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Satisfied Business Travellers Drive Online Adoption & Cost Savings,Satisfied Business Travellers

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Satisfied travelers drive program adoption and travel cost savings

5 min

As travellers around the world prepare to get back on the road post coronavirus (COVID-19), managing corporate travel spend is more important to businesses than ever. Working with the right travel management company (TMC) can help your business find savings by giving you visibility into your travel data, delivering powerful travel technology for a better user experience, and providing strong online and offline support. When it comes to spend management, working with a TMC that has high adoption rates should be top of mind as this can help you significantly save time and money. High adoption rates start with providing your travellers with a booking tool they love and will use again and again.  It's also essential to listen to and act on business traveller feedback to successfully implement your travel programme.

High adoption results in savings at Umpqua Bank and Nasdaq

We know that an unmanaged programme can increase the time and money spent on corporate travel. But a managed travel programme is only as good as its rate of adoption — your team has to use the travel booking tools for your business to see the highest return rates.

“Here’s the brilliant thing about Egencia and the rate of return on investment that we get: The fee structure’s low and what we make up in unused ticket management pays for it, so it’s fantastic. And then on top of it, you have a tool that people want to use, you have high online adoption — and if you don’t have a tool that people want to use, they’re not going to use it.”

— JJ Giachetti, corporate travel manager, Umpqua Bank

One thing making adoption easier is the fact that our digital corporate travel tools work across every device, meaning travellers can change plans when they’re on the road without having to look elsewhere. Our customers tell us that increased adoption ultimately delivers company-wide savings.

Six months after signing on with Egencia for their corporate travel management Nasdaq realised savings of $500,000 (a 32 percent reduction), increased online adoption from 30 to 61 percent, and reduced the number of hours needed to manage the travel programme by 50 hours a week.

Nasdaq case study

A high online adoption also means that your travellers will see — and be more likely to follow — any of the cost-savings initiatives you’ve woven into your programme and corporate travel policies. Your business might have introduced spending caps, for example, or airfare class limits. Your company may also be taking advantage of added value offers and savings technology that you don’t want your travellers to miss. With us, customers can use Egencia Savings Finder for Air and Hotel, for example, and save an average of 14 percent* per air ticket and 7 percent** per optimised hotel booking.

Making a travel programme work for different types of travellers at James Fisher Marine Services Ltd. 

Businesses can’t build successful travel programmes with a one-size-fits-all mentality. The ability to personalize the booking process and experience and allow for individual modifications is essential for modern companies with modern workforces. The booking experience needs to be adaptable for employees and contractors regardless of what normal travel may look like. Egencia offers a single digital corporate travel solution that’s intuitive and easy to use. That means there’s only one place for travellers to book and amend travel across devices, no matter where they're based around the globe. What’s more, it’s the same place that travel managers can update policy and modify profiles, and Egencia travel consultants can access to provide support. This single solution technology provides the flexibility and agility to support every type — and size — of business.

“Before moving to Egencia, previous business travel companies struggled to accommodate our needs. To put [our needs] into perspective, we’re frequently required to coordinate the travel of 20-plus engineers, technicians, and divers, including flights, cars, hotels, luggage, and other requirements like oversized luggage for things like diving equipment. And all of this often happens at short notice, and with location-specific restrictions.”

– Lisa Murphy, business operations lead at James Fisher Marine Services Ltd

Travellers need to quickly and easily find the right options to meet their needs, but there’s more that goes into creating a positive travel booking experience. Making sure travellers are comfortable with the payment process is also essential to boost traveller satisfaction. The option to include guest profiles or a lodge card in your travel programme, makes it easy to help travellers who may not be full-time employees but contractors, for example.

“Sub-contractors don’t have the same privileges as normal policy allows, so it’s great that we can customise this and set limits for them in the guest profiles on the Egencia platform. [Contractors] also prefer not to give credit cards when booking or staying anywhere, so we use the lodge card to pay for everything. We prepay and invoice in one go, so there are no fiddly expenses.”

— Lisa Murphy, business operations lead at James Fisher Marine Services Ltd. 

Listening and adapting to travellers’ needs at Zeb

Experienced travel managers know that their travellers are at the heart of doing business on the road. At Egencia, our unique corporate travel solution integrates your organisation’s travel policy into the booking tool so you can put the power of booking into your travellers’ hands and ensure their satisfaction.

“We believe that our employees can make their own decisions while they’re travelling, and therefore, we don’t control them too much — we just trust their own judgment on travelling. They’re spending a lot of nights in hotels — they need to feel comfortable.”

— Dr. Christian Spieker, head of corporate services, Zeb

Companies with experience in business travel know how important feeling comfortable on the road is because it impacts employee happiness — and ultimately, the quality of their work.

“We have our own surveys with the travellers; we ask them how satisfied they are. Traveller satisfaction has a big impact on the quality of the work in our company.”

— Dr. Christian Spieker 

Download our essential checklist for business travel savings to see how our technology and expertise could help you manage your travel spend and save.

*Figures for 2019 financial year

**Figures between 26/11/2019 - 06/03/2020

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