Turn On Unattended Processing
Everything on this page lives on one screen: DocumentQ Unattended Processing. Do it in this order — each step makes the next one testable.
1. Check which user the job will run as
The job queue entry’s own user must hold DocumentQ - Full (Write/Post). Registering requires that seat even when nothing human is clicking.
Decide this before you schedule anything. If the seat is missing, the schedule runs and every unattended registration refuses — the page names this as the cause when it happens, but it is a cheaper thing to get right first.
2. Enable the schedule
DocumentQ Unattended Processing → Enable Unattended Processing
This schedules a Business Central job queue entry that runs the cycle periodically. One cycle polls the mailbox, captures documents sitting at Received, reconciles, decides, registers anything that qualifies for touchless registration, and retries any file offload that did not land earlier.
3. Test it immediately with Run Now
Do not wait for the schedule to prove it works.
Upload an invoice so there is a document sitting at Received, then click Run Now. One cycle runs immediately. Check that the document moved.
If it did not, you now know that within a minute rather than fifteen.
4. Connect the mailbox, if you want the email route
The same page reports whether this tenant currently has a working email retrieval connector, and is where you configure it.
This is the only place the email route runs from. The mailbox is polled inside this scheduled batch and by nothing else — there is no independent mailbox watcher. On a tenant where unattended processing has never been enabled, emailed invoices never appear in DocumentQ at all. If somebody reports that nothing arrives from email, this is the first and usually the only thing to check.
The poll reads unread messages and takes PDF attachments. Send yourself a test invoice, then use Run Now again rather than waiting.
5. Enable touchless registration — both halves
Touchless registration needs two switches, and turning on only one changes nothing:
- DocumentQ Setup → Touchless Registration Enabled — tenant-wide.
- Vendor Touchless Settings — a per-vendor opt-in.
The Unattended Processing page shows the status of both and names which half is missing, rather than sitting scheduled and silent.
6. Choose the vendors deliberately
Do not enable touchless registration for every vendor on day one.
Watch DocumentQ process a few dozen documents first. Look at which vendors reconcile cleanly every single time — same items, same units, prices matching the order, receipts posted before the invoice arrives. Enable those vendors individually.
The per-vendor switch exists precisely so this is a decision about a vendor whose invoices you have actually watched behave, rather than a global bet.
Touchless also applies only to ordinary PO-backed documents. Credit memos, prepayments and contract-coded documents are never registered automatically, because the safety argument for doing so rests on a posted receipt those kinds do not have.
What touchless does and does not do
A touchless document builds its Business Central purchase invoice automatically from your purchase order and posted receipt.
Posting remains a human action, and any approval routing you have configured still applies. There is no flag anywhere in DocumentQ that causes a posting. The unattended batch registers; it does not post.
Confirming it is genuinely working
After a day of running, check three things:
- Documents are moving off Received without anyone clicking Capture.
- Documents for your touchless-enabled vendors are reaching Registered on their own.
- Nothing is quietly accumulating at Capture Failed.
If documents capture but never register, re-check step 1 and step 5 — a missing seat and a missing per-vendor opt-in look identical from the queue.
Not yet observed end to end. No document has yet been watched completing a full unattended cycle — mailbox poll through to touchless registration — on a live tenant. The individual steps are built and each is testable with Run Now. If you are enabling this in production, walk it once on a sandbox first.