How To Choose The Best Travel Management Software

 Choosing the best travel management software is tricky no matter what you do, so if you are here right now, rest assured you have come to the best place at the right time. Besides planning and arranging trips, corporate travel management involves many other important aspects. 

An ideal corporate travel management company should have your company’s best interests at heart and provide the ultimate travel solutions. It should offer the options that are advantageous to you. 

What is travel management software?

Travel management software enables booking, planning, tracking, and analysis of corporate travel. A travel management platform is a framework that supports policy compliance, real-time reporting, and flight inventories.

Here, we will discuss important factors to look out for when choosing top-tier travel management software.

12 Factors to help you find the ideal travel management software

#1 Determine the kind of service provider your business requires

Companies want to look for expense management services that support their staff and accounting departments without hindering operations and day-to-day progress. Your business, like any other, has some special requirements.

Hence, businesses and their top management must assess the company’s individual necessities before shopping around.

But before you dive in, it’s crucial to have a firm grasp of all the software’s capabilities and functions. Each travel software has its packet of features, so pick one best suited to your organization.

Sure, multiple features can be beneficial, still if your company doesn’t require them, they may be superfluous. Similarly, look for a solution that provides the services your organization needs, not just the superficial frills or gimmicks. The software is now simpler to use, and you won’t incur any extra expenses.

#2 Comprehensive inventory 

Maintaining travel compliance involves ensuring your inventory is accessible, your policy guidelines are understood, and that employees follow your approval process.

If the travel management software doesn’t include budget hotels and flight service providers, you are missing significant cost-saving benefits. Given that gen Zers and Millenials prefer affordable hotels, it makes sense to provide options.

#3 Integrated Expense Management

Look for the best travel and expense management software like ITILITE to manage and keep records of the company’s travel expenses. Companies deploying staff on business trips can use T&E management software to monitor traveling personnel, make bookings, and create reports.

#4 Makes bookings quickly

Booking a corporate trip does not need to be tediously long. If you store the details of every traveler in your travel management software, you can save a lot of time.

#5 Allows adherence to company policies

When travel policies are adhered to, the travel manager is relieved of significant responsibility. It decreases work anxiety and the expense of travel and streamlines approval requests. Your in-app policy should also be customizable based on factors relevant to your company guidelines.

#6 Ease of use 

Reroutes are irritating when it comes to business travel, and they also make it extremely difficult to trace your work trip. You will end up searching every month to gather your receipts. With the right travel management software, processes should be easy for travel managers and employees.

#7 Avant-garde analytics

The ability to provide information on business trips is among the crucial aspects of any travel management software. So, you can make informed choices that will let you save costs by allowing you to determine areas you are overspending. The software should help you keep track of travel expenses by department or team, amount spent, and other factors.

#8 Features that are simple and efficient

If you are the end user, don’t seek travel management software that can’t offer seamless solutions. In a perfect scenario, you want to swiftly make new bookings and retrieve or modify old ones without needing to switch between countless suppliers.

#9 An omnichannel to keep track of all the trips

Arranging all your business travel in one location makes it simple to track. Integrating travel is the primary objective of a travel management solution. So what happens in a real-world scenario?

Generally speaking, the platform should allow you to sign in and view bookings, policy violations, and more. You’ll also need a single platform for approvals, schedule information, cancellation alerts, etc. 

#10 Saved information and data management 

It is not necessary to spend a long time arranging business trips. Ideally, it will be only a  few minutes, provided you have software that automates and saves each traveler’s data in your travel management software. It may comprise the employee’s name, age, gender, ID proofs, birthdate, and other details.

#11 Excellent customer service

Whenever you plan a trip, try to remember anything can happen. Consequently, you will need a service provider who gives you the flexibility you need when schedules change and unexpected things happen. A platform that allows the flexibility to mitigate the issue swiftly and effectively. It should also have a friendly support team and charge minimal or no costs for any modifications.

 Furthermore, your travel management software must include assistance at little or no extra cost to the company. The processes should be transparent without any nasty surprises because you’ll want to be aware of what you are in for at all times. 

Also, travelers must receive the support they ask for when they require it without having to get anxious over disrupting their budgets with a barrage of service calls.

