Business travellers under 30 are more likely to change their bookings and share their data than older employees, according to a new study by Expedia and Egencia.
The sister companies have launched a new report called The Future of Travel looking at the impact of technology on both the leisure and corporate travel markets.
The study, which questioned 8,535 people across the world, found that travellers under 30, who are generally known as Millennials, are three times more likely to share data in exchange for instantly available benefits such as free wifi.
This group of younger travellers were also more likely to modify their itineraries than other age groups – with 24 per cent of under-30s saying they do this compared to only 13 per cent of those in the 46-65 age group.
Millennials are also more comfortable booking travel through mobile devices using self-service applications. Some 49 per cent of under-30s plan and book travel by smartphone compared to 39 per cent for those in the 31-45 age group and 26 per cent for those aged 46-65.
Egencia’s Kyle Davis, who is the TMC’s Asia Pacific managing director, said: “Millennials who have embraced self-booking for leisure expect the same easy, intuitive process for business travel.”
The report stressed that travel businesses had to ensure the “smooth transition” between different booking devices such as desktop computers, tablets and smartphones.
Expedia’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said: “Every piece of code that we develop has to work on the PC, it’s got to work on the tablet, it’s got to work on the smartphone.
“It requires a significant amount of investment amount of design work.”
The survey found that 32 per cent of under-30s had booked business travel through a smartphone while 20 per cent had used a tablet. This compared to 12 per cent of over-45s who have used a smartphone for business travel bookings and 9 per cent who have booked on a tablet.
The majority of Millennials (57 per cent) said they were happy to give more information if they received perks in return such as discounts, extra loyalty points and upgrades. But this number dropped to only 36 per cent of those aged 46-65.
Sabre Travel Network’s senior vice president Chris Kroeger said that travellers must gain some kind of reward or value from sharing data such as travel history, preferences and other data.