Why your company needs a corporate travel solution

It’s no easy feat to manage a team of dedicated employees and their travel arrangements. After all, business travellers’ expectations are changing. Corporate travellers today desire more personalisation, convenience, and the ability to mix business and leisure.

While a business may set up a travel desk or dedicated team or adviser to handle travel needs, doing so could put a strain on its resources, including manpower and budget. Instead, businesses, especially SMEs with limited resources, can use technology-based tools to help them manage business travel.

Want to boost the effectiveness of your company’s travel policy? Then perhaps it’s time to get a corporate travel solution. Apart from revamping the entire process of traditional business travel booking, a corporate travel solution would streamline operations and improve the travel experience. It will free up time usually spent on manual travel booking tasks, allowing managers to focus on higher-value work.

Not convinced? Consider these reasons for adopting a corporate travel solution.

Cater to business travellers’ specific needs 💼

With increasing demands for flexibility, as well as convenient and fast self-service opportunities, travel managers can sometimes struggle to balance traveller satisfaction with corporate interests. After all, not every complaint or request can benefit the company. Thus, travel managers have to identify the feedback that can actually help improve the organisation’s future corporate trips and overall travel strategy.

By having a corporate travel solution, the company can give employees more freedom when making their own travel bookings, while still making sure their arrangements comply with the business’ travel policy. As millennial business travellers are more tech-savvy and appreciate making their own business travel plans, they would view this freedom as an improvement in their travel experience.

A tech-driven travel solution can also allow travellers to select the perks they deem relevant, such as collecting loyalty points, flying with preferred airlines, or choosing their own accommodation. You can put in place controls within the travel solution to make sure that these bookings comply with the company’s requirements, such as budget limits.

Ensure the safety and wellbeing of employees ⛑

Should an emergency arise, business travellers expect to be able to contact their organisation as soon as they can. Unfortunately, it might be a challenge for travel managers to locate employees while they are overseas—especially when the company lacks a tech-driven corporate travel solution. Hence, it can be a challenge for travel managers to guarantee the safety and wellbeing of business travellers.

With a good travel management tool, it would be easier to keep tabs on employee locations and fulfil the company’s duty of care. Apart from being able to access the business traveller’s contact and emergency contact details instantly, travel managers can also provide any necessary information on support and resources in case of an emergency. Business travellers can also be reached at short notice and be updated on any potentially dangerous situations or risks.

Build up traveller compliance ✅

According to McKinsey, business travellers usually deviate from their corporate travel policy if doing so makes travel more convenient. On the other hand, when companies offer employees more flexibility and choice, they enjoy a higher rate of compliance and reduced administrative costs.

By offering business travellers a fast, convenient booking tool that is compliant with the corporate travel policy, companies can make it easy for travellers to make choices within the policy’s scope. After all, the corporate travel solution can be modified according to different travel policies and only show options within price limits or specific requirements.

Make online bookings more efficiently 👩🏻‍💻

Travel managers might sometimes have to deal with spur-of-the-moment changes when it comes to travel arrangements. Unfortunately, it can be a very troublesome, time-consuming process.

However, this could change when the company uses a corporate travel solution. Besides having easy access to their booking information through their mobile devices, employees would be able to make new bookings while they’re on-the-go.

Having the ability to make end-to-end bookings on a mobile device means that business travellers can immediately book a later alternative for a connecting flight, for example, in the event of a delay. Apart from that, travel managers can help make bookings outside of office hours via the corporate travel solution and keep the traveller updated any time.

Save time and money 💸

Multiple rounds of emails are usually required to initiate, clarify and finalise travel requests. While it leads to the same result, a lot of time is lost in the process, and this means a lack of efficiency and potential savings for the company. Having a corporate travel solution ensures a higher level of productivity since all the necessary information is readily available in one place. Travel managers would have access to relevant employee information and be able to make their travel bookings within minutes.

Besides that, processes would be streamlined, and there would no longer be the need for employees to pay out of their pockets and then later claim expenses from the company. This reduces the time spent on matters such as gathering receipts and reporting, claiming, vetting, and reimbursing expenses.

Gain access to a treasure trove of data 📊

Booking all aspects of your organisation’s travel within a single corporate travel solution ensures that all data is captured in one place.

Also, having access to data and travel reports can offer regular guidance and help companies increase the value of their travel programs. After all, a corporate travel solution would generate tons of data filled with valuable metrics such as hidden fees, flight costs, travel frequency, and hotel stay frequency. Thus, organisations can identify savings opportunities, allocate funds, and work within budgets more efficiently.

Have a more efficient travel experience with a corporate solution

With so many benefits to offer, there’s no doubt that a corporate travel solution can do wonders for a company. The right tools can help solve existing issues that travel managers face and also improve employees’ business travel experiences.

So tell us, are you going to start using a corporate travel solution and reap the above benefits?