Worksheet Returns lets planners send employees back to a previous planner in the approval chain when further revision is needed, without taking the work outside Pave. Returned employees are temporarily removed from the sender's worksheet and placed back into the receiver's worksheet. Once the receiver makes changes and resubmits, those employees go directly back to the sender, skipping any intermediate planners.

Worksheet Returns lets planners send employees back to a previous planner in the approval chain when further revision is needed, without taking the work outside Pave. Returned employees are temporarily removed from the sender's worksheet and placed back into the receiver's worksheet. Once the receiver makes changes and resubmits, those employees go directly back to the sender, skipping any intermediate planners.

What Worksheet Returns lets you do:

* Return one or more employees to the most recent planner or the first planner in their approval chain
* Add a message explaining what needs to change, which appears in the notification email and in the receiver's worksheet
* View and manage all active returns across the cycle from the Cycle Progress dashboard
* Pull up returned employees by planner or all at once to unblock a cycle

## Before you begin

Worksheet Returns requires two things to be set up before planners can use it:

* Approval chains must be configured for the cycle. See [Configure approval chains](https://support.pave.com/en-us/articles/configure-approval-chains-lC8OLSod9h).
* Worksheet Returns must be enabled in Worksheet Settings for the cycle. See [Configure worksheet settings](https://support.pave.com/en-us/articles/configure-worksheet-settings-HcVpUHzHyF).

When Worksheet Returns is enabled for a cycle, all planners in that cycle can use it. There is no way to restrict the feature to specific planners.


## Return employees from your worksheet

Any planner can return employees to a previous planner in the approval chain, as long as those employees are currently in their active worksheet. The first planner in the chain cannot initiate returns because there is no previous planner to send to.

**Steps to initiate a return**


1. In your worksheet, select the employees you want to return using the row checkboxes.
2. Click **Return employee(s)** in the toolbar. This button appears only when at least one selected employee is eligible to be returned.

   
    ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=edcd4bff-2011-46d4-b59f-7f5d34cde138 " =975x476")
3. In the modal, choose where to return the employees:
   * **Return to the most recent planner:** Returns employees to the last planner who submitted them. For example, in a chain of Manager → Director → VP where the VP holds the employees, this sends them back to the Director.
   * **Return to the first planner:** Returns employees all the way to the first planner in the chain, regardless of how many planners are in between. Using the same chain, this sends them back to the Manager.
4. Optionally, type a message explaining what needs to change. The message appears in the email notification and in the banner on the receiver's worksheet.
5. Review the table showing which employees will be returned to which planner, then click **Return** to confirm.


 ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=7f02d0b2-9a85-4514-b836-4cb8f32931e2 " =1502x1126")

**After you initiate a return**

* The returned employees are removed from your active worksheet.
* A banner appears on your worksheet indicating those employees are outstanding and waiting to be resubmitted to you.
* You can continue working on the rest of your worksheet, but you cannot submit your worksheet until the returned employees come back or are pulled up.
* The receiving planner gets an email and in-app notification with your name and any message you included.


 ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=ce40c43d-fb87-4f6f-af81-36bb367ec170 " =883x592")

 ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=4a4561fb-4dde-44dd-bd6e-1f250cbcbec8 " =1031x726")

## Receive and resubmit returned employees

When employees are returned to you, a banner appears at the top of your worksheet identifying who sent them and any message they included. All compensation data is preserved through the return: nothing is reset.

When you are ready to submit your worksheet, returned employees are included in the submission and go directly back to the planner who initiated the return. They skip any intermediate planners in the chain. For intermediate planners, those employees show as "Submitted."

If you received returns from multiple planners, submitting your worksheet sends each group of employees back to their respective senders in one action. The submission confirmation modal groups employees by which planner they are being sent to so you can review before confirming.


## Manage returns as a cycle admin

Cycle admins can view and manage all active returns across the cycle from the [Cycle Progress dashboard](https://support.pave.com/en-us/articles/cycle-progress-dashboard-eQKeE9jTRm). Planners with dashboard access see only returns where they are the sender or above the sender in the approval chain.

**View active returns**

The active returns panel in the top right of the Cycle Progress dashboard lists all current returns with the sender name, receiver name, employee count, and timestamp.


 ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=a17c048e-124e-405f-b0a7-c11673da41eb " =486x219")

**Return employees to a planner from Cycle Progress**

Cycle admins can initiate a return directly from the Cycle Progress planner table, without impersonating a planner.


1. In the Cycle Progress planner table, find the row for the planner whose employees you want to return.
2. Open the **Worksheet actions** menu on that row.
3. Select **Return employees to this planner**.
4. In the modal, review the employees that will be returned and optionally add a message.
5. Click **Return** to confirm.


 ![image.png](https://support.pave.com/api/attachments.redirect?id=f8fd4191-ee89-4349-8243-bd4a7f1e389a " =617x422")

**Pull up returned employees**

To resolve returns without waiting for the receiver to resubmit:

* **Re-submit all:** Click **Re-submit all** in the active returns panel to resolve every active return in the cycle at once. All returned employees move back to their senders' worksheets immediately.
* **Pull up by planner:** Open **Worksheet actions** on a planner's row in the Cycle Progress table and select **Pull up this planner's worksheet** to resolve only the returns associated with that sender.


## Things to know

**Which employees can be returned** Only employees currently in a planner's active worksheet can be returned. Employees who have already been submitted forward or are already in a returned state cannot be returned. \[UNVERIFIED: confirm whether ineligible employees can be selected for return at the time of initiation. The RFC indicates they can (as they are still the planner's current employees); the internal docs say they cannot.\]

**Returned employees cannot be returned again** Once an employee is returned, the receiving planner cannot return that employee further down the chain within the same return event. The receiver must resubmit first. After resubmission, the original sender can initiate a new return if further revision is needed.

**Multiple rounds of returns** Multiple rounds of returns are supported. Each return is recorded separately in the employee's activity history, so the full back-and-forth is auditable.

**Activity history** Every return and pull-up is recorded in each employee's activity history with a timestamp, the name of the planner who initiated the action, and any message included. If a return is initiated by a cycle admin who does not have direct reports in the cycle, the history entry and the worksheet banner display "Admin" rather than a specific name.

**If an employee becomes ineligible after being returned** If an employee is eligible when returned but is later marked ineligible while in the receiver's worksheet, the return is voided. That employee will not appear as returned and will not be included in pull-up or resubmission. This is consistent with how ineligibility is handled in worksheet submissions and pull-ups.

**Large returns** Returns of 51 or more employees are processed in the background. All employees will be returned, but it may take slightly longer than smaller batches.

**Finalized cycles** All return and pull-up actions are disabled once a cycle is finalized.

**Approval chains visibility** If the approval chains column is disabled for the cycle, Worksheet Returns still works. Planners who initiate a return will be able to see other planners in their approval chain as part of the return process, even if the approval chains column is not otherwise visible in the cycle.

Return employees to a previous planner

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