Smarter Dental Finance: Ottimate Now Available to Sevāredent Members
by Angella Brooks
Dental service organizations (DSOs) have changed the dental industry for the better. By providing operational support, DSOs empower dental practices to focus on delivering outstanding patient care.
But managing a multi-location dental organization is no easy feat. Finance teams must juggle purchasing, supplier relationships, approvals, and compliance across multiple offices, often with lean teams and disconnected technology that wasn’t built for the industry’s complexities. Rising costs and ever-evolving regulations only make things tougher.
When systems are disconnected and processes are manual, even seemingly simple tasks like reconciling invoices, tracking orders, or verifying supplier contracts can become time-consuming and tedious. That leaves DSO staff with less time to focus on higher-value work, such as supporting clinicians, analyzing spending trends, and optimizing operational workflows.
Many DSOs have turned to partners like Sevaredent to help streamline operations. Sevāredent is a Group Purchasing Organization that supports its members by negotiating supplier contracts for clinical supplies and indirect services.
Through a new partnership, Sevāredent members can now access Ottimate, an AI-powered accounts payable (AP) platform built to address the complexities of multi-location operations. As a featured member benefit, Ottimate helps DSOs streamline accounts payable processes, improve financial visibility, and reduce the manual work that often slows teams down, all at preferred member pricing.
Purpose-built AP for DSOs
While many AP platforms claim to support multiple locations, the reality is that most were built with single-location businesses in mind. Ottimate, on the other hand, is purpose-built for multi-location dental practices, making it an ideal fit for Sevāredent members looking to streamline AP.
DSOs can benefit from:
- Automated invoice capture, approvals, and supplier payments across all locations
- Invoice Trust Score, which enables teams to identify and accelerate trustworthy invoices and see which exceptions should be reviewed by AP staff while automatically redacting PHI and supporting HIPAA-compliant document processing
- Margin and cash flow insights that allow for smarter decision-making that supports growth
- Less administrative work, so finance and operations teams can focus on higher value priorities
These capabilities help multi-location DSO finance teams stay compliant, maintain visibility across locations, and avoid getting bogged down in manual processes.
Real-world benefits for DSOs
Managing AP across multiple locations can be a major source of stress for DSOs. Ottimate centralizes AP and automates routine work that often slows DSO finance teams.
Here are five key areas where DSOs see the biggest impact.
1. Operational efficiency
Automating invoices and supplier payments saves a significant amount of time. This is especially impactful for DSOs managing invoices from several locations.
Ottimate enables finance teams to approve invoices for multiple offices within a single workflow, rather than reconciling each location separately. Invoices move through the process faster, which means suppliers get paid on time, and locations stay stocked and running like well-oiled machines. Less manual work also means more time for staff to focus on strategic priorities.
Consider a DSO supporting 12 locations that used to spend 15 hours each week reconciling invoices. Since partnering with Ottimate, approvals are automated, which reduces manual work by 70%. The finance team now has more time to focus on renegotiating supplier agreements, resulting in an estimated $50,000 in annual savings.
2. Scalability for growth
Manual processes may be “good enough” when a DSO is only supporting a few locations. But as the DSO grows, manual AP can’t scale. Organizations must either hire additional staff or compromise on quality.
Automating AP with Ottimate delivers major efficiencies and time savings, empowering DSO finance teams to accomplish more with less. Modernized processes can scale to support expansion and growing invoice volume, without increasing headcount.
3. Accuracy and compliance
Disconnected systems and manual entry open the door to errors and duplicate payments. As DSOs expand and invoice volume increases, risk continues to grow.
Ottimate’s Trust Score helps DSO teams expedite trustworthy invoices while flagging those that need additional review. This allows teams to focus on invoices that truly require human judgment, while maintaining control across all invoices and locations.
Furthermore, Ottimate ensures every invoice and payment is traceable, so DSOs are always audit-ready across all locations. All the while, sensitive financial and patient data are handled securely and in compliance.
Consider a scenario where multiple offices receive invoices for the same lab materials. Ottimate can automatically match those invoices to supplier contracts negotiated by Sevaredent, helping prevent overpayment and keeping records clean and audit-ready.
4. End-to-end visibility and financial insights
DSOs often lack visibility across large (and growing) networks. Without centralized visibility, it’s hard to understand where money is going or what actions to take to improve margins.
With Ottimate, DSOs have real-time visibility into spend, supplier activity, and financial performance at both the office and corporate level, which they can use to fuel better decision-making. For example, finance leaders can easily see which locations are incurring higher lab costs and optimize supplier agreements to improve margins, without impacting the quality of patient care. Real-time visibility also makes it easier to forecast cash flow and plan for large expenditures across multiple locations.
5. Membership perks and preferred pricing
Thanks to a new partnership, Sevaredent members can access Ottimate at preferred rates. That means more multi-location organizations can access the tools needed to modernize financial operations, control costs, and benefit from Sevāredent-negotiated member contracts.
How DSOs can leverage Ottimate
Manually managing AP across multiple locations isn’t efficient and doesn’t support growth. Here are a few key ways DSOs can leverage Ottimate to work to streamline AP across multiple locations.
- Apply Sevaredent contract pricing
Sevāredent members benefit from negotiated supplier agreements and preferred pricing when managing invoices. - Automate AP processes
All invoices are automatically captured, matched to purchase orders, and routed for approval across locations. This reduces manual reconciliation, decreases errors, and helps ensure invoices keep moving through the workflow. - Gain actionable insights
Finance teams get real-time visibility into spend, supplier compliance, and cash flow. These insights fuel better budgeting and smarter decision-making that support growth.
Together, these capabilities create a connected financial ecosystem for DSOs. Finance teams are better equipped to maintain compliance, optimize spend, and allocate resources efficiently across every office location.
Leadership perspectives
“Sevaredent members now have access to Ottimate, giving their DSOs AI-powered AP automation and financial insights. This member benefit helps reduce administrative burden, improve efficiency, and support operational decision-making across multiple offices.” – Blake Hibray, President, Sevaredent Sourcing Solutions
“We’re excited to bring Ottimate to Sevāredent members. DSOs can now leverage our platform to automate AP, track margins and cash flow, and confidently manage finances across all locations — all tailored to the unique needs of multi-location dental organizations.” Zach Svendsen, VP of Alliances, Ottimate
See how Ottimate can transform AP for your DSO
Curious how Ottimate can reduce manual work and provide visibility across all the locations your DSO manages? Find out today.
Sevaredent members can contact their Strategic Account Manager to learn how Ottimate streamlines AP and procurement across all offices. Or, schedule a discovery call with Ottimate and mention your Sevāredent membership to access preferred pricing.