towards advance bookings. “It was difficult for us to see how we could add value to the rail-booking process, and the SBTs [self- booking tools] at the time were not at the level we needed them to be for integration into the back office,” says Birse. However, perhaps as an indication of
improved functionality, this arrangement is changing soon, with Serco employees now able to book their train ticket through
Thetrainline.com on Concur. Birse acknowl- edges that this set up makes it easier for Serco to apply and police a rail policy. The company does not allow its employees to travel first class and, although exceptions can be built in, this is the cornerstone of its rail policy. “We need to avoid the situation where we
have two people on the same train going to the same meeting, one of whom has booked a second class ticket in advance, through the corporate tool within policy, while the other is using a personal credit card to buy a first class ticket at the booking office and then trying to get it through on expenses,” she says. “We have a flat organisation and our travel policy should reflect this.”
NUMBER CRUNCHING
Rail booking specialist Evolvi claims market leadership in the UK corporate rail booking space. Information released at the Business Travel Show this year claimed 59 per cent of total UK corporate agency rail business was booked through its Evolvi-ng platform, a 4 per cent increase on 2012’s market leading
100 BBT MAY/JUNE 2014
share. The rail ticket revenues in 2013 came in at almost £397 million, out of a total market figure provided by the Rail Settlement Plan of £673 million. Evolvi’s trade relations director, Jon Reeves, explains that the company was formed in 2005, emerging out of a TMC. “We noticed that a lot of business travellers were using the train, and there was a need to develop a product specifically for corporates,” he says. “It needed to offer booking as well as compli- ance, access to management information and a choice of fulfilment. Adopting a B2C [business-to-consumer] approach would not have worked – it needed specialist insight.” However, one of those B2C firms is
Thetrainline.com, and it had a corporate travel team as long ago as 2001. Ian Cairns, its director of distribution, credits its B2C credentials with helping it to service road warriors. “The CRM [customer relationship management] tools we have developed for the leisure traveller are an important part of driving buyer behaviour towards advance purchase, and we can apply this insight to the corporate world as well,” he says.
INNOVATIONS The principles of rail booking are comparable with air, according to Tony D’Astolfo, man- aging director for travel industry research specialist Phocuswright. D’Astolfo is a well-known name in business travel circles, following stints with United Airlines, Get There and Rearden, among others. He says:
“We noticed that a lot of business travellers were using the train, and there was a need to develop a product specifically for corporates”
“The questions over rail travel are the same as for most business trips: how do I book it, how is the booking reported and what is the travel experience like?” Phocuswright’s European conference,
taking place in Dublin in May, includes a Travel Innovation Summit. Here, 30 or so new businesses present their product to an audience of analysts and investors, with the winning innovation given a slot at the main conference. “I haven’t seen the submissions for Dublin yet,” D’Astolfo says, “but there is a history of rail featuring as part of a multi- modal booking product. We’re seeing a lot of businesses, like Rome2rio, getting a lot
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