A COMPLETE Travel Management Glossary...A complete travel management glossary A complete travel...

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A COMPLETE

Travel ManagementGlossary

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When it comes to the subject of business travel, there’s a lot to take in; with all the specialist terms and abbreviations, it can feel like a foreign language at times.

Whether you’re new to travel management or are a seasoned pro who is soon to be reviewing your current business travel supplier, this is your one stop, go-to guide for everything travel related.

All of the definitions that you’ll find in this glossary have been condensed down to 100 words or less in order to provide concise, practical explanations.

For more in-depth business travel information, check out our articles and blogs - all written by our expert team of travel professionals.

A complete travel management glossary A complete travel management glossary

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Account Manager

Airline contract

Airline ticket reissue

Amadeus

Ancillary fees

APEX fare

Award criteria

BBT

Benchmarking travel

policies

Best available rates

Bleisure

Business travel agents

Business traveller

profile

Call off contract

CCS

Charge cards

Charity fares

Compliance

Content aggregation

Content channels

A

B

C

Direct connect

Distressed inventory

Duty of care

Dynamic travel policy

D

E

F

E-ticket

Full content

agreement


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IATA

ITM

LCC

Lead-time

Leakage

LFR

Lot

I

L

Gamification

GBTA

GDS

MI

MICE

Hotel billback

Hotel rack rate

Hotel RFP

G M P

HR RDG

Rebate in corporate

travel contracts

Review pack

RevPAR

Rogue Traveller

Schengen visa

Service adoption

SLA

SOTO

Split ticketing

SSO

Standstill period

S

Management fees

Merchant fees

Metasearch

Tail spend

Third place working

TMC

TMC RFP

TNC

Travel policy

Travelport

Travel risk policy

Travel transaction fee

Traveller behaviour

Traveller friction

Traveller tracking

Unmanaged travel

VAT recovery

Visual guilt

M

T

V

U

N

OJEU

Online adoption

Online booking tool

Open booking

OpenRail

POD

Post-trip approval

PQQ tender

Pre-trip approval

Prepayment

Price benchmarking

Pure transaction fees

O

P

NATS

Negotiated hotel rates

NDC


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Advance purchase excursion fare (APEX)

An airline fare that is discounted due to certain usage restrictions.

These fares tend to be heavily discounted due to the numerous restrictions involved and are generally non-refundable.

Typically these fares have to be purchased 2-4 weeks in advance, with a minimum and maximum gap period between the departure dates. They also don’t allow any stopovers.

Airline contract

A deal negotiated between an organisation and an airline company on a guaranteed volume of tickets in exchange for cheaper, negotiated rates.

Organisations that have a substantial air travel requirement can use their frequency of travel to their advantage with airline contracts, safe in the knowledge that they will hit the required volume.

However, this type of arrangement can be a hindrance to travellers, as it reduces flexibility when travellers are restricted to travelling on the routes provided by the selected airline alone.

Airline ticket reissue

An alteration to an airline journey that requires the issue of an entirely new ticket, usually because a traveller has changed travel date and therefore the flight number or price.

Tickets can also be reissued for changes to origin, destination or stopovers.

The rules around ticket reissues due to changing travel dates are set by the relevant airline. Airlines can also charge a fee to make an amendment - details can be found in the ticket’s conditions.

An Account Manager (AM) looks after a TMC’s customers.

Account manager (AM)

Their key duties are:

Consulting – answering queries and providing solutions to problems. Anticipating and suggesting actions to changes in the industry.

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Analysing – breaking down and analysing your MI as well as understanding company behaviours.

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Travel Reviews – analytical abilities allow your AM to highlight trends or behavioural patterns to form strategic plans to make instant/long term savings as well as improving current processes.

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Ancillary fees

A charge for additional services throughout a traveller’s journey.

These can vary from pre-journey services and add ons, such as priority boarding, food and beverages or WIFI throughout the journey.

Ancillary fees are most commonly used by Low Cost Carriers to boost their revenue through non-ticket sources, to off set their low air fares.

Award criteria

Used when organisations decide to put their travel contract out to tender.

This allows organisations to score and rank suppliers on different factors, depending on importance. For example, X company has a total scoring criteria of 100, with pricing weighted as 0-30 points, quality as 0-20 points, technical as 0-20 points, experience as 0-20 points and cultural fit as 0-10.

This allows companies to evaluate the different options available to them, highlighting which choice would be the best fit against their desired criteria.

Amadeus

A GDS that is the largest transaction processor in the industry.

Founded in 1987, Amadeus provides a variety of searches, bookings and other processes for various travel sectors.

TMCs use content aggregated from Amadeus, other GDS systems and online sites to show fare results to customers in their booking tools, allowing them to review all options before selecting the right choice for them.

