Expense - Missing Add expense button when report is created offline on instant submission

[jponikarchuk]

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Version Number: 9.2.74-0
Reproducible in staging?: Yes
Reproducible in production?: No
If this was caught during regression testing, add the test name, ID and link from BrowserStack: Exploratory
Email or phone of affected tester (no customers): jnsdonsoijnods@gmail.com
Issue reported by: Applause Internal Team
Bug source: Exploratory - Critical User Impact
Device used: Mac 26.1 / Chrome
App Component: Money Requests

Action Performed:

Precondition:

• Submission frequency is Instantly.
• Disable Add approvals and Make or track payments.

1. Go to staging.new.expensify.com
2. Go to workspace chat.
3. Go offline.
4. Click + > Create report.

Expected Result:

Add expense button will be shown when report is created offline.

Actual Result:

Add expense button is missing when report is created offline when workspace is on instant submission.

Workaround:

Unknown

Platforms:

• Android: App
• Android: mWeb Chrome
• iOS: App
• iOS: mWeb Safari
• iOS: mWeb Chrome
• Windows: Chrome
• MacOS: Chrome / Safari
• MacOS: Desktop

Screenshots/Videos

1.mp4

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[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @muttmuure (Bug), see https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/14418 for more details. Please add this bug to a GH project, as outlined in the SO.

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @rlinoz (DeployBlockerCash), see https://stackoverflowteams.com/c/expensify/questions/9980/ for more details.

[melvin-bot]

💬 A slack conversation has been started in #expensify-open-source

[github-actions]

👋 Friendly reminder that deploy blockers are time-sensitive ⏱ issues! Check out the open `StagingDeployCash` deploy checklist to see the list of PRs included in this release, then work quickly to do one of the following:

1. Identify the pull request that introduced this issue and revert it.
2. Find someone who can quickly fix the issue.
3. Fix the issue yourself.

[rlinoz]

I believe it is coming from #76504

[DylanDylann]

@rlinoz Let me check it

[Nodebrute]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

Missing Add expense button when report is created offline on instant submission

What is the root cause of that problem?

When a report is created offline with instant submission enabled, the report actions are not loaded yet. The isAwaitingFirstLevelApprovalNew then tries to find the action in an empty array, which returns undefined. When is called, it returns null, and the function incorrectly returns false for empty reports, preventing users from adding the first transaction.

This bug was already there but it affected the UI in PR #76504, which replaced (deprecated) with isAwaitingFirstLevelApprovalNew. The old function used getSubmitToAccountID(policy, report), which only needed policy data and didn't require report actions to be loaded, so it worked correctly offline. The new function requires report actions to be loaded, causing the issue when they're not available yet.

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

When report actions are not loaded yet (e.g., offline scenario), check if report is empty and if empty, allow adding transactions by returning true We should add this below line of code here
https://github.com/Expensify/App/blob/main/src/libs/ReportUtils.ts#L2004

    if (!reportActions || reportActions.length === 0) {
        const transactions = getReportTransactions(report?.reportID);
        const transactionCount = report?.transactionCount ?? 0;
        if ((!transactions || transactions.length === 0) && transactionCount === 0) {
            return true;
        }
    }

What alternative solutions did you explore? (Optional)