Patent ID: 8014756

Claim:
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, comprising program instructions computer-executable, to implement a method, comprising: receiving an authorization request from a requester; determining at least one user approver authorized to approve the authorization request and the number of approvers required to approve the request, wherein to determine the at least one user approver, consideration is given to the identity of a third party optionally identified in the request on whose behalf the authorization request is made, the location of the requestor, the location of individual potential approvers, and the requestor's job grade; sending a request message to at least the number of required user approvers, the request message including an indicator of priority or urgency, wherein sending a request message to at least the number of required user approvers comprises contacting at least one of the user approvers for both a verbal authorization and an authenticated approval through the network, wherein if the number of approvers required for the given authorization request is more than one, the more than one required approvers operate to approve or deny the request in parallel with the other approvers of the more than one required approvers; sending, if one or more of the user approver's answers includes a denial of the request, the request to one or more additional user approvers authorized to approve the request; wherein at least one of said receiving an authorization request, said sending a response, said sending a request message, and said receiving a reply message comprise communicating via a mobile communication device.