Automation Recommendations — Lasting Language
Emerson North · Lasting Language

Automation
Recommendations

Replacing contractor hours with tools  ·  March 2026

bfolsom@emersonnorth.com
The Problem — In Amanda's Words

What's Eating Her Time

"I feel like AI would probably do a better job scheduling than a lot of people's brains."

Amanda — on scheduling complexity

"I could train a monkey to go from my Google Calendar to my SimplePractice — it's the problem solving that's hard."

Amanda — on the scheduling task

"If that could be automated where it faxed automatically… that would be huge."

Amanda — on Plan of Care faxing

"I get so many paper checks — opening the mail, undoing them, lining them up to sign and deposit, scanning remittances, emailing them to Evelyn."

Amanda — on billing/remittance
📅
Scheduling
PT + Speech coordination, monthly calendar builds
📋
POC Tracking
Expiry alerts, faxing physicians, 3-attempt logging
💰
Remittance
Paper checks, scan → email → manual SP entry
📊
Medicare Cap
Palmetto threshold monitoring, combined PT+SLP billing
What It's Costing Now

Current Admin Stack

RolePersonResponsibilitiesCost / moProblem
Scheduling VA Nora Monthly APL build, PT calendar coordination, schedule emails ~$200 Remote — hard to hold accountable. April schedule still not done.
Billing / POC VA Evelyn POC tracking spreadsheet, physician faxing, remittance entry, Palmetto threshold checks ~$400 Part-time, off-site, limited availability. High manual burden.
Owner time Amanda Opens mail, signs + scans checks, routes to Evelyn, covers gaps ??? Highest-value person doing lowest-value work.
Current known contractor cost ~$600 / mo + Amanda's admin hours
Target: in-house admin + automation tools ~$2,080 / mo Replaces both VAs + frees Amanda's time
The goal: Automation handles the repeatable tasks. The new admin handles what requires judgment and a human face. Amanda stops doing admin entirely.
Automation #1

Scheduling Automation

AI reaches out to patients with a curated schedule — patients don't self-book, the AI handles it all

Current (Manual)
1Pull PT schedule from WebPT manually (1st + 15th)
2Build speech schedule around PT times in Google Sheet (APL)
3Export schedule PDF per patient from SimplePractice
4Email each patient their PDF schedule
5Manually handle every reschedule + cancellation
April schedule still not done. Nora is remote — no accountability.
AI-Driven (No Patient Self-Booking)
1Amanda provides rough availability for next 2 months (1st + 15th)
2Luma syncs Amanda's SP availability → GHL reads open slots
3Dakota AI texts each patient a curated schedule based on their frequency + conversation history
4Patient replies with any conflicts → Dakota adjusts and confirms
5Confirmed schedule → Luma pushes it into SimplePractice automatically
6Cancellations + no-shows → Dakota handles rescheduling outreach automatically
"Amanda sees the patient. The tool handles the rest." — Bryce
Scheduling AI · GHL already in use
GHL + Dakota AI
Dakota handles all patient-facing scheduling conversations via SMS. GHL workflows manage confirmations, cancellation follow-up, no-show reschedule offers, and reminders. This IS the scheduling brain — no new tool needed for the outreach layer.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
SP Sync Layer · New
Luma Health — the bridge, not the brain
Luma's job is narrow but critical: it gives GHL/Dakota a live read of Amanda's SimplePractice availability, and pushes confirmed appointments back into SP. Without it, Dakota can have the conversation but someone still manually enters the appointment into SP. Luma closes that gap.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
Automation #2

Plan of Care Tracking & Fax Automation

Currently Evelyn's job — spreadsheet + manual faxing + 3-attempt documentation

What the automation does
1POC dashboard watches eval date + expiry for every patient
230-day alert fires → GHL notifies Amanda/admin
3eFax automatically sends renewal doc to physician fax number on file
4If no response in 5 days → auto-resend (attempt 2)
5If no response after 5 more days → auto-resend (attempt 3) + flag admin
6All 3 attempts auto-logged with timestamps — compliance documented
Tool stack
Fax Layer
Sfax or eFax Corporate
HIPAA-compliant digital fax API. Can be triggered programmatically via Zapier or Make — no manual printing or scanning. Delivery receipts auto-logged.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
Tracking Dashboard
GHL Custom Fields + Zapier/Make
POC eval date + expiry stored as GHL contact fields. Zapier/Make watches for expiry approach → triggers eFax + logs attempt count. Replaces Evelyn's spreadsheet.
Alternative (all-in-one)
Updox
Healthcare-specific fax + patient communication platform. EHR-agnostic, HIPAA-compliant. Built-in fax logs and retry logic. Integrates with SimplePractice via API.
✓ HIPAA Compliant

"If that could be automated where it faxed automatically… that would be huge."

Amanda Smith
Automation #3

Remittance & Billing Automation

Eliminate the paper check → scan → email → manual entry loop

Current Process
1Medicare mails paper remittance + checks
2Amanda opens mail, lines up checks, signs, deposits
3Scans remittance documents
4Emails scans to Evelyn (off-site)
5Evelyn manually enters remittance data into SimplePractice
6Evelyn verifies amounts are correct
Automated
Primary Fix — Free
ERA (Electronic Remittance Advice) via Availity
Sign up for ERA through Availity (Medicare's free provider portal). Medicare sends remittance electronically — SimplePractice auto-posts ERA directly. No paper, no scanning, no emailing. Evelyn's remittance job essentially disappears.
✓ HIPAA · Free to enroll
Check Handling
Remote Deposit (Bank App)
Any remaining paper checks deposited via mobile deposit. Eliminates the "line them up and sign" step — admin or Amanda photos the check in 30 seconds.
ERA setup: ~2 hours one-time. Saves hours per month immediately.
Automation #4

Medicare Threshold Tracking

Palmetto doesn't have an API — but we can build a dashboard that removes most of the manual checking

How It Works Now
1Each Medicare patient has an annual therapy cap (~$2,300 combined PT + SLP)
2Evelyn checks Palmetto portal + SimplePractice to total running spend
3If PT bills between checks, combined total can silently go over $2,300
4Once threshold hit, she stops checking — but resets annually

"I don't know that there would be a way to automate the Palmetto system."