#12 User Management

Travel managers should have access to their travel management software and view what’s going on. Having control of the software and access to what the team has been scheduling helps you gain a quick perspective to take action when needed. 

As a travel manager, you may be savvy with various scenarios. That may be whether you are managing your own travel plans or assisting people with making travel arrangements. You should be able to quickly pull up the booking or monitor to see who wants additional assistance.

Bottom Line: Ask for a Demo

A demo can assist you in determining how effectively the service functions and how your company would gain from using it. Before signing up, make sure your service provider answers all the pertinent questions and ensure you test the capabilities of the software.

The system you use to plan and manage travel will likely impact your experience as a travel manager and on every employee who travels for business.

How can Business Travelers Manage Work and Leisure Together?

 The strong comeback of business travel is making companies increase the number of domestic and international business trips. Employees have started traveling to various destinations regularly to accomplish specific business travel goals.

Also, they will get opportunities to blend work commitments and leisure activities by leveraging the bleisure travel benefits supported by employers. While traveling for work, employees these days have the option to leverage different bleisure options.

For instance, some employees can extend work trips for leisure purposes, while others can enjoy work trips with family or friends. That is why; every employee must refer to the organizational travel policies to decide the right way to blend work and leisure during business trips. Also, they should follow some simple best practices to enjoy the bleisure trip along with achieving business travel goals.

10 Ways Business Travelers Can Enjoy Bleisure Trips in the Right Way

1. Prioritize Work over Leisure

Organizations support bleisure travel to make business trips successful by keeping employees stress-free. While planning bleisure trips, you must prioritize work over leisure. You need to ensure that the extended work trip does not impact the outcome of the meeting.

For instance, you should consider flying out earlier when there is a tight deadline for the commencement or completion of an important project. Likewise, you should not indulge in leisure activities when your coworkers have to work longer hours on the project.

2. Maintain Transparency

Many companies these days allow employees to combine work and leisure while updating travel policies after the pandemic. But they require employees to get approval from managers or the HR department to indulge in leisure activities during business trips.

You must convey your intention to combine work and leisure while sending business travel requests. Transparency is essential to avoid misunderstandings with coworkers or superiors after the business trip.

3. Comply with Organizational Travel Policy

Companies these days define reimbursable and non-reimbursable travel expenses by implementing elaborate travel policies. They reimburse most travel expenses incurred by an employee for work purposes.

But they reimburse only specific expenses incurred by employees for leisure purposes. You must understand your organization’s travel policy to identify reimbursable leisure costs. The understanding will help you avoid overspending and speed up travel expense reimbursements.

4. Include Weekends in the Trip Schedule

You can indulge in additional leisure activities on the business trip by spending a weekend in the business travel destination. While scheduling professional activities, you should explore ways to avoid paid leaves by leveraging weekends.

You can leverage weekends by arriving at the destination on Saturday or leaving the destination on Sunday. However, you must not miss the chance to add two weekends to week-long business trips.

5. Customize Your Travel Packing List

While making trip-specific travel packing lists, work travelers prioritize business attire or formal attire over casual attire. But you have to make several changes to the business travel packing list if you want to combine work and leisure.

Your updated travel packing list should include active casual, rugged casual, and smart casual attires along with flip flops. However, you must not forget to include a swimsuit which you can wear while relaxing by the pool in the hotel.

6. Spend Time with Friends

Many companies these days allow employees to take their partner, family member, or friend on bleisure trips. You should request your partner or friend to join you on the bleisure trip if your company’s travel policies allow it.

Otherwise, you can use the bleisure trip as an opportunity to spend time with your friends living in the business travel destination. They will help you experience the distinct culture of the city by interacting with the local people.

7. Plan Leisure Activities in Advance

Bleisure trips are much shorter than leisure trips. You get opportunities to indulge in leisure activities for a few days after completing work commitments. That is why; you must decide the things to do and places to see in the travel destination in advance.

Also, you can enjoy the trip more by doing the things you want to do. For instance, you should spend a short time exploring museums and art galleries if you are interested in experiencing the city’s artistic heritage.

