GUEST BLOG: Enhance connectivity to counteract travel risks

The UN tells us there are now more people in the world with mobile phones than ever before. According to GSMA Intelligence, there are also more mobile devices than people. And the 7.2 billion devices already used around the globe are multiplying a lot faster than we are.

The fact is, we’re hooked on our mobile connectivity. We’re using mobile devices for everything from tracking our partners to forecasting the weather, and even measuring our heart health.

Business travellers are depending on mobiles too

When business travellers set off abroad they turn to their mobile devices to find their way, research accommodation, catch up on news, make travel plans, pin down colleagues and more.

But when something serious happens overseas, it’s not always easy to find exactly the right advice and help quickly, from a single online source. Especially in the last year, when travellers have had to contend with everything from the British Airways flights fiasco and cyber security threats, to wildfires, hurricanes and terrorist attacks.

The (not so good) old days

Dramatic as recent global events have been, they’re not unprecedented. Think back to Turkey in July 2016, when the military surrounded Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport and flights were grounded. Or to Paris in November 2015, when there were several terrorist attacks across the city. Or to Greece in July 2015, when wildfires raged outside Athens. Many business travellers in situ had limited real-time and comprehensive information about what was going on, or how to react.

The value of hand-held solution

What if corporate travel risk mitigation came hand-in-hand with mobile access to a complete online risk management programme, as a matter of course? What if this global programme anticipated both medical and security risks, and provided services to mitigate these risks, such as pre-travel advice and training, tailored to specific destinations and needs?

What if it offered an accurate gauge of what life was really like on the ground abroad, with real-time intelligence and situational awareness?  What if it provided location-based monitoring and asset tracking; enabling HR departments to see all their global staff and assets in the context of relevant threats, and letting relatives at home see how close loved ones were to danger?

If an emergency struck, what if travellers could counteract the risk by using their mobile apps to raise an alert or call for medical or security assistance and advice from multilingual response teams - at the swipe of a screen?  And all this from the same mobile source, on a single mobile platform.

Meeting expectations

Business travellers today are venturing further afield than ever, to countries with limited medical care and volatile security situations. Even in traditionally safe destinations, threats to their health and safety are unpredictable.

It’s no surprise that their expectations of travel risk management have changed. Increasingly, they want to know about the real-time risks that they’re up against abroad and harness the right technology to counteract them - from a single source in the palm of their hands.  

Advanced mobile intelligence tools can’t always prevent a crisis overseas. But they can limit the impact of an emergency - and that’s a compelling reason to make them part of any travel risk management plan.

This post was written by Chris Knight, head of corporate services at global assistance providers CEGA. CEGA and security experts Solace Global are exhibiting their one-source medical and security assistance service, INtrinsic, at the Business Travel Show, stand B254. Register for your free ticket now at http://bit.ly/2qYu9GF. 

How are airports transforming to improve business travellers’ experience?

Despite a sluggish 2016, business travel growth is set to go full steam ahead over the next few years, driven by economic buoyancy in emerging markets, a boost in global trade, and fluctuating currencies, according to the latest forecast from the Global Business Travel Association.

For some though, the airport can be the most stressful and unpleasant part of a trip. For business travellers in particular, the airport can be a thorn in their side – a regular part of their working routine which can be unproductive and often eats into personal time.

Thankfully, many terminals across the world are now transforming to better appeal to travellers. In fact, recent research from Collinson Group showed that 53 per cent of travellers now say they enjoy the time they spend in airports. So why is this change in perception occurring?

Expanding the choice of activities for downtime

A big emphasis has been put on expanding retail options, particularly luxury shops and duty-free discounts, as well as creating sanctuaries for passengers to relax ahead of flights. At Dubai International Airport, there are Sleep Pods for weary travellers and a ‘Zen Garden’. Heathrow’s Aspire Lounge has a spa with express treatments, while the airport itself boasts over 20 fashion and luxury brands including Harrods and Louis Vuitton for those who fancy a spot of retail therapy.

Quiet spaces to work away from the crowds

Most airports around the world now have premium lounges where passengers can enjoy quiet, relaxing, connected spaces. No longer trying to sign up to sketchy internet connections, free Wi-Fi allows them to fire off those last-minute emails, transforming ‘dead time’ into productive work. They can also take advantage of the complimentary snacks and drinks, which for those travelling frequently, can also replace subsistence expenses of the departure hall.

