Issue:
You create a custom app with two step approval. Approver 1 approves then it emails a SharePoint group following which it assigns a task to a user in the group. The first step approval outcome and its task assignment works like a charm, but when it comes to notifying a SharePoint group, your workflow gets ‘Suspended’ after multiple retries.
FIX
To check whether or not user workflow is suspended/running you can go to your Item’s properties (…) > Advanced > Workflow
Where it says ‘Started’ in the image above, if it was suspended you will see ‘Suspended’.
Click on ‘Suspended’ and you will be taken to the workflow status page and you will see something like this on clicking the blue I button next to Internal Status
Not a pretty sight! And if you are like me, then the first thing you do is to check Uncle Bing and type sp.utilities.utility.SendEmail Correlation then promptly panic, because you have no clue what those SharePoint 2013/2010/2007/2003 on premise fixes mean, especially where they show all sorts of .NET fixes..Ummmmm….nope. NO thanks. And, I don’t blame you. If something looks too complex and hard, you are probably not looking in the right direction. So, you stop, close your eyes and recollect your thoughts, preferably with a couple of shots of espresso!
If something says ‘Access denied’, it’s probably just that, the user who is trying to email to the group doesn’t have access to it.
But, you gave that user ‘Edit’ permission to the entire site. So, what’s the missing link? What part of the SharePoint group do they not have access to? Espresso kicks in and wait…let’s just check the said SharePoint Group’s Settings instead of having a depressing monologue in our heads.
Aha! Well, if I set the viewership of the group to just its members and expect everyone to email the group that wasn’t real smart of me is it now? Change that to Everyone.
Now restart the suspended workflow and everything is good in your SharePoint Online Office 365 Workflow World DUH!!!
Oh well! Sometimes espresso is the right choice.