8. Make the Most Out of the Downtime

You can extend work trips for leisure purposes if your company supports bleisure travel. But you can make a work trip more exciting only by making the most out of the downtime. You can explore the city’s distinct culture after completing work commitments by joining heritage walks, visiting eateries popular with local people, and taking leisurely walks.

9. Consider Exploring a Different City

Europe and America create opportunities for you to explore multiple cities during the same bleisure trip. You can travel from one popular travel destination to another in a few hours by taking a train ride. While planning bleisure trips, you should explore ways to spend time in cities other than the business travel destination. You can make the bleisure trip more exciting by experiencing cultural differences between two popular cities.

10. Focus on Safety and Security

Companies ensure the safety and security of employees traveling for work by meeting duty of care responsibilities. Most companies these days implement business travel management software that comes with a built-in duty-of-care solution. Employees can access the software to manage travel risks by getting support in real-time.

But organizational travel policies often extend the duty of care solutions only to the business part of the business trip. Employees have to explore ways to remain safe and secure during an extended business trip. Hence, you must focus on remaining safe while indulging in leisure activities if your company does not extend the duty of care solution for the entire bleisure trip.

Conclusion

Most organizations these days support bleisure travel to make business trips successful by keeping work travelers stress-free. Hence, work travelers have the option to indulge in leisure activities before or after meeting work commitments. But they must prioritize work commitments over leisure activities. Also, they should follow some best practices to manage work and leisure efficiently and simultaneously.

Corporate Travel Policy Template

 

When you have employees traveling for business purposes, especially during these times, you should consider creating a corporate travel policy template that balances business outcomes on mobility and cost while enabling procedures to keep employees safe.

Top 12 Benefits to Look for in Company Travel Software

 The big bang return seen by business travel creates opportunities for your enterprise to increase revenue and profits by investing in corporate travel. But you cannot increase return on investment (ROI) on business travel only by making more employees engage in domestic and international travel.

In addition to increasing the number of business trips, you must make business trips successful through travel management automation. Your company or startup needs company travel software that helps employees achieve work travel goals by keeping them comfortable, relaxed, and safe.

At the same time, the travel management software will help your organization control work travel costs despite global inflation. But you can leverage short-term and long-term benefits by implementing the right company travel software.

For instance, you can reduce infrastructural overheads by implementing cloud-based company travel software. Likewise, your employees will love to use the software when they can access it on computers and mobile devices.

But you should look for specific features that deliver the benefits required to meet your organization’s current and emerging travel needs.

12 Benefits You Should Consider While Comparing Company Travel Software

1. Anytime and Anywhere Access

Employees access company travel software before, during, and after business trips. You can enable them to access the software on the go when it is optimized for mobile apps. Also, you must evaluate the software’s user interface (UI) to ensure that employees can perform desired tasks without putting in extra time and effort.

2. Travel Policy Implementation

Employees can understand business travel rules clearly when they can access organizational travel policies using the software. You can implement custom travel policies while configuring the company travel software. This benefit is essential to prevent employees from escalating work travel costs by violating predefined travel policies.

3. Travel Policy Compliance

Work travelers often violate preset policies due to a lack of understanding. The software will make them comply with organizational policies by displaying travel rules customized based on employees, departments, routes, and similar parameters. Also, the software informs you about travel policy violations by sending real-time notifications.

4. Faster Travel Request Approvals

Employees find it challenging to make business travel arrangements properly when there is a delay in trip approvals. You must ensure that an employee sends trip requests to the right authority and the authority approves the request immediately. The company travel software will make it easier for employees to send trip requests to the right authority. Also, the approvers can use the same software to accept or decline out-of-policy travel requests.

5. Smooth Travel Booking Experience

Work travelers these days want to book their choice of flights, accommodations, and other business travel solutions. You can enable employees to book their preferred travel products and services by implementing company travel software that supports self-booking. However, you can make more booking options available to work travelers by implementing software that comes with access to a large travel inventory.

6. Latest Travel Information Delivery

Many employees are yet to travel for business purposes confidently after the pandemic. You can make work travelers confident only by making them access real-time travel information. The company travel software will deliver the latest travel information to employees before and during the business trip. Employees can access the software as a mobile app to access the real-time information required to stay safe and manage work travel risks.

