GUEST BLOG: Is your travel risk management programme really fit for purpose? 7 questions to put it to the test.

Every organisation, regardless of size, has a legal and moral duty of care to protect their employees wherever they may be. Away from their more familiar surroundings, they’re likely to find themselves in environments that can present unforeseen and unfamiliar threats to their health, safety and security. The importance of therefore having a fully integrated travel risk management programme in place cannot be underestimated. So how confident are you in yours?

In order to be effective, a solid TRM programme needs to encompass both proactive and reactive measures and needs to start well before a journey has even been booked. 

Pre-trip - The groundwork for any travel risk management programme needs to be laid well in advance. Having the right policies and procedures in place and ensuring that they’re communicated, understood and adhered to, is vital.

You then need to ensure that you have an accurate real-time picture of the risks that your people may face so travel risk assessments are key - evaluating and documenting the potential hazards in a particular area, identifying the level of risk and suggesting steps to mitigate and control it.

Just as important is how you prepare your employees for travel. Basic travel safety awareness training is crucial, even for seasoned travellers. If travel has been authorised to higher risk destinations, specific pre-trip briefings should also be carried out and, where necessary, additional protection measures taken. 

Active trip - During any trip, you need the ability to not just locate your travellers at any given time but also communicate with them, alert them to any potential risks and be able to provide immediate assistance. They, in turn, need the ability to easily access advice and assistance, if required.

Post-trip - It’s common to assume that once a trip is completed so are all of the required actions, but this isn’t the case. After a trip, it’s important that you have a mechanism in place to gather feedback in order to constantly review your programmes to ensure that they’re truly fit for purpose.

To assess whether your own travel risk management programme is fit for purpose, I’d encourage you to ask the following questions: 

1. Do we have clearly defined policies and procedures relating to travel (from a health, safety and security perspective) that are not just documented but are communicated and adhered to by all concerned?
2. Do we have access to reliable real-time health, safety and security information that can be used to support travel decisions and can be easily communicated to travellers before they embark on any trip?
3. Are all of our travellers provided with the necessary pre-travel training and relevant briefings to empower them as individuals?
4. Do we have a process for controlling travel to higher-risk regions?
5. In the event of a safety, security or health incident, are we able to locate and communicate with travellers and advise/support them accordingly?
6. Do we have a robust incident/crisis management plan for dealing with emergencies? And is this regularly tested?
7. Do we have total confidence in all parties in our chain, both internal and external?

It’s important to remember that TRM programmes don’t just deal with the major incidents or cover your people in high risk areas. A TRM programme will also help you prepare for and mitigate against far more common occurrences such as travel disruptions, road traffic accidents or medical-related incidents. Although these incidents may not hit the headlines, they can still have a significant impact, not just on the individual traveller but also on the organisation as a whole.

If you’re at all concerned about your travel risk management programme or would just like some general advice, the Anvil team will be on hand at the Business Travel Show, stand B312.

This post was written by Matthew Judge, Group Managing Director, Anvil Group. To learn more about Riskmatics®, Anvil’s award-winning risk management system, visit https://www.anvilgroup.com/riskmatics/

Anvil Group is exhibiting at the Business Travel Show on 20-21 February 2019 at Olympia London. Visit them on stand B312.

GUEST BLOG: How sentiment analysis will revolutionise how companies measure the true cost of travel

 

Why is sentiment analysis important in understanding the total cost of business travel? 

If we look at our recently conducted Planes, Trains and Marginal Gains report, it is clear that business travellers have needs outside of a room for a night. So when we change a corporate policy that restricts the options available for our travellers, or restricts their travel abilities, there is often a correlating impact on morale. This impact on morale can manifest itself in many ways, such as tired or unprepared travellers, who arrive at meetings or events feeling frustrated. There is therefore a high likelihood that the reason for travel isn’t successful - that the sale isn’t closed, not all the meeting agenda was covered - meaning additional travel and meetings are needed, or poor business decisions are inadvertently made.

All of these have an impact on cost – whether it’s lost sales, or additional travel. But we need to marry these risks with the opportunity for savings. This is why it’s important to understand the impact of policy changes on travellers, or even try to pre-empt how a change would be felt within the business.

At Clarity, we are looking at how sentiment analysis can give us insight into how policy and business guidelines actually impacts the traveller. One of the key areas of focus for travel buyers for 2018 is how to spend less but retain quality, and so customer, and more importantly, traveller feedback is vital. But guess what? Not all travellers want to fill in a survey. And if they do, we don’t always get the truth. More often, we get as little information as is necessary to complete the survey. 

So, it’s important that any traveller surveys that we do provide clearly explain how it will inform the overall travel policy, with relevant questions, such as: opinions on days in lieu in return for extensive business travel; the benefit of utilising properties with access to gyms; monitoring the amount and quality of sleep that travellers get when away on business; and feedback on type and class of travel, location of accommodation etc. We can then link this information back to the properties, carriers, times and seasonality of stays and get a clearer picture of traveller experience and sentiment, and use this data to help strike a balance between corporate spend and traveller satisfaction.

