A travel consultancy service targeting the public sector has entered the travel management company market.
Mark O'Brien - previously a director for Rosenbluth, Expotel and The Travel Company - founded Public Sector Travel (PSD) with James Drew.
The new company - a website-based model that will work under travel consultancy Barrington International - said it was established after undertaking a two-year consultancy project surrounding travel spend and policy compliance in association with a leading university.
James Drew, chairman of PSD, said: "Our investment over the last two years to understand the public sector market has enabled PSD to tailor its products and services directly to a business sector that has a critical need to reduce cost and provide far greater value."
But its appearance in the market should not come as a surprise given the focus on travel spend cutbacks throughout government departments as part of the Con-Lib coalition's public spending review.
Chief executive O'Brien said: "PSD is the first travel company in the UK to operate exclusively for the public sector with a website registration process that only public sector workers can take advantage of."
More controversially, O'Brian claimed his intermediary would offer an "unbiased and transparent" approach that traditional travel companies could not compete with due to the "inflexibility of their own airline agreements".
Other TMCs in the market have criticised the claim, calling it "totally inaccurate".
But O'Brien said he would welcome airlines to join the programme on the basis they guaranteed to offer "the lowest airfares" to our customers, insisting that was what would set aside PSD from its competitors.
The rookie TMC has partnered not-for-profit specialist TMC Key Travel for operational support including ticket fulfilment, customer services and emergency out of hours support.
Andy Speller, Key Travel's customer services director, said: "We are passionate about making first-class knowledge and best in industry fares accessible to the not-for-profit sector and have been working closely with the PSD team to bring this exciting proposition to market.
"We are confident it will have a major impact on public sector travel budgets".
www.publicsectordirect.com
www.keytravel.com