Overview

Through a competitive tender process, this client appointed Selective Travel Management (STM) to manage their entire travel contract. The client had an estimated £1m travel budget with a large expenditure within the USA.

Objectives

The client had a very large off contract spend (approximately 33%). This gave the client limited visibility in times of emergency, no consolidated travel spend, and users were freely booking out of policy travel. It was a stated aim for this client to bring all expenditure within contract, with zero off contract spend. They also wanted to tighten controls over out of policy expenditure.  

Challenges

As this was a new client for STM, we had no historical data to rely upon and we knew that some travellers were not happy to use a nominated Travel Management Company (TMC). 

Solution

STM engaged with the client and provided a fully customised self-booking platform with a built-in approval process. All bookings within policy did not require to be approved, whereas all outside of policy needed to be sent to a nominated approver to confirm the option. Enforcing an approval process immediately saw users select an option that was within policy. Out of policy bookings fell and now approximately 91% of all bookings comply with the client’s travel policy

Off contract spend was more difficult for STM to immediately reduce. Through a marketing campaign and account managers hosting regular meetings, we were slowly able to encourage users to try STM.  We advised on the virtues of booking through a TMC and dispelled any myths as to why they would not use us. Within the first 6 months of servicing this client, off contract spend had reduced to 25% and with further engagement, we reduced this further to only 8% after a full 12 months.  

After the initial 12 months and the drastic reduction in off contract expenditure, the client mandated that 100% of travel must be booked via STM and closed off all internal expense claims.