Alert someone not sending notifications

Hi

I have a very standard approval workflow set up, that is not issuing alerts as expected:

The initial Approval request is sent through (the emails and Smartsheet alerts for that are correctly received) and the approval or rejection action is done, but the alert to be sent for "If Approved" or "If Declined", just never ever arrive - on email or in my Smartsheet alerts. To try to eliminate the problem, I am set up as both parties (originator and approver), I am the sheet owner and a system admin, I have set the alerts and notifications in the Automation Settings as unrestricted... but I get nothing. Zip. Nada.

The workflow is triggered like this:

That status comes from a form that sets the Status column to "Pending" by default - it is a hidden field.

After the accepted/declined alert, the next step in both cases, is to lock the row, and that action is performed, so the automation is clearly working its way through the steps.

Any suggestions, please!? I'm going nuts!

Karla