Road warriors, a challenge for business travel agencies / Conclusions of the May Conference

They are known as "road warriors" and are the employees who spend more than 50% of their time traveling for work. Agencies face new challenges with this customer profile, due to their high level of information, their demand for advanced technological solutions and their need for new services. These are some of the conclusions of the special conference for agencies held by Forum Business Travel in Madrid and Barcelona.

Both specialized travel agencies and their client companies defend the usefulness of the corporate social networks to listen to the needs of the frequent traveler and adapt their services. As reminded by Óscar García, founding partner of Forum Business Travel, “hereí Facebook or Linkedin are no good; comments must be registered in closed environments and validated by the company, due to the confidential information they handle”.

In addition to these communication channels, which are still very incipient in the workplace, another challenge ahead is to bring together travel apps. We need to bring some sanity to the world of apps. They are useful but many of them are not used. The future lies in integrative and transactional solutions, rather than merely informative ones," says Javier Pardo, commercial director of NH Hotel Group.

Continuing with technology, the objective sought by suppliers and users is to achieve a balance between security, savings and satisfaction. The most recent trend among companies is to involve the traveler with management and scheduling techniques, especially in the case of millennials, who are demanding more freedom when it comes to organizing their trips. For this reason, some companies are flexibilizing their travel policies.

According to Alicia Benavent, travel manager at Calidad Pascual, “today's traveler has undergone a major transformation compared to a few years ago, and the ‘fault’ of this is due to technology”. In his opinion, “agencies have to keep improving their services to provide added value because their role as a strategic provider is necessary”.

Furthering this idea, Marco D’Ilario, HRS director for Spain and Portugal, stresses that corporate travel agencies “are the ones in charge of maintenance and parameterization of online self-booking tools, and the traveler needs to have his profile data, contacts or loyalty cards correctly updated in them”.

The demand for intermediation increasingly includes new suppliers, such as those related to the so-called collaborative economy, in addition to other items that are often beyond the control of financial departments, such as meals, parking, cabs and other extras generated during business trips.Ana Medina, Partneship Manager at HRS, also calls for "more specialization on the part of suppliers, since the customer's demand for quality is greater.

According to Estefan de Esquide, head of innovation and product development at American Express Global Business Travel España, "the key is that the technological tools provided have to be adapted to the customer's needs;The key is that the technological tools provided must be adapted to the particular needs of each company, in addition to being able to respond to the different audiences within the company, from corporate travelers to the areas involved in management such as travel managers, general services, purchasing, finance and human resources.

.