Distribution Strategies

With corporate travel managers focused on getting more out of their travel budgets, companies continue to turn to the Internet for choice and cost savings, according to Orbitz for Business’ latest quarterly trend report.

Published: 14 Jul 2010

With corporate travel managers focused on getting more out of their travel budgets, companies continue to turn to the Internet for choice and cost savings, according to Orbitz for Business’ latest quarterly trend report.

According to the company, 70 percent of business travellers said they felt personally obligated to save their company money when booking travel.

The spring quarterly report, Business Traveler Magazine Quarterly Trend Report, which examined the most prevalent issues affecting the corporate travel industry, was based on a survey of 846 business travellers.

According to the trend report, 38 percent of respondents stated they have flown economy class on domestic flights to cut travel costs. Also, to help avoid higher fares associated with last-minute bookings, only six percent of business travellers said they book their flights less than a week in advance. Thirty percent of respondents said they book at least eight days in advance, with the remaining 64 percent booking at least two weeks before a trip. Nearly 20 percent of business travellers said no cost cuts have been made so far in 2010, and the majority of respondents (54 percent) said they were planning to have the same number of business trips in the next three months as they had in the first quarter.

With corporate travel managers setting their sights on compliance as a pathway to cost reduction and adoption, more attention is being given to converting out of policy travellers. According to the trend report, reigning in these 'rogue travellers' will depend on how a company adopts self-service and online booking tools as part of their managed travel solution:

-- Self-Service: 91 percent of business travellers surveyed book their own travel. And 73 percent of respondents cited convenience and self-service as the primary reasons they chose a specific airline carrier.

-- Online Booking: 88 percent of business travellers said they book the majority (50 percent) of their travel online, while only two percent do not use an online tool when booking travel.

-- User Experience: 83 percent of business travellers cited proactive travel-delay notifications and rebooking as the most valuable service feature when managing their travel spend. A close second (81 percent) cited having a corporate travel tool that provided a visual matrix showing available fares and rates.

Frank Petito, president, Orbitz for Business, said, “One of the challenges we’ve been able to solve for customers is delivering a familiar online booking experience that also drives tight policy compliance, expense management, and cost reduction. By providing a tool that mirrors what employees use in their personal travel, we believe they’ll ultimately do what’s in the best interest of the company when booking business travel.”