THE BIG TMC DEBATE AT THE BUSINESS TRAVEL SHOW

The conference programme is SO close to being finalised and we have some fantastic names for 2014, including senior directors of four of the world’s leading TMCs - Carlson Wagonlit Travel, HRG, BCD Travel and Radius Travel - who are going to take part in a panel debate called ‘View From the Top – TMC Leaders Speak’.

The panel will feature TMC luminaries Doug Anderson, President & CEO, Carlson Wagonlit Travel; Stewart Harvey, Group Commercial Director, HRG; John Snyder, President and COO, BCD Travel and Shannon Hyland, President & CEO, Radius Travel. They will reveal their visions for the future of the industry and the future of TMCs; discuss the changing needs of their clients and the hottest topics facing the industry today, from NDC to travel management 2.0.

Don't miss this session - it's a rare opportunity to be able to hear their opinions and visions and to learn from their vast experience and knowledge. It takes place at 1015 on Wednesday 5 February. 

It's free to attend the conference sessions - just make sure you register for a visitor pass at www.businesstravelshow.com. You can also keep an eye on the conference programme on our website too.

GUEST BLOG: Being prepared: the best form of protection for employees abroad

Events abroad such as the Algerian hostage crisis, the Kenyan shopping mall attacks and most recently Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines have shocked us all. Alongside the human impact and devastation, these events serve as a reminder of the need to ensure plans are in place to protect the welfare of employees working overseas.

UK employers have a legal requirement to protect their employees due to Health and Safety legislation and, more recently, the Corporate Manslaughter Act 2007, but still many companies are falling short when it comes to implementing a robust Duty of Care strategy. On a moral level, it should be top of the agenda for all businesses, but it is also significant from a legal point of view; senior management is viewed as liable for any negligence in process, in respect of an organisation’s Duty of Care towards their employees.

Growing markets throughout the world present exciting business opportunities as well as increasing health and security risks, and forward-thinking organisations will consider and plan for all eventualities – no matter how extreme. Natural disasters, civil unrest, terrorist attacks; these are all events that can occur with little or no prior warning, whatever the country. No corner of the globe is free from risk. The recent Cyclone Cleopatra that ravaged the relatively ‘safe’ shores of Sardinia is a case in point.  

So how do employers equip their staff with the tools to protect themselves when faced with a crisis abroad?

Ensuring that they have real-time information and intelligence at their disposal, before and during their journeys, is a start. In this ever-connected world, there’s no excuse to not take advantage of the expertise available. Smartphone technology has transformed the travel risk management landscape. It gives employees instant access to up-to-the-minute data that will help them make informed choices about their movements and, if necessary, instantly request for the assistance of security personnel or medical teams.

Implementing a robust travel risk management strategy has the potential to save lives. That fact alone should encourage those in charge of protecting the welfare of employees, to consider using assistance and intelligence services. Of course, no strategy is capable of preventing disasters from occurring, but there’s no excuse for not allowing employees to be prepared if disaster does strike.

This blog post was written for the Business Travel Show blog by Tim Edwards at AXA Assistance UK. Tim is Business Development Manager for the Corporate Mobility and Travel Risk Management product that AXA Assistance offers. For more information: www.axa-assistance.co.uk/intelligo

GUEST BLOG: How smartphones are transforming the traveller’s behaviour

The year 2013 has been so far the most important year in the history of mobile phone sales as 50 per cent of handsets sold have been smartphones. Having constant internet access from a phone has changed consumers’ habits and it is the travel industry that has experienced this transformation most directly.

According to a recent study from BI Intelligence, there are several factors that are influencing customers’ behaviour, which should be taken into account by all tourism industry suppliers: 

• 32 per cent of smartphone users make travel arrangements using their device, supporting the theory that, in the near future, the number of online sales made via mobile phones could exceed the sales made by traditional means.

• Mobile devices have changed the overall travel experience of consumers. Starting with the moment they book a flight or hotel using the phone, tourists become fully immersed into the variety of networks, which allow them to share their travel experience sociallly, such as Instagram or Pinterest. Finally, they are able to publish their comments and ratings on review sites such as Tripadvisor or Holidaycheck.

