Comply to travel policy or do as you like? Stanley Slaughter reports on the latest debate on the industry’s “burning issue”
It is a debate that has been engaging the business travel community for more than a year now. Many see it as the industry’s most central issue: can travel managers continue to expect and require their travellers to comply with company travel policy or has technology liberated them from such obligations.
Billed under the headline of the “burning question”, it was the subject of a very lively debate at the spring forum of Management Solutions (UK) and ACTE in London on May 15. What raised the temperature was the concept of the “happy traveller” put forward by Rodolfo Silva in the opening keynote speech.
Get There’s managing director for Latin America said there was now clearly different generational behaviour among travellers. Younger travellers were demanding more information and services on their smartphones. “This revolution is only set to continue and will get faster and faster. The traveller is more savvy and better connected than ever before,” he said.
Silva warned that travellers would move away from traditional travel policies and use the tools they wanted. “The personal approach will have a significant impact on the managed travel community. The benefits of a managed travel programme are well documented but in order to achieve this we have to think more and more about the traveller. We need to create the happy traveller. We need to make their lives simpler and stress free,” he said.
Jon West, managing director of UK, Ireland, India and North America for HRS and moderator of the session, divided companies between those which were “enterprise-centric” – that is where the company determines the rules and the employee fits in – and those which were “customer-centric” where companies listened to employees and made policies to fit these views.
It seemed to be a situation which travel managers at the forum recognised but were still prepared to challenge. But while a few took a hardline approach, many adopted a more flexible attitude. One said that her travellers did have their own ideas on how they should be booking while largely sticking to company policy. “We try to allow them to choose what they need. That is how it will work for us in moving forwards,” she said.
Another buyer spoke of a policy which was “fit for purpose”. He told the forum: “You have to tweak a policy to make it work for you. That is what I mean when I say ‘fit for purpose’. If it isn’t working, then you must change it.”
Avoiding the word "policy" was another key point from one buyer who opted instead for guidelines. “I try to make it so they can’t not remember the travel policy at the time of booking. Compliance is driven. But it is guidelines. We sometimes have to name and shame regular culprits. I do not think mandate is dead but you use it in a softer way,” she said.
But there were indications that behind the softer approach lurked the iron fist. Two travel managers told the forum that if their travellers went outside policy, their costs would not be refunded.
One took a tough approach to the whole concept for flexibility. “Why is travel so different?” he asked. “People accept company decisions on other things like which computer system or which private health system to use. Why not travel?
“I am happy to give choice but I can’t go along with this happy traveller phrase at all. People will always want to stay in five-star hotels. Our job first and foremost is to keep travel costs down. If we give them choice out costs are going to be racking up.”
But outside the buyers, there was a feeling that something did need doing to the traditional travel policy and its mandatory nature. One TMC executive said that while travel policy was not dying, it did need a “really big overhaul.” She added: “We need to give the traveller some space to have their own ideas. Travellers have technology at their fingertips for leisure but when they come to work, they have to work with a black and white screen. That has to change to make it more customer-friendly.”
The hedged-bet nature of the travel managers’ approach was best summed up by one who said he did not like the word “mandate” and explained that if his travellers wished to go outside policy they could approach their line manager and give their reasons why. A non-policy trip could then be signed off. “Our compliance is high so I would like to think we have happy travellers,” he said.
But Jon West was unconvinced. He felt the ebb and flow of the arguments suggested that more companies were enterprise-centric than customer –centric and that they were just paying lip service to the idea of the “happy traveller.”
It is a debate that looks certain to continue. But there are increasing signs that the travel managers are drawing a line in the sand.