7. Duty of Care Obligations

While making travel policies after the pandemic, you must focus on meeting your company’s duty of care solution. The right company travel software will ensure the safety of work travelers by tracking their real-time locations. Also, employees can access the duty of care solution embedded in the software to manage emergencies by getting the required assistance or support on time.

8. Travel Data Consolidation

You can track and access information about various business trips instantly only by consolidating employee travel data. The company travel software will enable you to access travel data in a single place. Also, you can access relevant data by generating reports based on important parameters like employees, departments, projects, destinations, and business travel goals.

9. Travel Data Analysis

You can improve work travelers’ experiences and control business travel costs by making data-driven decisions. But you have to put in time and effort to gain actionable insights by analyzing large volumes of data. The company travel software features analytics that makes it easier for you to detect patterns and find trends by accelerating data analytics.

10. Travel Expense Reimbursements

You can keep work travelers stress-free only by ensuring quick travel expense reimbursements. The software will make it easier for you to streamline business travel management through automation. Employees can use the software to generate and submit automated expense reports. At the same time, the absence of paper receipts will help your finance team review and approve the travel expense claims quickly.

11. Travel Spending Control

Global inflation makes it essential for your business to escalate corporate travel budgets. But you must focus on controlling business travel costs to get higher ROI. The software launched by travel management companies makes business travel products available at negotiated rates. Also, it helps you curtail costs by preventing travel policy violations and travel expense fraud. At the same time, you can use analytics to find opportunities to control costs without affecting business travel experiences.

12. Incentivize Employees to Save

Your travel policy could not boost the business travel experience without allowing employees to book their choice of business travel solutions. But the policy can control costs by incentivizing employees to choose lower-cost booking options. You can implement company travel software that allows employees to retain a part of the savings by reducing trip costs. The software will use intelligence technologies to help employees reduce trip costs by recommending the appropriate business travel solutions.

Conclusion In addition to controlling company travel costs, the cloud-based travel management software will help employees achieve preset work travel goals. You can shortlist the company travel software solutions based on the features and benefits required by your company. But you should check if the software meets your company’s precise work travel needs only by evaluating these features in real-time by requesting a free trial.

How to Choose a Travel Management System

 Business travel is making a strong comeback after the pandemic. Your company or startup can leverage the comeback of business travel to earn incremental revenue. But you cannot get a higher ROI on business travel only by increasing the number of domestic and business trips.

What's the best travel management system for your business? We break down the difference between online and offline bookings, how to choose the right system for you, and more.

In addition to increasing the business travel budget, your organization must focus on boosting the business travel experience and ensuring business traveler safety. At the same time, you need to explore ways to beat global information by controlling ongoing work travel costs.

Your company can save time, resources, and costs by automating business travel management. A cloud-based travel management system helps your organization automate business travel management without increasing upfront and recurring infrastructural costs.

But you should remember that travel management software differs primarily in the category of features. You can streamline the entire business travel management efficiently only by investing in a travel management system that comes with robust features. You can even use features as the primary criteria to choose the right travel management system for your business.

9 Features You Must Consider While Choosing a Travel Management System

1. Travel Policy Implementation

You can make it easier for employees to plan business travel and get travel expenses reimbursed by implementing a clearly-defined travel policy. However, it is also important to help employees understand the business travel rules and access the latest travel rules.

The right travel management system will make it easier for you to implement custom travel policies. Also, employees can use the software to access the latest and relevant rules while organizing domestic or international business trips.

2. Travel Policy Compliance

The travel management software enables employees to access the latest travel policies of your company in seconds. But you must remember that work travelers often violate present travel rules unknowingly or unintentionally.

You can make every employee comply with preset travel policies by showing in-policy travel options. Hence, you should opt for a travel management system that shows in-policy travel options to employees and sends automated notifications each time it detects a travel policy violation.

3. Travel Request Approval Workflow

While making organizational travel policies, you must focus on streamlining and centralizing the business travel approval process. Your policies must clearly define who the approvers are and what each of them can approve. You can further speed up the approval process through automation.

You should implement a travel management system that enables travelers to send work travel requests to the right approver. At the same time, the software will make the approver approve or decline the business travel request while mentioning the reasons.

