Whether you’re a small, midsize or large enterprise, saving money across your travel program is easy to achieve with the right travel management partner.
Smaller business owners who may not have a managed corporate travel program —managed corporate travel is a business travel program that is handled by an external travel management company, who manages the booking, budgeting, analysis and insight into travel policy performance — are often faced with challenges when trying to reduce their corporate travel costs. They may lack the spend requirements (buying power) to gain contracted rates with airlines, hotels or rental car companies. The good news is, suppliers are enhancing their programs to offer custom-made solutions to allow these types of companies to gain greater spend control and access more benefits.
For example, the airlines offer a variety of small-business loyalty programs that give more back to smaller businesses. These programs are separate from the standard frequent flier programs or award miles companies may earn. The small-business loyalty programs are designed to encourage repeat business with the airline. For example, Delta’s SkyBonus Program requires a company to have a minimum of five travelers flying per year with at least $5,000 of cumulative spending. The airlines’ loyalty programs are a great benefit as they provide percentage discounts across a wider selection of airfare types or award points which can equate to free tickets.
At Teplis Travel, we manage the enrollment and tracking of small-business loyalty programs on behalf of all our corporate travel clients and present the value-added savings this program brings to their program, year after year.
Companies in the medium to large organization category will find, by aligning themselves to one supplier, they can be rewarded with substantive discounts stemming from the competition between suppliers.
Teplis Travel’s strategic Account Managers work to assess a company’s travel trends and expenditures to determine the benefits of a preferred hotel or airline program (where loyalty is rewarded) against a ‘best rate of the day’ agreement.
We customize each corporate travel program to include several techniques that drive savings. By leveraging the total travel spend of an organization, we can negotiate aggressive supplier discounts in all purchasing categories including air, hotel, car rental and ground transportation.
- Airline – As a first step, we assemble reporting to enable the negotiation of a primary airline contract. The markets where spend is concentrated would determine the best carrier for a first contract, however each airline’s market share, by city pair, will also reveal which markets could be leveraged to generate the best discount. (Moving volume to a different carrier, in a market where that carrier is striving for dominance, is the key to getting the best discount.)
- Car Rental – Teplis provides benchmark studies on consolidated volumes to assist our corporate travel clients in soliciting bids from selected rental car companies to achieve maximum savings on their behalf.
- Hotel – We explore hotel chain-wide discounts, if appropriate, and client specific, locally negotiated rates at individual hotels in those destinations frequented by employees, consultants, guests and other associated travelers to archive greater savings based on the travel requirements of each customer.
Delivering ROI to our corporate travel customers has been part of Teplis Travel’s strategy for over 47 years. We focus on creating programs that will drive results and deliver measurable savings. If you’re interested in learning how Teplis Travel can deliver more to your company’s bottom line, contact us for a free travel management consultation.
