Over the last couple of years, business travel has steadily increased. Companies are ready to send travelers back on the road. According to a study by GBTA, 54% of travel managers state that business travel has returned more quickly than expected.
However, 84% of business travelers are willing to travel only with proper safety precautions. Therefore, it’s time to take actionable steps to honor your duty of care obligations. You must create a corporate travel security policy for employees’ safety before green-lighting business travel in your organization.
Let us understand the meaning and purpose of having a corporate travel security policy for your organization.
What is a Corporate Travel Security Policy?
A corporate travel security policy is a set of guidelines and procedures established by a company to ensure the safety and well-being of its employees while traveling for work. This policy outlines the steps to be taken to mitigate risks associated with business trips, such as health emergencies, natural disasters, political unrest, or accidents. It typically includes instructions on how to handle security situations, access emergency contacts, and maintain communication with the company during travel.
The policy may cover a range of aspects, including pre-trip planning, travel approvals, accommodation requirements, and transportation safety. It might also address employee behavior, provide training on handling emergencies, and establish the use of travel security tools or apps. Companies may require employees to register their travel plans with the organization or a third-party security provider, ensuring they can be tracked and reached if necessary.
In addition, a corporate travel security policy often involves travel insurance coverage for incidents like medical emergencies or evacuation. By setting clear security protocols, companies not only safeguard their employees but also reduce liability risks and enhance compliance with legal obligations. This policy helps create a structured approach to managing the complexities of business travel while prioritizing the health and safety of staff.
Download Customizable Corporate Travel Security Policy Template For Free
Keeping employees safe during business trips is the company’s responsibility. Hence, you must incorporate the best measures, whether in terms of health, social security, or data security. For that, you need an exhaustive travel security policy. The policy must include steps to be taken before, during, and after the trip.
Here is a customizable corporate travel security policy template that covers all the aspects of travelers’ safety. You can download the template and use it in your company to enhance business travelers’ safety.
Components of a Corporate Travel Security Policy
A corporate travel security policy outlines the steps and guidelines that a company implements to ensure the safety, security, and well-being of employees when they travel for business purposes.
Following are the components that you can include in the travel security policy as a general rule:
1. Objective
The objective defines the reasons behind creating the travel security policy. While writing the objective, you must consider the goals to accomplish through the policy. For instance, you might want to lay out a standard travel risk assessment procedure for the company.
2. Pre-trip Measures
Travel risk management begins way before the business trip. Therefore, your travel security policy should enlist business travel safety measures before starting their business trips. These measures might include going through the destination country’s Covid-19 guidelines or downloading the mobile app of the company’s travel management solution provider.
3. Booking Safety Guidelines
A safe trip begins with safe bookings. Hence, your corporate travel security policy must include guidelines to ensure employees book safe flights and hotels. You must provide a list of trusted vendors and manage all travel bookings through a single travel management software.
4. Traveler Support and Safety Information
In addition to comprehensive risk management, a robust corporate travel security policy should prioritize traveler support to alleviate any sense of abandonment in unfamiliar locations. This entails incorporating essential safety information within the policy, such as the company’s official SOS number and contact details of an on-site representative.
This proactive approach ensures that employees can access immediate assistance and guidance during their travels.
5. Post-trip Measures
While traveling to foreign places, your employees might pick up a destination-specific illness that turns out to be contagious. Hence, it is wise to get them adequately tested before they resume working from the office. So, the travel security policy should lay out post-trip health assessment requirements and other safety precautions.
Purpose of Having a Corporate Travel Security Policy
The purpose of having a corporate travel security policy is to protect the safety, well-being, and security of employees who travel for business purposes. It should also minimize risks to the organization.
Here are the key reasons why having such a policy is essential:
1. To Improve Travel Risk Management
When your employees travel for work, they might encounter some risks such as:
- Political Instability: They might get stuck at a destination facing mass protests, a coup, or general social unrest.
- Health Threats: They might contract a location-related illness or aggravate old allergies.
- Data Security Theft: They might face a cyber attack that threatens their business and personal data security.
- Female Travelers’ Safety Concerns: Women traveling for work might encounter incidents of harassment and assault.
Managing such travel-related risks is the primary responsibility of a travel manager. Hence, they must conduct a thorough risk analysis and enlist all the business travel safety procedures in the corporate travel security policy.
For instance, they can include links to international Covid guidelines that the employees must refer to before going on business trips. Data security measures, medical recommendations, and valuable tips for female business travelers can also be included.
2. To Prepare Employees for Contingencies
Analyzing travel-related risks and providing safety measures is insufficient to combat unfortunate incidents. You must also train your employees to detect severe threats and take necessary safety steps.
Your corporate travel security policy can incorporate adequate business travel safety training measures for the employees. You can also include a travel risk assessment checklist to assess the gaps in their preparedness to travel and design the training module accordingly.
While training, you can discuss various types of threats like physical, social, and data security. You can also define their resolutions. However, you must emphasize that preventing a dangerous situation is better than reaching the resolution stage. Receiving appropriate training can save employees from accidents and even help avoid a life-and-death situation.
3. To Ensure Employees Make Safe Bookings
Safe transportation and accommodation are essential for a safe business trip. Therefore, you should ensure that employees don’t neglect the safety aspect while booking flights and hotels. You can do that by creating a list of safe flights and hotels in the corporate travel security policy and mandating the employees to book from them.
Furthermore, the policy should outline a list of preferred airlines known for thorough aircraft cleaning between trips and reliability in avoiding frequent last-minute cancellations.
Additionally, it should specify criteria for selecting hotels, emphasizing safe locations with 24/7 front-desk service and compliance with World Health Organization (WHO) safety guidelines. This ensures that employees are accommodated in establishments prioritizing hygiene and security standards during their travels.
4. To Define Traveler Support Framework
Business travel is full of uncertainties. The employees might get stuck in an emergency while traveling to unfamiliar destinations. Hence, they must have round-the-clock traveler support available. Moreover, they should know who to contact to get help.
Hence, you should create a sturdy traveler support framework for your business travelers. In the framework, you should include the details of the emergency contact person/ team. Moreover, you can describe the travel insurance plan.
Free Travel Security Policy Template
Implement a Corporate Travel Security Policy for Better Employee SafetyÂ
After Covid, your employees might get anxious about going on business trips. However, a corporate travel security policy can help you create a robust system to ensure their safety. Once you have made the right travel security policy that suits your organization, you need corporate travel management software to implement it seamlessly across the organization.Â
Our integrated travel and expense management software can help you take travelers’ safety to the next level. The platform can help you tag safe airlines and hotels for further usage and red-flag the unsafe options. Moreover, you can track travelers’ locations and get 24/7 traveler support.
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