4. Booking Options and Assistance

Most work travelers expect employers to allow them to book their choice of business travel products and services. You can meet this expectation of employees by choosing a travel management system featuring built-in self-booking tools.

While making business travel arrangements, employees can use the tool to book their choice of flight, accommodation, and car rental. However, you can help employees get relevant assistance while booking travel products by opting for software that supports self-travel booking and managed travel booking at a time. 

5. Extensive Travel Inventory

The choice of business travel solutions differs from one employee to another. For instance, some employees love to stay in one of the safer hotels, while others prefer stress-free accommodation. You can meet the varying needs and preferences of work travelers only by allowing them to access an extensive travel inventory.

Many travel management systems enable work travelers to access extensive travel inventory. Employees can further use the same software to compare various travel inventory options. It is one of the features that will help you boost meet employees’ work travel experiences.

6. Negotiated Corporate Rates

The cost of business travel will continue to rise in the near future. Your business has to explore ways to curtail costs without affecting employees’ work travel experiences. You can control business travel costs effectively by investing in software provided by a leading travel management company.

The software will provide employees with access to an extensive travel inventory. At the same time, it will make them book flights, accommodations, and cabs at discounted rates. You should prioritize travel management systems that offer negotiated rates.

7. Travel Analytics

The inflationary phase of the global economy increases business trip costs consistently. Your business can get higher ROI only by controlling business travel expenses. That is why; you need actionable insights gained by analysis of historical travel data of employees.

The new-generation travel management systems consolidate large volumes of travel data and analyze the data using analytics.  Some of these actionable insights provided by the software will help you control business travel costs, while others will help you finetune your organization’s travel policies.

8. Duty of Care Solution

You can make employees engage in international travel confidently only by keeping them safe and secure. While comparing travel management systems, you should check if the software features a duty-of-care solution.

Employees can access the duty of care solution to manage emerging travel risks by getting real-time support. However, you need to prioritize software that enhances employee safety by providing multi-level support, delivering the latest travel information, and supporting employee tracking.

9. Travel Expense Management

A delay in travel expense reimbursements often makes employees experience stress after business trips. You can speed up travel expense reimbursements by investing in unified travel and expense management software.

The software will help employees to submit travel expense claims by generating automated expense reports based on scanned receipts. Also, it will accelerate expense approval and payment while ensuring travel policy compliance and preventing expense fraud.

Conclusion

The right travel management software will help your company keep work travelers safe and stress-free without increasing costs. But you must focus on investing in a travel management system that meets your organization’s requirements and budget. It is always important to choose software that employees can access anytime and anywhere using their smartphones or tablets.

At the same time, you should ensure that the travel management system can be customized, extended, and scalable according to changing business needs. Also, your company can gain a competitive advantage by choosing software that leverages cutting-edge technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics.

17 Ways to Manage Stress and Anxiety Before, During, and After Business Travel

 According to a recent survey by the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), businesses have been spending more on international business travel and allowing non-essential business travel.

The double-digit increase in business travel transactions indicates more and more employees engaging in domestic and international business travel after the pandemic.

But business travel often impacts the mental health of employees traveling for work adversely. Many corporate professionals experience stress, anxiety, and depression due to frequently traveling to various business travel destinations. Every work traveler can manage stress during, before, and after business trips by following some simple tips or best practices.

7 Ways Work Travelers can Manage Stress before Business Trips

1. Prepare an Elaborate Business Travel Itinerary

You have to visit multiple places and engage in various activities during the business trip. Hence, you should prepare a business travel itinerary to access important information like meeting schedules, flight times, hotel addresses, local transportation, and day-to-day activities.

2. Make a Travel Packing Checklist

You will experience stress when you do not find the necessary documents or accessories while traveling for work. You must make a destination-specific travel packing checklist to ensure that you can access clothing, toiletries, medication, safety items, and important documents instantly.

3. Book Tickets Early

Organizational travel policies these days make employees book flights, accommodations, cabs, and other business travel solutions early. Also, you can get your choice of seat and stay in a stress-free accommodation by booking business travel early.

4. Try to Reduce Flight Time

As highlighted by several studies, travelers experience negative emotions like tension when they spend time at altitudes. You can easily reduce stress and anxiety by spending less time at altitudes. That is why; it is always important to book direct flights instead of connecting flights while engaging in international business travel.

