The Knowledge > Buyer perspective
My wish list for... ONLINE BOOKING TOOLS
An SME travel manager shares his views on why mixing and matching offline, online and direct booking works for him
Peter Macey FACILITIES AND CENTRAL PURCHASING OFFICER, THE MEDICAL AND DENTAL DEFENCE UNION OF SCOTLAND (MDDUS) After a full career in the British Army, Peter joined the MDDUS and helped set up a successful business travel operation which he manages and runs single- handedly. He has become something of an expert in the SME market, speaking at a variety of events, and is a long-standing member of the ITM.
ONLINE booking tools have been growing in popularity and robustness over the last nine or ten years and they have always been a consider- ation for me. However, I have avoided using them as there has always been something lacking and they do not seem to meet exactly what I am looking for. Therein lies my irritation. Additional services, such as price
and service provider comparisons, are important differentiators. Services such as insurance and travel alerts are just a bonus. This presumes that the booking system itself is easy to use and navigate. But so often, these basic requirements are not met, particularly when it comes to air travel online services. When I started my job ten years
ago, our company used a travel agent for all travel bookings, with some level of success. My operation is small – all domestic, 400 return flights and a similar number of rail journeys and hotel room nights – and is run single-handedly by me. It is relatively easy to keep on top of as long as there are systems in place. But even with an operation this size, it can present its own challenges, especially when I am ‘multi-hatted’ like so many others are today. Some cracks soon started to appear in what our travel agent could offer. Service levels were always excellent but other matters were not and I kept them on but in a slightly reduced capacity. I adopted an online booking tool for rail and use LHR Express; both have
“Our agent's service levels were excellent but other matters were not, so I kept them on but in a reduced capacity”
enhanced our travel operation and eased the booking processes. Yes, we pay a fee for the services, but in terms of cost savings and convenience for booker and traveller, it is a success. For air travel we look for
the least expensive flights outbound and sometimes the same on the inbound
sector or a flexible return. The ability to view all airlines for specific routes does have a real advantage, certainly
over having to flick between different airline sites for comparison, but it’s still time consuming. I’d rather pick up the phone to our agent and have all that information within minutes. But the cost for doing that is always more than the cost of DIY online. I book accommodation direct in
our main areas of business, and outside that I use an HBA. I require direct billing on a full account basis at no cost to me but it is surprising the number of HBAs, both online and offline, that are unable to offer this. I am not naive enough to think that this is a free service but am content that the bill I get shows exactly what I am paying for. What of the internet deals? By mixing and matching travel and accommodation through various sites I get the best deal. But again, online booking tools, while offering online solutions, very often do not offer the types of deals or savings that individual sites can offer. My main area of concern is whether the online system is able to cope with all parts of a journey and at the same time give the ability to produce the relevant tickets in the office or via e-ticketing. My ideal online travel booking system would comprise the following: • An easy-to-use online system that shows the information I request rather than the information it wants to show me;
• Extensive airline, hotel, rail and car hire choices all in one system;
• The flexibility to mix and match price fares and methods of travel;
• Favourable pricing options and more favourable transaction fees;
• Exclusive deals pertinent to the specific airline/hotel/rail network;
• A secure transaction system; • A traveller tracking device that as the manager I can log into;
• MI that I can request and define what I want when I want it;
• Additional enhancements such as insurance, concierge, parking etc.
My ideal requirement would be to have all these systems integrated into an online system in one place. Am I asking too much?
JARGON BUSTER ➔ ACRONYMS: sadly you just can't get away
from them in the dynamic world of business travel. So to help you out we've listed some of the most commonly used ones below, just so you don’t get your Service Level Agreements confused with the School Libraries Association.
ACFO Association of Car Fleet Operators ACTE
ADR average daily room rate APIS ATOC
BAPCO
BAR best available rate BTA BTC
Association of Corporate Travel Executives
Advanced Passenger Information System Association of Train Operating Companies
British Association of Professional Conference Organisers
business travel agent business travel centre
CDW collision damage waiver CRM CRO CRS CSR
DDR daily delegate rate ETES end-to-end solution FFP
customer relationship management central reservation office central reservation system corporate social responsibility
frequent flyer programme
GDS global distribution system GTMC
HBA hotel booking agent HBAA IATA ITM KPI LRA MI
Guild of Travel Management Companies
Hotel Bookings Agents Association International Air Transport Association Institute of Travel & Meetings key performance indicators last room availability
management information
MIA Meetings Industry Association MPI
OTM online travel management PNR passenger name records RFP ROI SBT SLA
request for proposal return on investment self-booking tools
service level agreement
SME small and/or medium-sized business/es TEM travel and expense management TMC travel management company
Meetings Professionals International
8 I THE BUSINESS TRAVEL MAGAZINE
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