Benchmarking travel policies

A document used by organisations to provide a clear overview to their travellers on the rules when it comes to booking business travel.

Companies of similar sizes tend to have comparable travel requirements and structures, therefore benchmarking travel policies against each other can provide fantastic insight into how effective a current travel policy is.

This form of benchmarking allows companies to evaluate and share best practices to see what is achievable with a few changes to a similar travel policy.



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Business travel agents

Also known as corporate travel agents or TMCs.

They help organisations manage their business travel. Most business travel agents will provide a self booking tool, which allows bookers and travellers to book trips themselves, along with a more traditional service where people can book by phone or email.

Additional services are also provided to help organisations control their business travel spend such as data analytics, consultancy, security & risk management and account management.

Best available rates

A pricing model that’s commonly used by hotels to provide the lowest possible rate to a consumer on a given date.

This involves hotels analysing the current market conditions, such as demand in a certain area and time of stay, to price a room accordingly. As this pricing strategy is based on ever changing variables, the price of a room can fluctuate throughout a day.

Best available rates essentially provide consumers with the most appropriate room cost at any given time by predicting the demand for rooms and lowering or raising the price accordingly.

Business traveller profile

A record stored with a TMC containing traveller information such as name and contact details. This saves time during the booking process and ensures booking accuracy.

Company information can also be included e.g. department codes and cost centres, along with traveller preferences enabling frequent flyer details, seating, meal and hotel requirements to be provided to the relevant supplier automatically.

Some TMCs offer a single profile for all bookings, others use multiple systems making single profiles more challenging. Make sure you find out how it works when considering business travel suppliers.

Bleisure

Bleisure is the practice of combining business travel and leisure travel into one trip.

Combining these two previously distinct types of travel can sometimes create a happier traveller by reducing the stress that’s sometimes associated with travelling.

Bleisure can either give a traveller a few extra days to rest before undertaking the business trip, or act as a positive reminder that they can relax and experience the destination afterwards.

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Charge cards

A method of payment that can be used as part of an organisation’s business travel strategy.

Similar to a credit card, it allows the cardholder to instantly pay for any of the travel services they require through the organisation, instead of having to pay for it themselves and submit an expense form.

The benefits of using this method are that there is no spend limit and it incurs no interest charges. However, they are open to misuse, such as paying for unauthorised amenities.

Buying Business Travel (BBT)

that provides numerous articles on everything corporate travel related, BBT publishes a magazine bi-monthly which has a circulation of over 18,000.

BBT has a target audience of travel and meetings buyers and arrangers, with more than 41,000 subscribers across on and offline media.

BBT also hosts the prestigious annual Business Travel Awards.

Charity fares

These were introduced by airlines to provide increased flexible travel choices to people carrying out humanitarian work overseas.

They are designed to assist humanitarian travellers, particularly in respect of the often fast- changing nature of their work. They allow for increased baggage allowance and greater flexibility over amendments and cancellations.

Typically these fares are only provided by a select few TMCs including Click Travel. Click here for more information.

Call off contract

Call off contracts fall under framework agreements.

Organisations may set stringent terms and conditions as part of a framework agreement or, alternatively, set boilerplate conditions of the contract which can then be modified under the agreement, as part of a call-off contract.

Call-off contracts are then the legally binding agreement and may comprise of additional information specific to that client, such as contract particulars; the call-off terms and conditions and any special terms and conditions relevant to that client.

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Content channels

Travel products can be bought through a range of web sites and travel retail systems. Each of these points-of-sale are referred to as “content channels”.

Travel suppliers, such as hotels, airlines and car rental companies will typically distribute their content through a number of different channels, often in an attempt to segment the market. However, modern travel retailers aggregate the content from multiple channels to work around this strategy.

Note that metasearch engines are not considered content channels because they don’t actually retail travel products, rather they act as a signpost redirecting the user to the content channel for their chosen product.

Compliance

The practice of adhering to a travel policy set by an organisation to help achieve an overall goal. Compliance can be measured by TMCs and reported on as part of extensive MI data.

By measuring compliance, organisations can ensure that employees are not unnecessarily overspending and, more importantly, that the overall travel expenditure isn’t more than originally anticipated.

Organisations can drive compliance through various methods, all of which they can discuss with their AM - here at Click Travel we use a traffic light system to employ visual guilt.

Content aggregation

Refers to the process of submitting a user’s search request to a range of content channels and combining the results into a single view for the user to choose from. It is conceptually similar to metasearch.

Content aggregation results in wider choice, more flexibility and greater cost saving opportunities. By tapping into a wider variety of content channels it can also substantially reduce core travel costs through exploitation of price fluctuations.

