GLOBAL SURVEY
travel, travel management, expenses and so forth. Go outside of that regime and you also create lots of man-hours of work and people-processing time.” Interestingly, recent research by Bar-
claycard highlighted the fact that there has been an increased demand for bleisure in the last year – business trips that tag on holiday time. The blurring of this space between business and leisure could create further issues as the consumerisation of business travel progresses. In contrast, the Amex GBT study shows
that, across the seven markets, business travellers are hesitating to blend, as well as take advantage of, leisure add-ons, despite the support that companies show towards this practice. A lack of reporting of these types of trips
may be the issue, since the leisure bit is, in fact, masked by the business element. Yet overall uptake for bleisure appears to be low. It could be that people just want to get home to their families and friends after spending a week cooped up in a business hotel in Lagos. The research highlights there is a strong
feeling in this respect among UK travellers – with 81 per cent saying business travel takes them away from spending time with family and friends (see box, p67), compared with 62 per cent of French and American travellers who say the same. Yet Marshall actively encourages staff to
take time off and immerse themselves in the culture they are trying to assist with de- veloping, and so does her chief executive. Two Four Group’s Hannaford-Janes says she has often asked film crews working for her production company if they want to extend to the weekend with time off to save the company money, especially with flights back from North America. “The main issue for organisations is process. There are many factors for the company to consider, including how to manage approvals, any added costs to the business, and the issue of duty-of- care during the leisure part of the trip, including insurances,” states Philip Haxne, regional director for EMEA at Global Busi- ness Consulting, Amex GBT. “If a traveller brings family this raises questions about the company’s responsi- bility for them, and whether it’ll absorb
64 BBT May/June 2018
BIGGEST CHALLENGES FOR UK
TRAVELLERS BUSINESS
• Being away from family and friends
• Not being able to adjust travel plans if the unexpected happens
• Having to travel over weekends, holidays or out-of-business hours, as well as keeping day-to-day workload on track.
Source: GFK / American Express Global Business Travel
“Bleisure has always existed, but now some companies want to get an overview of how common it is – which is really difficult”
any costs – if so, then benefit taxation can become an issue. As a former global travel manager, my opinion is that bleisure has always existed, but now some companies want to get an overview of how common it is – which is really difficult – and to understand better any implications and added costs.”
COMPLIANCE: THE CORPORATE BUGBEAR Compliance, the perennial bugbear for travel managers, features prominently in this extensive survey. It’s an evergreen topic that sucks the lifeblood of those who manage programmes, at the heart of which is travel policy. Shockingly, the Amex GBT survey revealed that 26 per cent of UK travellers aren’t aware their company even has a
policy, while 47 per cent question whether the travel policy is clear. In the US, however, strict travel policies
drive stricter compliance, which is nice if you’re an American travel manager. But in the UK, where corporates are relatively lax at enforcement, a change in travel policy often fails to motivate comparable changes in compliance. Companies here are better served by a carrot rather than a stick approach – employing “project encouragement” rather than “project fear”. Hannaford-Janes sums it up: “The fact is non-compliant people will always be non-compliant.” Engagement, engagement, engagement
are the three crucial words, as is the word communication, but, as Marshall puts it, travel policies are only bits of paper or today’s digital documents. “You can’t just
BUYINGBUSINESSTRAVEL.COM
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