Corporate travel management has gained much popularity due to its unmatched specialism in business travel. Booking travel for your business can be a time-consuming task. With so many routes and airfares, finding the best deal when organizing your employees’ travel itineraries is hard. In this article, you will learn more about the benefits and importance of corporate travel agencies.

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What is Corporate Travel Management?

Corporate travel management is a company’s structure to facilitate business travel. This includes planning a business trip, organizing a corporate event, or any other necessary task for the corporate traveler. Ensuring the process is handled properly and according to compliance is the job of corporate travel agents. All this must be done without jeopardizing business productivity.

Why Businesses Should Use Corporate Travel Management Agencies

Reduce costs: a major advantage of using corporate travel management agencies is reducing travel costs. This includes accommodation rates, insurance, airline tickets, and other related expenses. A business travel agent will have the necessary experience to find or negotiate the best possible deals for the company.

Time management: organizing a business trip can take considerable time, so if you manage a medium or large company, you won’t have time to book your business travel. A dedicated corporate travel manager will handle these tasks so you and your staff can focus on everything else.

Efficiency: as corporate travel is on the rise, most businesses opt for a corporate travel management agency to ensure their employees travel safely while adhering to all the relevant travel policies.

Externally-based Corporate Travel Management vs. In-House vs. Agent

Businesses tend to use a corporate travel management company to minimize costs. There are two types of corporate travel agencies; in-house and external. Below you will find out the main advantages and disadvantages of both approaches.

In-House Travel Management Agents

An in-house travel management agent is an employee you hire to take responsibility of booking trips, making last-minute changes to the travel itineraries, and maximizing your savings while finding the best deals for your employees.
By hiring an in-house travel management agent, you can be sure of working alongside a trusted employee who’ll make your business travel planning easier. Another advantage of hiring an in-house agent over an external one is the fee or commission you will avoid paying to that agent.

External Corporate Travel Management Agents

External travel management agents specialize in corporate travel and have extensive experience in booking business travel. These individuals are available at your request and use online booking tools that will maximize cost savings. The main difference between an external and in-house agent is that you’re not employing the person to handle your business travel needs; you’re paying them a fee or commission every time they book for you.

An in-house travel agent may not always be available in a crisis as they often work solo. On the other hand, a dedicated team of external travel management agents will be available 24 hours a day. If one of your employees runs into difficulty abroad – whether they’ve fallen ill or lost their luggage – the agents will be on-call 24/7 to assist them.

What Are the Tasks of a Corporate Travel Management Agent?

Whether you hire an in-house agent or opt for an external agency, the tasks of these agents are very similar. Here are the top 6 responsibilities of corporate travel agents:

1. Create and Manage Travel Itineraries

If you book your flights directly with an airline or use an online ticket service, you’ll likely get charged high fees for any changes you wish to make to your itinerary. Schedule changes are difficult to avoid in the world of business. Still, to avoid getting penalized, you should use a corporate travel agent to make the necessary changes without any extra charges.

By leaving all your business travel plans in the hands of a corporate travel agent, you can rest assured that nothing will go wrong during your business trip. This is thanks to the agents’ extensive knowledge of the travel industry.

2. Find the Best Price

A major part of corporate travel management involves finding the best possible rates and negotiating with several service providers.
Travel agents for businesses have adequate expertise in handling negotiation tasks since they deal with different parts of the travel industry daily. This means they can find you the best rates or even get special discounts that you may not otherwise be able to get yourself.

3. Arrange Suitable Accommodation

Arranging the most suitable accommodation for business travelers is another key responsibility of a corporate travel agent. Before booking the required number of days and employees, the agent looks for all available options at the right price, including guest houses, hostels, and hotels.

If you were to take care of this task yourself, you wouldn’t have enough time to look for inexpensive accommodation in the right location. This is where a corporate travel agent comes in handy for finding the best accommodation without going over budget.

4. Arrange for Transportation

One of the biggest parts of travel planning is transportation. This can easily be handled by a corporate travel agent, who will arrange your transportation needs in advance. They will ensure your flights are booked, a rental car is organized, airport transfer is arranged, and train tickets are purchased. Sure, you will be required to pay the agency for these services; however, considering the amount of time and money they save you, the fee or commission they charge is well worth it, especially if you or your employees travel regularly.

By using a corporate travel management agency, you’ll get better accommodation rates and benefit from cheap business-class flights for your employees. This means the overall business travel costs can significantly be reduced.

5. Organize Business Meetings and Events

Whether your company needs to organize annual events or meetings abroad, the process can take time and investment. Hiring a specialized corporate travel agent to take care of this task will reduce costs and make your business events more profitable.
The planning process for hosting an event can be complex and time-consuming. Therefore, a reputable travel management company will be highly advantageous in such situations.

6. Control Travel Costs and Policy Compliance

While managing travel costs is the main task of a corporate travel agent, you would benefit much more by allowing someone with extensive experience to handle this job. Specialized agents comply with corporate travel policies by using real-time travel policy management to maximize functionality for the business traveler.

Hiring a professional agency to take care of your company’s travel needs will drive cost reductions and optimize business relationships while complying with travel policies.

How Travel Companies Can Benefit From Corporate Travel Management Companies

Travel companies like hotels and airlines can optimize their travel strategy with the help of a corporate travel agent. This is because travel management companies are responsible for booking flight tickets, accommodation, car rentals, transfers, and business events. For hotels, this serves as an indirect link to business travelers. They can gain more customers via the corporate travel agents since it is the agent’s job to plan and book accommodation and business meetings for the companies’ employees.

Most corporate travel management companies turn to GDS (global distribution system) to carry out their tasks, such as finding the right accommodation, flights, and transportation. GDS is also an important distribution channel for hotels, connecting them with corporate travel agents and providing them with up-to-date information about their latest room prices and availability. GDS systems maximize the chances of corporate travel management companies finding your hotel and booking your rooms. By becoming part of this vital distribution system, your hotel will increase its revenue and reach a wider audience.

Our “Global Distribution System (GDS): What Are the Benefits for Hotels?“ article provides more information about the main GDS systems, how they work, and how they can benefit companies operating in the travel industry.

List of Corporate Travel Management Companies

Outsourcing business travel management to a professional corporate travel management company means companies will benefit from specialist knowledge and round-the-clock support. For hotel owners connected to GDS systems, these corporate travel agents will help them attract more business travelers.

In the article “Corporate Travel Agents for Hotels to Gain More Business Travelers”, you will get a better insight into how hotels can increase revenue with the help of corporate travel agents and the best corporate travel agents to partner with.

When you consider all the advantages of hiring a corporate travel agent to handle your employees’ business travel needs makes sense. These agents ensure your business travel runs smoothly by freeing up your time so you can focus on other areas of your business.

More Tips Regarding Corporate Travel

The corporate travel market is receiving an increased focus from many in the travel industry, partly business travelers often spend more money on their travels, especially when their employer covers their costs. However, more importantly, business travel is growing, thanks to factors like globalization and the availability of flights. In the following articles, you will find more information about the corporate travel market:

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This article is written by:

Martijn Barten

Hi, I am Martijn Barten, founder of Revfine.com. With 20 years of experience in the hospitality industry, I specialize in optimizing revenue by combining revenue management with marketing strategies. I have successfully developed, implemented, and managed revenue management and marketing strategies for individual properties and multi-property portfolios.