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Crown Commercial Service (CCS)

Founded in 1991, CCS combines direct buying with advice and policy to provide professional procurement services to public sector organisations.

Public sector organisations can purchase goods and services via CCS through the numerous frameworks they have in place, which are pre-tendered contracts with suppliers.

Framework RM1034 is designed to provide public sector organisations with a choice of travel services by splitting the contract into 3 different lots. This allows them to select the most appropriate lot for their travel requirements.


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Distressed inventory

Refers to hotel rooms that are unlikely to sell at full price, so have been reduced in cost. Hotels often significantly reduce prices to encourage consumers to book last-minute and to avoid their rooms going unoccupied

Inventory can become distressed for a number of reasons, but the most common is cancellations in close proximity to the booking date.

Duty of care

The legal and moral obligation to ensure the safety or well-being of an organisation’s bookers and travellers when away on business.

Organisations must make sure as far as possible that travellers are safe, secure and free from harm.

TMCs can help organisations fulfill their duty of care to their travellers by helping produce a robust business travel policy. They can also help by providing services such as traveller tracking technology, a 24/7 support function for all travellers and crisis management teams to guide both travellers and organisations through any emergency situations.

Direct connect

A technical service provided by travel suppliers (airlines, hotels and car rental companies) that provides programmatic access to their sales systems, enabling third party travel retailers to search for availability, and typically make and manage bookings too.

Direct connects represent a travel suppliers lowest cost sales channel and are becoming more and more popular.


Dynamic travel policy

Unlike a traditional business travel policy that is a static set of business travel guidelines, a dynamic business travel policy’s controls will adapt depending on the options available at the time of booking.

For example, instead of saying a rail ticket must be in standard class, you say it must be within X% of the cheapest option.

This gives the traveller choice whilst also controlling costs, delivering best value and a great user experience.


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Full content agreement

A clause in a contract between an airline and a Global Distribution System which obligates the airline to distribute all of its fares via the GDS, effectively creating a level playing field between the GDS and other distribution channels such as the airline’s own web site.

Gamification

A method that an organisation can implement to improve user engagement and motivation through game elements such as loyalty rewards cards.

This can be a powerful tool to drive a desired travel behaviour within a company, such as booking through an online tool only or booking with preferred suppliers, by rewarding travellers through incentives.

For example a traveller could receive 10 points if they book through a preferred supplier and accumulate their points throughout a year to spend them on rewards such as cinema tickets.

E-ticket

In an increasingly digitalised world, where almost everyone has access to a smartphone, printed tickets are usually no longer a necessity.

Travellers can easily book their travel tickets online and then access their tickets through a confirmation email, or mobile application, foregoing the printing process altogether.

This saves the time and hassle of printing, and also saves paper - two birds, one stone!

On the downside, travellers must ensure that their device is charged throughout the journey to have access to their ticket.


Global Business Travel Association (GBTA)

One of the biggest business travel and meetings organisations within the corporate travel industry.

GBTA caters for its 7,000 plus members, who represent more than $345 billion spend on corporate travel.

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., GBTA has operations on six continents to provide its ever growing subscriber list with compelling content, events such as the GBTA Convention and world-class education.


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Global Distribution System (GDS)

Distributes travel products to agents around the world.

In the world of air ticketing they remain the dominant distribution channel, however in other areas online travel agents such as Booking.com are now cleaning up in terms of the volume of content and bookings.

Hotel billback

A way of allowing a business traveller to stay at a hotel without having to pay their hotel bill on departure. Instead, the hotel bills the traveller’s TMC who then invoices the traveller’s organisation.

The same method can also be used for payment of conferences or venues.

Billback is offered by most TMCs, however it’s important to understand it’s limitations. Some TMCs only offer this service for UK hotels or selected chains, whilst others will provide billback for all property types in the UK and abroad.

Hotel rack rate

The price a hotel charges for a room before any discounts have been applied. It’s sometimes referred to as the published rate and is usually set artificially high, which means that discounts can look extremely generous by comparison.

If you’re working with a TMC or a business travel agency, make sure any savings reports you receive don’t compare the hotel rates you’ve paid with the rack rate as this will be giving you inflated and inaccurate savings figures.


Hotel request for proposal (RFP)

When an organisation invites hotels to bid for their business by submitting or negotiating discounted rates and or favourable terms.


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Institute of Travel & Meetings (ITM)

Founded over 60 years ago, ITM is a recognised body for the business travel industry, representing companies from a wide range of industries.

ITM consists of over 2,800 business travel buyers and suppliers, with its main aim of providing corporate travel best practices and advice.Each year ITM hosts its own conference where members gather to discuss the latest travel management issues and topics.

International Air Transport Association (IATA)

A trade association that represents 260 of the world’s airlines.

IATA advocates for the interests of airlines, sets industry standards and provides accreditation to travel agencies.

