International restrictions are continuing to hold back the recovery of business travel, according to the Focus Travel Partnership which shared the findings of its 2021 trading update with BTN Europe.
The partnership, which has a membership of around 55 travel management companies, said that the removal of UK travel restrictions in the past few weeks did not have an “immediate effect” on boosting international business travel, due to continued restrictions in many destinations around the world.
Hazel Dawson, commercial manager at Focus Travel Partnership, said there was still “uncertainty” about the need for testing and quarantine when travelling to many countries, particularly in Asia.
“Although VTLs - vaccinated travel lanes and dedicated flights - have been introduced, these are still very reduced in capacity and at a high price,” added Dawson.
Focus has seen a pick-up in demand for the US as a long-haul business destination after the country reopened its border in November 2021, particularly to destinations such as New York, Miami and Los Angeles.
The US accounts for 23 per cent of future travel bookings for Focus members with what Dawson called an “exceptionally high yield” of £2,536 per booking.
“Premium cabins are being travelled in more frequently with 85 per cent of all current bookings to the US in premium economy, business or first class,” added Dawson.
Another trend is a “slightly longer” pattern for forward bookings in 2022, compared to last year, with the average period between ticket issue and departure now just under 31 days.
“Confidence is still thought to be lacking from some corporate travellers’ perspective, but we believe that as the year progresses, this will be restored, country borders will open with less requirement of testing, and airlines will continue to increase capacity allowing for fewer cancellations and a levelling of fares,” predicted Dawson.
The partnership also outlined how tough 2021 had been for many of its TMCs, with revenue down by around 71 per cent compared with 2019 figures (see chart below). International travel was effectively banned from the UK for several months during the first half of last year.
Focus members booked £102 million in airline tickets last year, which compared to an average of £350 million annually pre-Covid. Ticket revenue in 2021 did go up slightly (by 1.75 per cent) compared with 2020, although fewer tickets were issued year-on-year.
Dawson added that some Focus members had managed to “stay above the average market trend” due to the sectors they specialise in.
“Our top-performing TMCs in terms of tickets booked very much sat in the three key areas of marine, entertainment and professional sports, all of which had exemptions to travel to various countries around the world with limited restrictions or quarantine being required,” she explained.
Average lead time between booking and travel in 2021 was also only 17.5 days, although this did increase in the latter part of the year.
Dawson added that corporate travel in the UK has “still been limited” due to reduced capacity and higher prices, as travel companies have tried to recover financially from the impact of the pandemic.
“This covers all sectors of air, rail and car hire - the latter of which has been even more impacted by import restrictions and the lack of stock of new cars being available within the UK, which has pushed up the price of hiring a vehicle,” she explained.
Read the full report from Focus Travel Partnership