Office Messaging (Beta) User Guide

Office Messaging is currently in Beta. It is turned on per organization. If you don't see the messaging button described below and are interested in the Beta, please reach out to Kojo Support.

Office Messaging lets your team have conversations directly on a Purchase Order or Invoice in Kojo web. Send messages, tag other users, and keep the full discussion attached to the document where the context matters most. Approval activity shows up right inside the conversation so everyone has the full picture. 

For improved collaboration on invoices, you can now also assign invoices to a specific user to help keep track of who owns the next steps for a given record.

Getting Started

To start, users need to have the necessary permissions to send, edit, and delete messages. There are dedicated create/edit/delete permissions for both Purchase Orders and Invoices. All standard roles have these permissions by default. For existing custom roles, these permissions will need to be enabled for any role you'd like to have messaging capabilities. 

There are three separate permissions for each entity type, so you can, for example, allow a custom role to create messages on PO but not created messages on invoices.

When Office Messaging is enabled, you'll see a message icon in the top-right action area of any Purchase Order or Invoice. A badge on the icon shows the number of unread messages on that document.

Click the icon to open the Messages panel, a drawer that slides out from the right side of the screen.

Messaging Basics

Sending a Message

1. Open the purchase order or invoice and click the message icon to open the Messages panel.
2. Type your message in the composer at the bottom of the panel.
3. Click the blue Send button to post it, or use the Cmd/Alt + Enter keyboard shortcut.

Messages appear in chronological order in the scrollable list above the composer. Each message shows the author's avatar, name, timestamp, and the message text.

Tagging a User (@mentions)

To pull a specific person into the conversation, type @ in the composer. A searchable list of people you can mention will appear — this includes users that have role-based access and permission settings that will allow them to view the record you're messaging on.

Mentioning someone sends the user an in-app notification so they know to take a look. Clicking the notification takes them directly to the conversation.

Editing or Deleting your Messages

Hover over a message you sent and click the three-dot menu that appears:

• Edit — opens an inline editor. Make your changes and click Save (or Cancel to discard). Edited messages are marked with an "Edited" tag. Editing does not send a new notification.
• Delete — you'll be asked to confirm ("Are you sure you want to delete this message? This cannot be undone."). After deleting, the message is replaced with "You deleted this message" (others will see "This message was deleted").

Note: You can only edit or delete your own messages.

Invoice Collaboration Updates

Messaging itself works the same way on invoices as it does on POs, but some additional updates have been made to improve AP-related collaboration. 

It's very common for an AP user to hit a point where purchasing, or another member of the team, needs to be brought in to answer a question or provide context before an invoice can be finalized.

In addition to core messaging capabilities, we also want to make it easier to track these handoffs within Kojo so it's always clear who owns the next steps for a particular invoice.

To help with this, we've introduced a native "Assigned To" concept on invoices.

Assigning an Invoice

The new assignment feature is purpose-built to answer the "who owns next steps here" question directly in Kojo for each invoice. 

The invoice header layout has been upgraded to show the current assignee and also more clearly show ERP link state, tags, and approval status (where applicable):

Note: This does not replace the existing Owner field, it works in tandem with it. For example, an AP user may own a particular invoice end-to-end (Owner), while the purchasing agent might temporarily own next steps (Assigned To) to unblock processing the invoice.

There are two ways an invoice can be assigned/re-assigned:

1. Manually via the dropdown in the invoice header.
2. Via messaging when tagging a user (shown below).

Once assigned, the header shows the assignee's avatar and name, and the user is sent an in-app notification about the assignment.

Managing Your Assigned Invoices

For invoices that have an assigned user, the invoice table shows who is currently assigned and how long ago that user was assigned.

Tip: The "My Invoices" view will include all invoices assigned to you, so even for purchasing and other users that aren't processing invoices on a regular basis, this view can act as a helpful queue of records that are waiting on you to move forward.

Deprecating Legacy "Review" Functionality in Favor of Messages & Assignment

To collaborate on invoices in the past, a subset of current AP customers have legacy "Reviewer" functionality enabled.

This functionality is now made duplicative by Messages and the native Assigned To functionality, and is less robust and flexible. If you currently have it enabled, the "Reviewer" functionality will be entirely removed and replaced by the new features described in this document when they are enabled in your account.

A view of the legacy reviewer collaboration modal:

How Approvals Interact with Messages

Approval activity is recorded directly in the conversation, so the message thread doubles as a running history of the document's approval. These approval messages are posted automatically by Kojo when an approval action happens, and they appear inline alongside regular messages.

This means full approval context still lives in the "Approval" tab:

And when an approval decision has a note, a message is automatically sent in the thread for context to ensure all communications live in the messaging thread:

Approval messages are color-coded so they're easy to spot:

• Approved (green): "approved this request," along with the approval level reached (for example, "Level 1 of 2" when multiple approvals are required).
• Rejected (red): "rejected this request." If the approver included a note explaining the rejection, it appears with the message.
• Re-sent (gray): "re-sent this request for approval," shown when an approval is requested again.

A few things to keep in mind:

• Approval messages are system-generated — you cannot edit or delete them.
• Messaging and approvals run in parallel: you don't have to send a message to request or complete an approval, and approvals don't require any messaging. The conversation simply keeps both in one place.
• Use a regular message (and an @mention) to give an approver context, ask a question, or follow up — the approval banners then show how it was resolved.

Who Gets Notified

When a message is posted, Kojo sends in-app notifications to:

• Anyone @mentioned in the message
• Anyone already participating in the conversation (has sent a message or been mentioned)
• The owner of the Purchase Order or Invoice

You can see this list at any time by hovering over the "Who will be notified?" info icon near the Send button.

Tips & Good to Know

• One conversation per document. Each PO and each invoice has a single, persistent conversation — all messages stay attached to that document over time.
• Real-time updates. Open conversations refresh automatically, so new messages appear without reloading the page. A "New messages" button appears if you've scrolled up and a new message comes in.
• Share a link. Use the link icon at the top of the Messages panel to copy a direct link to the conversation (or a specific message) and share it with a teammate.