One out of six rates charged on corporate purchasing channels is incorrect

Companies pay 14% more than they initially negotiated because one in six hotel rates, 17%, charged on corporate purchasing channels is incorrect, according to a report by the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA). This percentage can be as high as 20% in many of the programs that lodging solutions provider HRS monitors.

This error rate and the losses companies incur from these incorrect hotel rates would be unacceptable in any other area of corporate procurement.

While rate auditing and review, typically reactive solutions, help companies recoup some savings, there are rate filtering technologies;to identify the wrong ones and prevent them from appearing in shopping channels, such as GDS, online self-booking tools, or mobile apps, commonly used by business travelers.

A good example of these solutions is Rate Filter, launched by HRS, which automates price filtering in real time. Powered by artificial intelligence, the technology addresses the problem of incorrect rates and "illegal" calls in reservation systems used by corporate employees.

The rate filter prevents incorrect rate purchases from being made, representing a qualitative leap in corporate hotel rate assurance and generating millions in savings across the global corporate travel industry.

For a global manufacturing company, HRS detected errors that would have cost the company more than 7.5 million euros per year had they not been addressed. The extrapolated figure of lost savings to the entire industry, calculated at ?573 million, highlights the magnitude of the hotel savings at stake.