BUSINESS CLASS
As official UK media partner to the 2016 Business Travel Show, BBT reports on the key stories and conference sessions
MORE THAN 7,500 PEOPLE attended this year’s Business Travel Show at Lon- don’s Olympia Grand. The 22nd BT Show broke records as exhibitor numbers rose 5 per cent to over 270, including 96 new companies, and the show’s floor space increased by 27 per cent, taking over the entire ground floor of the exhibition hall. Exhibitors included American Airlines, American Express Global Business Travel, Egencia, Uber, Amadeus, Easyjet, Etihad, Virgin Trains, Portman Travel, Priority Pass, Premier Inn, Capita, FCM Travel Solutions, Flybe, Gett, Hailo, HRG, Mastercard, Star Alliance, Avis, Eurostar and
Booking.com. This year was also the first time all five of the leading car rental companies attended the event together: Avis, Hertz, Enterprise Rent a Car, Sixt and Europcar. The show’s feature areas, including the new Launchpad, were sold out and
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pre-registered visitor and hosted buyer numbers also rose over the two days. Buying Business Travel was once again media partner for the event, reporting live from sessions and producing daily e-newsletters going out to all registered attendees. Here, we round up some of the top stories from the show...
RISE IN RISK ASSESSMENTS Companies have increased their risk
assessments of business trips following the Paris terrorist attacks. A session at the Business Travel Show in London, moderated by BBT editor Paul Revel, heard that clients had been re-examining their policies and duty-of- care responsibilities since November’s atrocities in the French capital. Colin Pereira, head of high risk security
for TV news broadcaster ITN, said: “A lot of businesses since Paris have been phoning
us to ask: how do you do this? How do you assess 30,000 trips per year?” John O’Sullivan, managing director of
travel management company (TMC) Key Travel, added that a survey of its clients had shown a “sensitivity about travelling to Paris or Brussels and about going to any big city in the UK”.
“The immediate change is that clients
are looking to understand what the risk is and their duty-of-care,” he said. “They are also looking longer term at the develop- ment of a plan that looks at what they can do to make a difference.” One buyer said that since the Paris attacks the company had started doing assessments on every trip within Europe, which she said was “taking a long time and alienating staff”. Pereira added it was important to distinguish between the “reaction to an emergency and understanding risk”.
BUYINGBUSINESSTRAVEL.COM
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