We are also looking into how we can also use sentiment analysis from a much wider base of users to help provide recommendations that, when taken in conjunction with that amount of traveller feedback, give a strong wide coverage of sentiment around a product or experience for example - by tapping into the power of social media.

But this isn’t as simple as it sounds. For example, I need to be able to filter out noise such as unrelated sentiment. However the results are worth it. If I can help a customer determine the best fit travel policy that takes into account the needs of the traveller as well as the company, give the company the ability to see the impact and sentiment of the travellers behind that policy throughout the lifespan of the contract, and more importantly monitor what impact any policy changes have, then the net result can be a happy customer and a happy traveller.

The bottom line is sentiment analysis is an essential component in measuring the total cost of travel in 2018. By embracing this, companies will be able to determine a best fit travel policy - one that takes into account the needs of the traveller as well as the company - which in turn can reduce costs, maintain quality and, by combining spend with return on investment, enable customers to measure the true cost of travel.

This blog was written by Darren Williams, Head of Management Information and Data, at Clarity. He will be on stand B520 at the Business Travel Show demonstrating the new approaches Clarity is taking to measure the true cost of travel. To secure a one-on-one meeting at the show call 0800 731 1627.

GUEST BLOG: Safety first.

It’s every manager’s worst nightmare – a seemingly regular business trip goes wrong and your employee goes missing abroad. Your emails are unanswered, calls unreturned, and the employee fails to turn up to their scheduled meeting.

Whilst the possible harm to your employee is undoubtedly and rightly your main concern, the consequences for businesses which have failed to adequately pre-empt and plan for risk can be dire – from finding yourself in the middle of a media inquisition to the possibility of criminal charges.

Under the UK’s Health & Safety legislation, companies owe a duty of care to their employees and must take reasonable steps to protect their personnel (from sourcing safe vehicle hire to understanding the employee’s pre-existing illnesses). However, many businesses are ill informed about exactly what constitutes ‘reasonable steps’, as the buck doesn’t simply stop with a travel insurance policy. This, in isolation, does not represent a duty of care plan and will not prevent the employee from being exposed to risk. Instead, careful planning and ongoing management should be at the foundation of every overseas trip, particularly when considering the unique and unexpected risk factors that some countries face. From the Ebola outbreak in West Africa to the recent uncharacteristic protests in Hong Kong and terrorist attacks in Europe, the varied nature and scope of risk has certainly been shown by events of late.

The overwhelming force of globalisation has changed the structure and pace of corporate life – meaning travelling internationally is a necessary part of doing business for globally operating companies. Assessing the risks for business travellers is about so much more than insurance, as the costs to a business of an employee coming to harm whilst working away from home can be far more significant. Pre-empting risk is essential in order for every business that works internationally to avoid fines, imprisonment – and ultimately danger to their employees.

This post was written by Matthew Judge, Group Managing Director, ANVIL, which is launching the next generation of its traveller security application TRIS at the Business Travel Show today and tomorrow. Register online or onsite - www.businesstraveller.com/register 

GUEST BLOG: Let the games begin

Business travellers are booking out of policy – we know that. One half of hotel reservations are made outside the approved booking tool*, and 59 percent of business travellers reported booking at least one major part of their latest trip out of policy**.

They’re generally not doing it to hurt your company. In fact, 79 percent of business travellers reported they booked out of policy to get a better deal**. The problem is, those deals aren’t necessarily better. On average, travellers who book out of policy spend $2,881 more on business trips than they needed to**. Travellers want to do right by their company but don’t always know how. For example, corporate negotiated rates can help to keep costs down, but travellers can’t access those rates if booking directly with an airline. In addition to lost savings, out-of-policy bookings can result in fragmented or incomplete data that can make locating travellers during a crisis more difficult, weaken negotiations with suppliers and hinder smart decision-making.

So, what are your options? You can let it continue. You can look for open booking technology that lets travellers book however they want while aggregating your data. Or you can implement a modern engagement strategy that connects travellers with your travel programme and goals using gamification mechanics. By sitting on top of your current booking platform, this is likely the fastest, most efficient and most fun fix.

Compliance isn’t top of mind for today’s travellers. Gamification – a modern, incentives-based engagement strategy that uses competition and collaboration to motivate desired behaviours – can help align the interests of your employees with your company’s cost and compliance aims. Rather than using penalties to enforce policies, modern engagement effortlessly educates travellers on how and why to make smart travel decisions, and uses friendly competition, badges, points and leader boards to encourage them to book within your policy.

 How Modern Engagement Helps Travellers

• Set goals 
• Track and improve performance 
• Receive real-time feedback 

 How Modern Engagement Helps Companies

• Promote desired behaviours 
• Improve traveller satisfaction and loyalty 
• Improve traveller experience 

This post was written by Alicia L. Tillman, Vice President, Deal Consulting and Business Services,
American Express Global Business Travel who are exhibiting at the Business Travel Show 4-5 February 2014. Register now at www.buisinesstravelshow.com