Hotel Emma

BACKGROUND

Hotel Emma is an independently owned and operated boutique hotel in San Antonio’s Historic Pearl Neighborhood. Known for providing exceptional service, extensive amenities, and impeccable attention to detail. They have also been honored with the prestigious Five Diamond Award from AAA, recognizing it as one of the best hotels in the country.

Shortly after opening Hotel Emma in 2015, executives realized that there were opportunities to upgrade the standard Accounts Payables paper check process.

All payments were manually processed using paper checks, which was time-consuming and slowed down the payment cycle to valued vendors. Every check had to be routed for approval, cut, stamped, and required a two-signature system. This meant tracking down multiple people before getting payments in the mail.

The time had come to supplement an outdated and inefficient AP process with a more modern payment solution.

Once introduced to Edenred Pay’s Payment Automation Platform, the decision to come onboard was almost immediate. “There were absolutely no hesitations, recalls Jon Sakshaug, VP of Finance for Hotel Emma. “We knew automating our accounts payables was the most logical decision we could make for our business.”

SOLUTION

The integration to Edenred Pay’s Platform was virtually seamless and the time investment to make the transition was minimal.

Edenred Pay worked directly with Hotel Emma’s vendors to get them enrolled and provided comprehensive training to the staff to ensure they felt comfortable and confident using the electronic payments platform.

“We work with many local vendors who had no prior experience receiving electronic payments,” Sakshaug revealed. Although there were no real hesitations, Sakshaug acknowledges he was slightly skeptical about vendor enrollment. “I was unsure of how many vendors would actually participate,” he admits. “But the response has been remarkably positive, and enrollments have exceeded my expectations.”

RESULTS

Approximately 40% of Hotel Emma’s payments are now being made through Edenred Pay’s Payment Automation Platform. The Edenred Pay partnership saves their team 4-5 hours a week on payment processing.

Edenred Pay continues to lead vendor enrollment initiatives on behalf of Hotel Emma, encouraging new and existing vendors still using paper checks to get paid faster with electronic payments.

In addition to time savings, Hotel Emma has earned over $30,000 a year in cash-back rebates. The added revenue goes straight to their bottom line, allowing Hotel Emma to reinvest those earnings into other areas of the operation.

“I only see positives to partnering with Edenred Pay,” Sakshaug shared.