Digital push to create a seamless experience

Today’s business travellers expect everything to be available digitally 24/7. To meet this demand, we are seeing a rise in new services such as digital airline tickets, airport apps and digital membership cards for airport lounge access. With an enthusiasm for technology, business travellers value apps, smartphones and digital experiences expecting unique offers, regularly updated digital content and a seamless handover between all channels.

This post was written by Justin Banon, Director, Priority Pass.The Priority Pass team will be at the BusinessTravel Summit Amsterdam and available to discuss business travel trends, and how you can best support your business travellers, at Stand 13.

GUEST BLOG: Do travel risk management programmes adequately address personal travel risk?

Since launching our latest animations that provide travel safety tips for Women and LGBT travellers we seem to have stumbled into an area of travel risk management that many programmes don’t want or don’t know how to tackle; namely personal travel risk.

Training and educating in regard of personal travel risk is perceived as being fraught with complications; not least because travel policies and procedures are generally based on home-country legislation, attitudes and cultures rather than the reality of the situation at the destination.  Many policies therefore treat all travellers as equal and it is often easier to stick with this assumption for the whole risk management process and assume personal travel risk is equal.

To complicate the issue further the programme owner can’t make guesses or assumptions about what personal travel risks an individual employee may face.  If we can’t assume the gender, sex or religion of an employee, it is very difficult to provide advice or training equal to the risks they might face in a location. 

Very often the benchmark for traveller equality is a middle aged, straight, white male; the demographic that probably faces the least personal risk of all travellers. Subsequently the procedures, risk assessment, education, training and support we offer individuals is based on this ‘least at-risk’ population. This benchmark means that the ‘most at-risk’ in our travelling populations can be let down on the duty of care owed to them.

If a business trip is being organised to a country where women are not treated equally to men and homosexuality can be punishable by death, should the travel risk management and individual traveller risk assessment not be based around the most vulnerable in your travelling population? All travellers should be provided with enough information to make their own risk assessment of whether they will conduct this trip or whether the dangers are too great. As we can’t make assumptions about any individual is it not justified that the lowest common denominator should be the most at-risk in your organisation?

On first appearance it seems strange but personal risk is probably lowest in hostile environments where the everyday dangers and the protective measures put in place to prevent these dangers almost completely nullify personal risk. I bring this up because all organisations have very clear travel policies for these locations, however, some lower risk countries may present an equally dangerous environment for a traveller who is oblivious to the fact that their fundamental being or lifestyle may not be culturally accepted or even illegal at their destination.

We rarely choose where we travel for business and perhaps it is time to look at  personal risk as we do much more tangible risks, such as kidnap, crime or natural disasters. If the destination poses elevated risk for any individuals in your travelling population, everyone receive the education and training to help them make informed decisions about whether they are OK to travel and what precautionary measures they may need to take. 

In my experience the least at-risk would probably benefit from this blanket education; not only to remind them about travel essentials, but also to make them more considerate of their colleagues concerns if travelling in a group.

This post was written by Saul Shanagher of beTravelwise, who are exhibiting at this week's Business Travel Show. You can still register for a free visitor pass at www.businesstravelshow.com.  

GUEST BLOG: How do you know your travellers are safe?

Duty of care requirements put the onus firmly on employers to ensure they are providing appropriate training, briefings and safety measures for employees overseas.

Employers should look to specialist third party providers for integrated pre-deployment services that encompass everything from basic security awareness e-learning, employee route recommendations and detailed journey plans, to information on location-specific medical care and the prevalence of terrorism, civil unrest or piracy. Employees should, where relevant, be trained to cope in challenging environments.

Whilst pre-travel planning and research can help determine if it is safe to travel and what mitigation measures are commensurate to the threat, technology solutions can help augment duty of care once personnel are in-country and employers should harness the right technology to protect their employees.