Amanda — and she's right, there's no Palmetto API
Recommended Approach
Dashboard Layer
Google Sheet Dashboard + GHL Alerts
Build a Google Sheet with one row per Medicare patient. Columns: SLP billing (auto-pulled from SP where possible) + PT billing (manually entered after Palmetto check). Formula calculates running total, highlights when within $300 of cap. GHL sends an alert email to admin.
Longer Term
SimplePractice Financial Reports
Use SP's built-in insurance billing reports to pull SLP totals automatically. Admin only needs to enter the PT side from Palmetto. Reduces manual lookups to once per billing cycle instead of ongoing.
⚠ The PT side will always require a human check in Palmetto — no way around it
The goal is reducing frequency and making it fast — not full automation.
The Human Layer

What the In-House Admin Handles

Automation removes the repeatable work. The admin handles everything that needs judgment and a human face.

Stays Human
  • →Greeting patients in lobby — personable, front-facing
  • →Inbound calls to reschedule existing patients
  • →Outbound calls to referrals — confirm they're scheduled
  • →PT schedule coordination for Synapse shared patients
  • →Edge-case scheduling problems that require judgment
  • →Manual Palmetto threshold entry (PT side only)
  • →Reviewing any fax attempts that didn't get a response
  • →Day-of issues Amanda can now escalate in person
Replaced by Automation
  • ✓Monthly APL spreadsheet build
  • ✓Emailing individual schedule PDFs to patients
  • ✓Appointment confirmation emails and reminders
  • ✓POC expiry monitoring + physician faxing
  • ✓3-attempt fax logging
  • ✓Scanning + emailing remittances to Evelyn
  • ✓Manual remittance entry into SimplePractice
  • ✓Post-discharge review request emails
Recommended Stack

All Tools Together

Scheduling Brain · Already in use
GHL + Dakota AI
Does most of the heavy lifting. Referral pipeline, AI-driven scheduling outreach, appointment confirmations (3-touch), cancellation/reschedule handling, discharge follow-up, review requests, nurture sequence. GHL is already built — Dakota is already live. Extend, don't replace.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
SimplePractice Sync · New
Luma Health
One job: bridge GHL and SimplePractice. Reads Amanda's available slots from SP so Dakota knows what to offer patients. Writes confirmed appointments back into SP so nothing has to be manually entered. Not a scheduling tool — it's the integration layer GHL needs to close the loop.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
POC Faxing · New
Sfax + Zapier/Make
HIPAA-compliant digital fax triggered by GHL. POC expiry → auto-fax physician → retry day 5 → retry day 10 → full audit trail. Replaces Evelyn's manual fax process entirely.
✓ HIPAA Compliant
Remittance · New
ERA via Availity (Medicare)
Free Medicare ERA enrollment. Remittances post directly into SimplePractice — no paper, no scanning, no emailing Evelyn. One-time 2-hour setup. Biggest ROI of any item on this list.
✓ HIPAA · Free
Medicare Cap Tracking
Google Sheet Dashboard + GHL Alert
Palmetto has no API — this stays semi-manual. One row per Medicare patient, SP totals auto-reported, PT side entered by admin after Palmetto check. Formula flags within $300 of cap. GHL sends alert email.
PT Coordination · Future Integration
WebPT API Integration
PT (Synapse) runs WebPT. Goal: connect WebPT to GHL/Luma so PT schedules are read automatically — eliminating the bi-monthly manual pull. Amanda confirmed they use WebPT. Feasibility to be investigated before implementation.
Implementation

Roadmap — 4 Phases

1
This Week
  • Fix referral trigger in GHL
  • Enroll in Medicare ERA via Availity
  • Add confirmation email header images
  • Fix consult workflow (no intake form)
  • Verify review link → Google Maps
2
Weeks 2–3
  • Evaluate Luma Health SP sync — request demo
  • Investigate WebPT API access
  • Set up Sfax + Zapier POC fax workflow
  • Build Medicare threshold dashboard
  • Amanda writes Evelyn + Nora SOPs
3
Month 2
  • Launch Luma Health + SimplePractice sync
  • Go live on POC fax automation
  • Hire in-house admin
  • Onboard admin with SOPs + tool access
4
Month 3+
  • Wind down Nora (scheduling replaced)
  • Reduce Evelyn to part-time review only
  • Write nurture email sequence (9 emails)
  • Amanda fully out of admin work
Net outcome: Nora + Evelyn (~$600/mo contractors) replaced. One in-house admin at $2,080/mo handles everything remaining. Amanda's admin time drops to near zero.

The Goal

Amanda sees patients.
Tools handle the rest.

Decisions Today

  • →Confirm Luma Health vs NexHealth to evaluate
  • →Who sets up Availity ERA enrollment? (Bryce or Amanda)
  • →Admin hire timeline — start sourcing now?
  • →Nurture email copy — Bryce writes or Amanda?

Amanda's Homework

  • →Write Nora's scheduling SOP (already started)
  • →Write Evelyn's POC tracking SOP
  • →Send job description for admin role to Bryce

Bryce Folsom  ·  bfolsom@emersonnorth.com  ·  Emerson North