Are you struggling to manage your company’s travel program while keeping costs in check? Or perhaps your employees face frequent travel hiccups. Missed flights, unresponsive support, or complicated reimbursement processes? In 2024 itself, a vast majority of travelers (8 out of 10) faced business travel disruptions.
One of the key reasons for this could be the lack of a streamlined process for travel management. A corporate travel agency could be the game-changer your business needs.
The right travel agency does more than book flights and hotels. It simplifies the entire travel process, provides real-time support, and even helps cut down expenses.
But with so many options, how do you decide which one aligns with your business needs? This blog will guide you through the critical factors to consider when choosing a business travel agency. Read ahead to know more about these things!
What is a Corporate Travel Agency?
A corporate agency for travel is a service provider that manages travel for your company. They make sure the travel experience is seamless for your employees.
These agencies provide them with 24/7 customer support. Usually, they provide you with a corporate travel agent that assists your employees with business trips. Additionally, they make sure it is planned within company policy.
Some of the tasks that all corporate agencies perform are:
- Book travel for employees
- Prepare a detailed itinerary
- Assist with cancellations, re-bookings, etc.
- Negotiate corporate hotel rates
- Help with documentation and foreign exchange
Key Factors in Selecting the Perfect Corporate Travel Agency
Choosing the right business travel agency is key to keeping your travel program smooth and cost-effective. To find the best fit for your business, you’ll need to look at a few things. It could be related to their booking platform, policy compliance, and the level of customer support they provide.
But here’s a question: have you thought about how much money the right agency could save you? Use our savings calculator to find out! It’s a quick way to estimate how much you could cut down on corporate travel costs. Click here to give it a try.
If you’re unhappy with your current travel agency or hiring one for the first time, start by figuring out what your business needs. Here are some questions to help you get started:
- How important is 24/7 customer support for your business?
- Do you want to save money on business travel?
- Do you want to enhance the employees’ travel booking experience?
- Do you need to gain actionable insights into travel and expense data?
Understanding what you actually want to accomplish from hiring a best corporate travel agency would help you evaluate and select the best one.
Here are some key aspects to look for while choosing a business travel agency:
1. Personalized Customer Support
Business travel can be full of surprises. Sudden cancellations, last-minute changes, or unexpected challenges can throw your plans off course. That’s why reliable, around-the-clock support is essential. The right travel agency offers 24/7/365 assistance. It can be through multiple channels like phone, email, and chat.
Additionally, having a dedicated support agent who understands your team’s unique needs makes a lot of difference. This personalized touch ensures quick solutions whenever issues arise. Checking online reviews can help you gauge the quality before committing.
2. Smooth Booking Experience
Gone are the days when booking a trip involved back-and-forth emails or calls. Modern corporate travel agencies offer user-friendly platforms where employees can:
- Book travel independently within policy guidelines.
- Make cancellations and re-bookings quickly and easily.
- Collaborate with managers for approvals, all within a single interface.
A best corporate travel agency with an intuitive system saves time and minimizes errors. It ensures a seamless experience for employees and admins alike.
3. Advanced Technology for Travelers and Admins
An agency with integrated travel and expense software is a must. This technology not only simplifies travel management but also provides:
- Data visibility to monitor travel spend in real time.
- Policy compliance features to reduce policy violations automatically.
- Virtual travel consultants to identify cost-saving opportunities and suggest actionable insights.
A mobile app with booking capabilities. Plus, travel alerts and an easy-to-navigate interface can further enhance convenience.
4. Extensive Hotel & Flight Inventory
The range of travel options your agency offers can impact your costs and flexibility. Agencies that rely on limited vendors might lead to higher expenses. Instead, choose one with access to a Global Distribution System (GDS).
This ensures a wide selection of flights, hotels, studio apartments, and car rentals. It helps cater to both budget-conscious and luxury preferences. Having more options helps optimize travel costs without compromising on quality. For instance, you may be able to secure 30% discounts with itilite.
5. Travel Agency Geo Reach
When vetting a corporate travel agency, pick the one whose expertise matches your geographic profile. For instance, if your business travel is mainly domestic, you would not need a travel agency with dozens of offices across the globe. On the other hand, if your employees travel overseas frequently, consider hiring a travel agency with a big name so that you get the expertise when needed.
Moreover, you should seek a corporate travel agent who is well-versed with international business etiquette to ease your employees’ international travel experience. You can look for one specializing in travel for companies in your industry.
6. Reporting and Analytics
Many corporate travel agencies have a broken system that does not provide complete travel data insights.
Your travel managers will struggle to make strategic decisions without travel data insights. This will create difficulty in enhancing the efficiency of the travel management process.
Hence, your business travel agency should give you reports on a regular basis.
For instance, they can provide MIS (Management Information System) reports. These reports include your top spenders, % of last-minute bookings, out-of-policy bookings, and more. Such reports can provide you with insights that can help you save money.
7. Ancillary services like passport/ visa/ travel insurance
While traveling internationally, travelers might need additional services to enhance their travel experience. Such services are called ancillary or concierge services.
A few examples of concierge services include airport lounge facility, visa renewal, and business travel insurance. However, not all corporate travel agencies provide them without additional requests. Therefore, you must ask the agency what extra service they provide apart from bookings.
8. Security of data
“There’s no silver bullet with cybersecurity; a layered defense is the only viable option.” — James Scott.
Business travel involves storing and managing a lot of sensitive information like employee IDs and credit card details. If this data gets compromised, it can threaten the employees and the company’s security.
Therefore, you should look for a best corporate travel agency that can keep your employees’ data safe. For instance, you can check if there are any global standards of security to be compliant with.
Once you have checked all these aspects, shortlist a few corporate travel agencies, see which one best fits your business needs, and hire it!
Further, you can draft your corporate travel security policy using the template below.
9. Innovation and Easy Scalability
With the growth in your organization, the number of business travelers will also increase. So, you need a solution that can store all the additional employee data and handle the increasing number of travel requests with ease.
Therefore, you should look for a business travel agency that deploys a cloud-based software solution. Cloud-based solutions offer on-demand scalability, making it easier to add additional users and manage all their data without extra costs.
Hire a Best Corporate Travel Agency to Manage your Travel Better
Hiring an agency can help you manage your business travel process more efficiently. Moreover, such agencies can also provide travel-related expertise with the help of a corporate travel agent.
However, if you onboard a traditional agency, you may end up managing their travel expense with separate vendors. It can lead to poor data visibility, analytics, and cost leakages. So, you must accommodate your company’s complete travel and expense needs on a single platform.
itilite is a travel management company that offers a wide range of corporate travel inventory, 24/7/365 support, concierge services, and more. Moreover, the platform integrates travel and expense. It offers lightning-quick booking and reduces travel costs by giving you economical options.
If this is something you are looking for, book a free demo with us today! We’ll provide you with a one-on-one experience of how you can benefit from the platform.
