Beyond Automation: EHS Business Solutions' Journey to 75% Time Savings and 5x Growth

Why do most accounts payable departments still manually handle the majority of the invoices they receive, even after investing in automation technology? In this IOFM webinar, sponsored by Ottimate, AP industry veteran Mark Brusso sits down with Liz Schwartz, founder and CEO of EHS Business Solutions, and Don Dittmar, VP and Head of Product at Ottimate, to unpack why partial automation creates more risk than it solves, and how one restaurant-focused accounting firm achieved 75% time savings and 5x growth using full AP and payment automation. Liz shares how automating invoice processing and vendor payments let her firm scale client capacity without adding headcount, onboard 90% of vendors to ACH payment, and shift her team from data entry into higher-value advisory work. Don and Mark round out the conversation with a broader industry view on AI-driven coding, ERP integration, and how to build fraud-resistant approval policies. What you'll learn in this webinar: Why nearly three-quarters of AP departments have some automation technology, yet still manually handle most invoices Why partial automation creates process risk, mixed workflows, and inconsistent controls across locations How EHS Business Solutions achieved 75% time savings and 5x growth for a restaurant-focused accounting practice How automating vendor payments (with 90% of vendors on ACH) eliminated manual check writing and mailing Why rapid growth or acquisitions are a common trigger for finally automating AP How AI-driven predictive coding and reinforced learning are changing what "automated" AP looks like today How to build approval workflows and spending policies without overengineering them What to know about ERP integrations, including QuickBooks, Intuit Enterprise Suite, NetSuite, Sage Intacct, and Microsoft Dynamics How the platform scales to handle high invoice volume (tens of thousands of invoices per month) Chapters: 0:00 Welcome and speaker introductions 4:04 Why most AP departments still handle invoices manually despite automation 5:26 Poll: Where is your organization in its AP automation journey? 7:34 How AI is changing what "fully automated" AP looks like 7:53 Why partially automated AP creates risk 15:23 How automation helps restaurants and hospitality businesses scale 21:14 How automation supports a firm through rapid growth or acquisition 30:23 Scalability: growing your business without growing your team 32:57 Poll results: Biggest AP challenges today 42:22 Poll: If you could automate one AP task, what would it be? 42:56 How vendor payments and ACH onboarding work end-to-end 49:35 Lessons learned and what's next for EHS Business Solutions 52:14 Q&A: Setting approval thresholds and spend policy 53:05 Q&A: Can the system handle high invoice volume? 53:55 Q&A: ERP integrations (QuickBooks, NetSuite, Sage, Dynamics) 55:37 Closing advice and wrap-up This session is built for restaurant and hospitality finance leaders, accounting firm owners, and AP teams evaluating whether their current automation actually goes far enough. Learn more about Ottimate's AP and payment automation at www.ottimate.com.