Software request form: approving new tools without shadow IT or licence surprises

A software request form is how employees ask for a new application, extension or subscription before it is bought or installed. Without one, tools arrive on company cards and personal sign-ups, data ends up in services nobody has assessed, and the organisation pays for three products that do the same thing. The form does not exist to say no; it exists so that yes comes with a security check, a named owner and a licence record.

What a software request form should ask

• The software name, vendor and website — and the specific plan or edition.
• The business need in the requester's words: what problem it solves.
• Who will use it and how many licences are needed.
• What data it will handle, especially personal, customer or financial data.
• Whether it connects to other systems or needs single sign-on.
• Cost: price per user or per year, and the budget holder who approves it.
• Alternatives already in use that were considered.

Route the request by risk

1. Check first whether an approved tool already covers the need — the cheapest approval is pointing at existing software.
2. Low risk (no sensitive data, no integrations, low cost): approval by the line manager and IT.
3. Medium risk (business data or integrations): add a security review of the vendor.
4. High risk (personal or regulated data, broad access): add data protection review and, where relevant, a vendor due diligence checklist.
5. Record the decision, the conditions and the approver.
6. Only then purchase through the normal route so the licence lands in the asset record.

Ask what data the software will touch before asking what it costs. A free tool that receives customer data is a bigger decision than a paid one that does not.

Keep requests and approvals in one place

Ettex Forms can host the software request form with conditional questions — the data and integration section only appears when the answer calls for it — and each request lands in Ettex Records with status, approver and decision. Approved software then belongs on the IT asset register with owner, renewal date and licence count, so the next request for a similar tool can be answered by looking up what the organisation already owns.

After approval

• Assign an owner responsible for access, renewal and removal.
• Record licence count and renewal date, and review both before renewal.
• Add the tool to onboarding and offboarding checklists if accounts are per person.
• Include it in periodic user access reviews where it holds sensitive data.
• Retire duplicate tools the new software replaces.

Software requests are one type of IT request; hardware, access and general support requests follow the same intake pattern with different approvers, which is the job of a broader IT request form.