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.