5. Recheck Your Digital Devices

Before the scheduled departure, you must not forget to charge your laptop, smartphone, tablet, and other digital devices. Also, you should ensure that electronic chargers and adapters are stored properly in your suitcase.

6. Stay Active and Hydrated

Many work travelers become dehydrated during air travel due to dry air and low humidity. You must keep yourself hydrated by drinking plenty of water before boarding. At the same time, you can stay active by sleeping adequately before boarding an early flight.

7. Prepare to Manage Air Travel Issues

Despite making business travel arrangements properly, you cannot rule out issues like flight delays, flight cancellations, and lost luggage. You can manage these unpredictable issues in air travel by getting real-time assistance.

Hence, you must install the necessary apps on your mobile device and note down the contact information of the person who will assist you in case of emergencies.

7 Ways Work Travelers Remain Stress-Free during Business Trips

8. Eat Stress-Relieving Foods

While exploring a city’s food culture, work travelers forget that certain foods increase stress and anxiety. You can remain stress-free during business trips only by avoiding stress-causing foods like fried snacks, fast foods, sugar, artificial sweeteners, alcohol, and caffeine. At the same time, you should consume stress-relieving foods like oatmeal, green leafy vegetables, walnuts, and dark chocolate.

9. Get Enough Sleep

You should remember that sleep deprivation and poor sleep affect your mood and make you experience stress. You can tackle a day’s stress efficiently during business trips only by getting adequate sleep. Like other business travelers, you might find it difficult to maintain a healthy sleep pattern while traveling. But you must try to sleep properly throughout the business trip.

10. Keep Your Body Hydrated

Some work travelers experience stress due to dehydration, while dehydration makes make business travelers experience stress. You can manage stress only by drinking water adequately and regularly while traveling.

However, you must not increase water intake by drinking alcoholic or sugary beverages. Instead, you should carry a water bottle and get it refilled throughout the business trip.

11. Practice Meditation

In addition to reducing stress, meditation produces a deep sense of relaxation. You should practice meditation to relax and refresh your mind while traveling for business purposes. However, you can relieve stress quickly only by focusing your attention and removing jumbled thoughts from your mind. At the same time, you should stay healthy by finding time to walk or run.

12. Connect with Friends and Family

Many people experience stress when they feel lonely. You cannot connect with your family and friends while traveling. But you can avoid social isolation by staying connected with them through instant chats and phone calls.

13. Keep Expense Receipts Organized

You will need expense receipts after the business trip to prepare and submit expense reports. You can reduce the time and effort required to prepare an expense report simply by keeping receipts organized during the business trip. You should use an efficient receipt management system that stores the receipts digitally by taking their picture and transferring it to cloud storage.

14. Take Advantage of Downtime

You have to focus on achieving predefined business travel goals throughout the work trip. Hence, you will experience stress regularly while traveling. You can stay relaxed after meetings by taking advantage of the downtime. You should use the downtime to relieve stress by enjoying dinner, relaxing by the pool, or exploring the city by walking.

3 Ways Work Travelers Relieve Stress after Business Trips

15. Submit Expense Reports Early

Most work travelers experience stress when there is a delay in travel expense reimbursements. You can get travel reimbursed quickly by submitting expense reports early. You must leverage the business travel management software implemented by your company to generate automated expense reports in less time simply by scanning expense receipts.

16. Rejuvenate and Reenergize Your Body

You must wait to go to the office after the business trip. It is always important to allow your body to recover by drinking plenty of water, eating stress-relieving foods, and adhering to your exercise routine. It is always advisable to work from home for several days before returning to your office.

17. Identify the Main Causes of Stress

The causes of stress vary from one business traveler to another. You can manage travel-related stress efficiently in the future only by identifying the specific causes of stress. The understanding will make you remember the measures taken by you to manage stress while planning business trips in the future.

Conclusions

Companies and startups these days protect work travelers’ mental health in various ways. In addition to keeping their travel policies flexible, they implement feature-rich business travel management software.

The software helps work travelers manage stress levels by providing multiple options, relevant information, and real-time support to employees. Employees must leverage travel management software to protect their mental health despite engaging in business travel regularly.