How simple strategies saved over 60% on airfare spending

A real-life example of how bringing an expert on board can deliver immediate savings.

TRAVEL DILEMMAS

Like most businesses, our client wanted to cut business travel costs without cutting their travel. A national and regional business with a highly mobile workforce, the company was not using a formal travel policy and didn’t have access to an online booking tool. Instead, internal bookers relied on last-minute fares and rates from travel websites to make travel arrangements. 

Apart from the issue of efficiency and time wasted trawling the internet for last minute deals, hidden costs and booking fees soon added to the total spend and blew out the travel budget.

TRAVEL SOLUTIONS

To eliminate unnecessary spending and make their budget stretch, we implemented three major changes to our client’s travel operations:

  1. A travel policy focused on advance purchase and best fare of the day (BFOD). 
  2. Access to a sophisticated online booking tool to cut time spent on making bookings and increase policy compliance.
  3. An overhauled accommodation policy introducing tightly controlled hotel rate caps and adoption of previously unused corporate specials.
THE BOTTOM LINE

Corporate Traveller’s changes saved the organisation an average of 61% on domestic airfares and 62% on international airfares. They also reduced the number of premium airfares purchased by 26%. How?

  • Booking five to seven days in advance rather than last minute
  • Employees immediately boosted savings by utilising a formal BFOD guideline, selecting more cost effective fares and expanding their choice of airlines