Slack: sign in, approvals, and support

Connect your Slack workspace to Cortena so assignees get approval and review digests (DM and/or channel), can act with the same buttons as in Cortena, and receive support replies they can answer from Slack. You can also Sign in with Slack on the login page when your workspace allows it.

1. What Slack does in Cortena

One Slack workspace install can cover several Cortena entities (tenants). You choose which ones when you connect.

2. Connect Slack (Settings)

1. Open Settings → Integrations → Email → Slack.
2. Click Connect (you need permission to connect accounting/integration tools for that entity).
3. Authorize the Cortena FinOps Slack app in your workspace.
4. On the Cortena confirm screen, select which entities this Slack workspace should cover.
5. Back in Settings, choose how digests are delivered for this entity:

Pick default channels if you use channel notify: useful for a central finance channel instead of (or as well as) personal DMs.

3. Turn on Slack on workflow steps

Connecting Slack is not enough by itself. On each Review or Approval node that should send digests:

1. Open Settings → Workflow (or your workflow editor).
2. Select the Review or Approval step.
3. In the notification / digest panel, enable Slack (you can also keep Email).
4. Publish the workflow when ready.

Reminders use the same Slack channel settings as the first notification for that step.

Only Review and Approval nodes support these digests today.

4. Working from a Slack digest

A typical digest shows the entity name, invoice number, supplier, amount, step name, waiting time, and Open in Cortena.

Buttons follow the same rules as Cortena:

Permissions still apply: if you are not allowed to complete the step, Slack returns an error even if you can see the message (for example in a shared channel).

Reject may open a short form when a reason is required. Hold opens a form for an optional or required comment, depending on the step.

After a successful action, the message keeps the invoice details and replaces the buttons with a status line such as Approved by @you, Reviewed by @you, Rejected by @you, or Held by @you.

5. Sync with the Cortena app

Slack and Cortena stay aligned for the same invoice and workflow step:

• Act in Slack → the invoice advances in Cortena; the list/detail updates over the live connection (no full page reload needed).
• Act in Cortena (approve, mark reviewed, reject, or hold) → matching Slack digests for that step update to the same status.
• DM and channel copies of the same digest both update.
• Later steps do not rewrite earlier ones (for example, rejecting on Approval does not change a completed Review message).
• Archive or delete an invoice → open digests lose their buttons and show that the invoice was archived or deleted.

Duplicate invoices that are not eligible for workflow digests do not keep getting Slack approval pings.

6. Sign in with Slack

On the Cortena login screen you may see Sign in with Slack. That uses the same Slack app as Integrations, but only for authentication.

Whether Slack login is accepted for a given entity depends on that workspace's Workspace login requirements.

Connecting Slack under Integrations is separate: you still need Connect for digests and support DMs even if people already sign in with Slack.

7. Support in Slack

When support replies by DM are enabled:

1. Cortena Support can send public replies to you in Slack.
2. Reply in the Slack thread to add your answer to the same support ticket.
3. You can still use in-app Support. See Create, track, and reply to support tickets.

You cannot open a brand-new support ticket from Slack yet (for example by mentioning the bot). Use Cortena Support to create tickets.

8. Tips & limitations

• Slack must be available for your entity (contact Cortena if Settings → Integrations → Email → Slack is missing).
• Assignees need a Slack user whose email matches their Cortena account for DMs and mentions.
• Delegate from Slack is not available yet. Use Cortena for delegation.
• Channel digests are visible to everyone in the channel; only permitted users can successfully complete the step.
• Chat with Cortena as a general AI assistant inside Slack is not part of this integration.
• Disconnecting Slack for one entity does not automatically remove the app from the Slack workspace if other entities still use it.

Related: Workflow configuration · Put approval or review on hold · Workspace login requirements

Quick reference