• All tourism suppliers are already preparing to meet this growing demand for online purchases through smartphones and consequently are developing specific applications for these devices. Thus, the large online travel agencies such as Booking, Expedia, Orbitz and HRS have designed their own mobile applications. There are also some recently created apps, which content is only available to smartphone operating systems such as Blink, Verylastroom or Hotel Tonight.

• In relation to these newly created applications, the most successful ones are those that offer users the possibility of making last-minute hotel reservations. Some recent studies made by Orbitz and Expedia reveal that about 70 per cent of bookings that come through smartphones were made within 24hs prior to hotel arrival.

In conclusion, all statistics indicate that travel industry is experiencing tremendous changes due to new technologies appearing on the market. They are being frequently used by potential clients and therefore the industry should be aware of any changes in their costumers’ behaviour.

This blog post has been written by Elisenda Molina, e-commerce manager at Abba Hotels. For more information, please visit www.abbahotels.com. 

Sources: http://www.puromarketing.com/21/15302/moviles-como-dispositivos-moviles-estan-transformando-mercado-viajes.html; http://www.celularis.com/mercado/smartphones-en-el-mundo/

GUEST BLOG: Failure rebranded as innovation?

You may have seen Amon Cohen’s recent interview with Dean Forbes in which Dean discussed Managed Travel 2.0 and went on to describe this concept as “failure dressed up as innovation”.

When the idea of Managed Travel 2.0 burst onto the scene it was a fresh approach to a long standing problem: how can we stop maverick travellers booking outside of process and prevent leakage from T&E programmes? Scott Gillespie led the charge promoting the travel innovations he'd like to see and in early 2013 KDS launched Flex T&E as a point of sale solution to this problem. At that time I said it would probably be an 80:20 solution with 20 per cent of corporates going down that route, however, the results have actually been more 95:5 and I believe this is because many people have taken their eyes off the real problem.

Initially we had thought that the emergence of ‘millennials’ onto the scene had driven the urgency to find a new type of solution, as these digital natives are far less forgiving of bad technology. However, the last year has shown us that this is not a generational thing - it's a ‘bad user experience’ thing!

People of all ages leave the corporate process when they can't find what they want. This may be because of poor content (the right content poorly displayed or the right content at the wrong price) or if they have to spend an unreasonable amount of time/effort using the tool (performance and usability).

Put another way - the whole leakage/maverick/millennial problem stems from a failure of tools and processes. When tools, policy and process are at odds with traveller experience, the result will inevitably be leakage and maverick behaviour. Tools and policy driven too aggressively by cost savings sometimes contradicted themselves (we've all flown a cheap flight but ended up spending more on ground transport or seen a cheaper flight than the one listed in our corporate tool) which further 'justifies' the maverick's stance.

Some providers jumped on this as an opportunity to 'not' address their core issue, which was a terrible user experience and lousy content. However, not even millions in marketing budgets can convince the industry that ‘open booking’ is anything more than a rebranding exercise (failure = innovation). Sceptics might even say it's an opportunistic way of bypassing both the TMC and GDS. At KDS we recognise the importance of the ecosystem and believe we all have a role to play both now and in the future.

Allowing people to effectively bypass process and tools using only an 'open booking' solution simply pushes the problem back to the user. They have to spend more time on many different sites for the search and book process. They then have to spend even longer manually entering this into expense systems - two steps backwards!

The simple answer to the problem is a great user experience with complete content. Sound familiar? It should do - because that's what we've attempted to solve with KDS Neo. We have found that Neo is delivering the right results by addressing the core issue and solving the root cause of the problem - fast and simple door-to-door bookings with the best choice of content. Users of all ages are responding to this in the way we hoped – by booking online with the right tool and embedded policy and process. Indeed both hotel attachment and user adoption are up in the customers who have deployed Neo so far.

There is still a place for 'open booking', specifically where there is no TMC in place or if the customer is not using truly innovative solutions like KDS Neo - but it remains on the peripheries rather than on centre stage.

This post was written by Oliver Quayle, KDS Senior VP Products and Partners. For further information on KDS please visit www.kds.com.

