Ways to Reduce Business Travel Expenses
Rocketrip has put together several resources that will help finance managers, HR managers, and other key stakeholders understand and improve the performance of their employee travel programs.
Travel spending is major pain point for many organizations, but also one that’s uniquely difficult to address. From the outside looking in, many travel management practices can seem arcane, and less than 100% effective when it comes to actually controlling employee spending. Confused about where to start? Here are some ways to tackle high T&E expenses.
Improve T&E Reporting
If you’re responsible for managing travel at your company, be sure to check out Rocketrip’s guide to controlling costs with strategic KPIs. This guide points out the most important signs of whether a company’s travel program is or is not working. After reading it, you’ll be able to identify which high level metrics are most important for getting a handle on employee travel, recognize the most commonly used KPIs in corporate travel management, and draw connections between travel and your organization’s larger objectives, such as cost-control and employee satisfaction.
Is Your Employee Travel Program Working?
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Use a Travel Management Company and Online Booking Tool
A travel management company, or TMC, functions like a corporate travel agent, helping employees book trips, and securing contractually discounted rates with airlines, hotels, and other travel vendors. Online booking tools, or OBTs, are booking engines built specifically for corporate travelers; the “content,” or flight and hotel inventory displayed in an OBT, is based on a company’s negotiated rates. TMCs and OBTs are cornerstones of the managed travel framework. Together they help ensure that employees book policy-compliant options.
For companies that have managed travel programs, it’s critical to measure the extent to which employees are using the official systems that are in place to control costs. These blog posts from Rocketrip explains some of the most commonly used metrics:
Develop The Right Travel Policy
There’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all travel policy, but there is a specific policy that fits your company’s needs. Rocketrip’s explainer on How to Write a Travel Policy will help you find the style of travel management that works best for you. Check it out, then download our customizable travel policy template to put your findings into action.
- How to Write a Company Travel Policy
- A Free Travel Policy Template from Rocketrip
- Measuring and Improving Travel Policy Compliance
Promote Cost-Effective Business Travel
How much your company spends on business travel ultimately depends on how employees spend on their individual trips. That means it’s critical to educate employees about ways to save. These travel booking best practices can result in significant savings on flights and hotels:
But to go beyond cost-control and actually reduce T&E expenses, your company needs a way to get employees to utilize affordable travel options. Rocketrip motivates business travelers to spend less on their trips by giving them data-based budgets and letting them keep half of what they save. Check out the post below to learn more about Rocketrip, Google Trips, and the growing popularity of spend-reduction incentive programs for business travel.
