, processing thousands of pricing approvals each month. The system has significantly reduced approval times from days to hours, enabling faster response to market conditions and customer requests.

Comprehensive list of price approval requests with filtering options

Detailed request view showing approval history and stakeholder information

Dynamic Workflow Management

The PAS implemented a flexible workflow engine that adapts to the organizational structure of each sales office. The system can automatically route approval requests based on predefined rules, while also accommodating manual interventions when necessary. This dynamic routing ensures that each pricing decision is reviewed by the appropriate stakeholders based on factors such as product type, customer importance, discount level, and market conditions.

Modal interface with fields for creating new price approval requests

Control Center and Administration

A powerful administrative control center was developed to manage the entire system. This interface allows authorized administrators to define approval hierarchies, set business rules, manage user permissions, and configure system behaviors without requiring developer intervention. This flexibility empowers business users to adapt the system as organizational structures and business policies evolve.

Role Management Interface

Role and permission management interface for configuring access control

Approval Hierarchy Configuration

Approval hierarchy configuration screen for customizing workflows

Reporting and Analytics

The PAS includes comprehensive reporting and analytics capabilities that provide valuable insights into pricing decisions, approval efficiency, and market trends. Key metrics tracked include:

• Average approval time by product category and sales office
• Approval rates and exception patterns
• Price trend analysis by product and region
• Bottleneck identification in approval workflows
• Stakeholder performance metrics

Comprehensive Reporting Dashboard

Exporting and reporting capabilities for audit and analysis

PDF export and reporting functionality crucial for audit and analysis

Business Impact and Future Directions

The Price Approval System has delivered significant business value to ITC, including faster pricing decisions, more consistent application of pricing policies, improved compliance with corporate guidelines, and better visibility into pricing trends. The system has become a critical business tool that supports both operational efficiency and strategic decision-making.

Future enhancements planned for the system include:

• Integration with predictive analytics for price optimization recommendations
• Mobile application for approvals on-the-go to further reduce decision time
• Enhanced customer profitability analysis to inform pricing decisions
• Machine learning algorithms to detect pricing anomalies and suggest improvements

The success of the PAS at ITC demonstrates how thoughtfully designed workflow systems can transform complex business processes, especially in organizations with intricate approval hierarchies and diverse stakeholder requirements. The system's ability to accommodate highly dynamic approval paths while maintaining governance and control provides a valuable model for similar implementations across various industries.