WHERE NEXT FOR THE SERVICED APARTMENT SECTOR?

There’s no doubt the industry has seen a significant increase in awareness  – and understanding – of the serviced apartment model in recent years, but what more could operators be doing to make themselves appealing to business travellers and to capture its share of the accommodation budget?

Marlin Apartments

 According to this year’s Global Serviced Apartments Industry Report from The Apartment Service, demand for serviced apartments is outstripping supply in many territories. This is due, in part, to the greater adoption of serviced apartments in travel policies, but also to more apartment operators taking short-stay (less than one week) business away from hotels.

But the report also claims that the serviced apartment sector still has a very long way to go and that its shortfalls are, in fact, self-inflicted. How?

• Varying terminology between territories (serviced apartment in the UK, corporate housing in the US, etc)
• Varying consistency of the product 
• Lack of synergy between the product and the GDS distribution channels used by TMCs
• Lack of recognised ratings system

Dolphin Square

So what’s the answer? According to TAS, the key to driving an even greater understanding of serviced apartments is through greater standardisation and the introduction and adoption of an industry-wide code of conduct for operators.

Let’s hope it’s not too long before these steps are taken and the serviced apartment sector can take another well-deserved leap forward in being accepted by corporate travellers and managers.

This post was written by David Chapple, who is event director of the Business Travel Show, which takes place 4-5 February 2013. Buyers can visit the ASAP (Association of Serviced Apartment Providers) Pavilion at the show, which celebrates its 20^th anniversary in 2014. 

GUEST BLOG: The shortest business class trip ever

I distinctly remember the first time I visited the Business Travel Show – it opened up a whole world I never knew about as a starter in the industry and I still have friends today that I met on that first visit at the exhibition’s old home in Angel, Islington. 

But it is the first time I decided to invest in exhibiting which I recall the most. As Sales & Marketing Director at Statesman Travel it was a difficult job to persuade the MD to invest in a space, stand, time and resources to get the most out of the show. But it was worth every penny as we showcased our services for the first time publicly to the market.  

I recall one client who was considering our services visited our booth and, to this day, I think the sight of us at the event added weight to our bid as a credible company. We won the account, of course. But it was when all the hard work was over that I experienced my most memorable BT Show experience. 

We had neglected to book any transportation for our booth post event, so I bribed a team from another airline booth to throw our stuff in the back and give us a lift across London.  We sat buckled up in the back of a truck in a set of brand new transatlantic business class seats for the five mile trip across the capital. Mission complete, at a competitive price too, and surely I must hold the record for the shortest business class trip ever?

This post was written by Paul Tilstone, SVP Global Operations, Global Business Travel Association.

NDC: THE CARROT AND THE STICK

It’s been a while since we blogged about NDC – five months in fact – and, in that time, this most controversial of business travel issues has continued to dominate headlines. It also came up again and again at the GBTA Europe Conference last week. And it was there that I had an idea.

There has been a lot of negative comment about NDC, but I think it’s safe to say the industry agrees that the price transparency NDC provides is a positive thing for everyone: the airlines, the buyer and the traveller. By displaying everything from the basic fare, to the extras such as baggage fees, extra legroom costs and taxes, buyers and consumers can compare like for like for the first time when booking flights and airlines can compete fairly. 

And this made me wonder. Does NDC have the potential to help travel managers drive and increase compliance while also keeping their travellers happy? Can it be both a carrot and a stick?

For example, if all airlines displayed a de-ancillaried price on NDC, TMCs could then negotiate any ancillary costs directly, and the choice of those ancillaries – up to the value of, say, five per cent of the air fare – could be left up to the traveller. So the traveller could decide if they prefer extra leg room, priority boarding or lounge access, for example, and this element of choice would help to make them feel like they were valued and had some element of control, while, in fact, they were being gently coerced into complying with policy. And a compliant traveller is every travel manager’s Holy Grail, right?.

By David Chapple

David Chapple is event director of the Business Travel Show, which takes place 4-5 February 2014 in London. Find out more at www.businesstravelshow.com. Comment on this blog below, or contact David on Twitter @btshowlondon