A whitepaper published this week by law firm Peters & Peters warns of the serious implications of non-compliance with travel risk management standard ISO 31030 and recommends corporates benchmark their own policies against it.
Launched in September 2021, ISO 31030 established a global benchmark for travel risk management and provides a framework of good practice.
The white paper, titled ISO 31030 Travel Risk Management: Legal implications and risks for organisations, explores some of the civil, regulatory and criminal legal implications that may affect a corporate when an employee or other person suffers harm, injury or death connected to work-related travel, and provides a number of case studies.
“Ideally, businesses that require their employees to travel regularly should also have proportionate, periodically reviewed and monitored compliance policies and procedures in place to help mitigate the risk of such an incident and to assist them in responding to any incidents that do take place,” the report recommends.
Commenting on the report, Bob Quick, director at Global Secure Accreditation, said: “The white paper clearly demonstrates the potential legal risks facing companies that do not actively address ISO 31030 within their own travel risk management policies. In the view of this leading law firm, ignorance of the standard may not be enough to avoid legal risk if travel goes wrong for employees of companies or other organisations.”
He continued: “Complying with ISO 31030 should not be challenging for businesses that care about travelling employees' wellbeing, yet recent research from Business Travel Show Europe showed that more than half of all travel bookers, buyers and managers were still unaware of the requirements of the new global standard.”
The Peters & Peters white paper can be viewed here.