A GPS tracker may be seen by some as ‘big brother’, but users maintain their ability, through the device, to regulate an employer’s knowledge of their location. The availability of itinerary travel tracking and regular mobile app check-ins means that a tracking device such as a satellite tracker (which frequently pushes out its position) needs only to be considered for higher risk travel or travel to countries where communication systems are poor or impacted by a natural disaster.

Travellers to high-risk destinations or individuals considered at high risk of an attack can benefit from wearing a tracker that constantly sends back their location and has an SOS capability. This can reassure travellers and enable them to continue their work.

In high-risk countries, communication systems can be unreliable and GPS may be the only way of ensuring that someone back at the office is aware of their team’s movements and can pick up quickly if they have strayed from a geo-fenced area, proposed route or plan. Early identification of unexpected activity could save a life.

  

Remember that personnel tracking needs to be part of a comprehensive and secure risk management platform that operates an 'opt in' tracking facility and delivers not just real-time situational awareness of staff, assets and facilities in a single display, but also 24/7 intelligence about political and civil unrest, terrorism and armed conflict, piracy and maritime incidents, health risks, severe weather warnings and more. All this should be complemented by integrated emergency medical and security responses and tailored to employee locations and client needs.

If an emergency does occur, fragmented medical and security assistance supply chains will complicate and delay employee access to life-saving information and emergency responses. Seamless support via a single contact point will best help organisations to operate efficiently in risky areas.

We’re finding that the appetite for one-stop security and medical risk management, tracking and emergency responses for employees abroad is growing. It now extends well beyond the (traditionally risk-prone) oil and gas sector, to, among others, the corporate, shipping, NGO, media and academic fields.

This post was written by Chris Knight, Head of Corporate Services for CEGA, and Emily Roberts, Head of Business Development for Solace Global. CEGA and Solace are exhibiting their one-source medical and security assistance service, INtrinsic, at the Business Travel Show in February, Stand B251. Travel bookers, buyers and managers can register for a free pass.

ONE QUARTER OF ORGANISATIONS DO NOT HAVE A TRAVELLER RISK MANAGEMENT STRATEGY

Despite a year where terrorism, tragedy and natural disasters adversely affected business travellers globally, a quarter of organisations still do not have a traveller risk management strategy in place and nearly half of those (11 per cent) don’t intend to introduce one in the foreseeable future.

However, despite this, 91 per cent of travel managers say they see the duty of care of travellers as part of their role and 89 per cent work with their TMCs (travel management companies) to ensure their travel programmes are responsible.

These are some of the results from a survey carried out by the Business Travel Show, Europe’s leading exhibition and conference for travel buyers and managers, which takes place 25-26 February 2015 at Olympia Grand in London. The survey also highlighted that, out of the top 20 issues facing buyers this year, traveller safety hobbled in at number five, behind challenges associated with cost cutting and compliance. 

The survey of 179 European travel buyers also asked buyers about their programmes’ sustainability credentials. 40 per cent do not have sustainable travel programmes, though half of these claimed that is because they achieve sustainability targets through other areas within the business. 43 per cent of programmes are sustainable and 17 per cent are planning to make them sustainable.  Comparative results from the last five years are below.

Is your travel programme sustainable	2014	2013	2012	2011	2010
Yes	43	62	37	33	42
No - we focus on sustainability in other areas of the company	20
No - not economical	6	10	9	12	12
No - not priority	14	21	32	36	25
No - planning to though	17	8	23	19	21

Fewer organisations are using travel alternatives, such as video conferencing. Just 52 per cent are using them more frequently, compared to 60 per cent last year and 64 per cent in 2013.

How much are you using travel alternatives?	2014 v 2013	2013 v 2012	2012 v 2011	2011 v 2010	2010 b 2009
More	52	60	64	44	46
Less	8	4	14	4	2
Same	40	36	23	11	52

There’s no denying it’s a good thing that 75 per cent of travel managers are operating responsible programmes but, in this day and age, when there are so many very real threats to traveller safety all over the world, it’s equally shocking that one quarter of organisations do not. Traveller security and risk management should be at the top of the agenda for buyers this year with good reason, and that’s why we address these issues throughout the 2015 conference programme.

This  post was written by David Chapple, event director, Business Travel Show. To register for a free pass for the show, which takes place 25-26 February 2015, please visit www.businesstravelshow.com/register.