All reputable TMCs will have an IATA license, which is a globally recognised seal ofapproval.

In travel management terms IATA is particularly noteworthy because of its creation of NDC, which is a programme designed to modernise and make the retail of air products more efficient.

Lead-time

The number of days between booking and the actual date of travel.

Your organisation can achieve significant savings by taking advantage of advance fares offered on most flights and train journeys.

It can often be the case that the further ahead you book your train journey or flight, the lower the price will be.

So, allowing for longer lead times will mean that you’re organised in advance and you’re getting the very best deals on your business travel.


Leakage

When employees are booking their business travel outside of the contract.

For example, a traveller may buy a ticket direct from the airline’s website and then claim through expenses, instead of buying through the organisation’s contracted TMC.

If you want full control of your business travel spend you need to capture leakage.

Reasons for leakage usually include a poor booking process, rates that are not competitive and a weak business travel policy.


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Lot

The different categories of services that are available during the process of procuring a travel management company.

Lots provide a choice of varied services to suit an organisation’s requirements, ranging from limited services to a fully fledged TMC. This allows companies the opportunity to award numerous suppliers.

For example, the Wider Public Sector Framework has a total of 3 lots available. Lot 1 is a limited service, providing an online only booking tool for UK and international rail and accommodation, whereas Lot 3 provides a fully managed service.

Low Cost Carrier (LCC)

The flight types that LCCs provide are generally short haul with the majority of the bookings being made online.

By limiting the services and products they provide as standard and charging for extras such as luggage, LCCs provide a cheaper type of transport compared to typical airlines. Examples of these airlines include Ryanair, EasyJet and JetBlue.

Lowest fare rate (LFR)

The cheapest possible legal airfare to a traveller’s chosen destination.LFRs can be used in air travel policies as a guideline on what type of air bookings can be made.


Management fees

An agreement between a customer and a TMC to pay a fixed fee based upon the amount of work required to fulfil the customer’s needs.

The advantage of this fee is that it’s easy for an organisation to calculate the total cost as the fee is fixed.

However, since management fees are locked, quite often companies find themselves paying a fee that does not equate to the volume of service that they’re actually using.

Reasons for leakage usually include a poor booking process, rates that are not competitive and a weak business travel policy.


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Meetings, Incentives, Conferencing and Exhibitions (MICE)

Most TMCs have a specialised Meetings, Incentives, Conferencing and Exhibitions team.

They will work with your requirements to create your desired experience, using industry expertise and contacts, as well as providing creative ideas and suggestions.

A MICE team can provide services ranging from organising an exhibition in a foreign country to arranging an offsite meeting.

Management information (MI)

The data collected by your TMC that provides vital information on your business travel.

From hotel group usage to duty of care information and CO2 emissions, it’s all presented in detailed reports. Your TMC can help you use these reports to pinpoint areas where you can save money or improve traveller compliance.

High quality MI allows you to understand your travel spend, as well as trends in traveller movements and bookings, which puts you in the best possible position to make the right decisions on your travel management.


Merchant fees

The percentage over the original price of the product.

Merchant fees are enforced by certain businesses as the vendor must pay an annual fee to maintain a merchant account.

Some businesses are thus forced to charge merchant fees, however, not all do.


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Metasearch

The process of searching multiple data sources at the same time.

In travel, metasearch is used to refer to websites that send a user’s travel search request to a number of other travel websites, and present the user with a combined view of the results, typically grouped by source. If the user chooses to book one of these options, they’re redirected to the source website that provided the chosen result.

A known issue with travel metasearch is extensive use of cache, which results in fares being presented in results that are no longer available.

The leading air navigation service provider in the United Kingdom.

National Air Traffic Services (NATS)

It was founded back in 1962 as a way to merge the UK’s existing military and civil Air Traffic Control services.

NATS has two main functions;

It provides air traffic control services to 14 UK airports and1

it oversees en-route air traffic control to the Shanwick Oceanic Control Area & the UK Flight Information Regions.

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NATS is headquartered in Whiteley and employs over 4,500 employees made up of ATCOs, ATSAs, ATCEs, STARs and administrative staff.

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Negotiated hotel rates

Discounted prices agreed between an organisation and a hotel for a set period.

The organisation gets a better deal on their hotel rates and the hotel receives a higher volume of bookings in return. TMCs can arrange them on your behalf and they’re usually a % discount or a set price per room.

Whilst negotiated rates will save organisations money, it’s best practice to combine them with additional content such as Booking.com and a GDS to ensure you always pay the best available rate at the time of booking.


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New Distribution Capability (NDC)

Traditionally TMCs have accessed airline content via a GDS.

However, technology has come a long way. Once airlines began selling their airfares direct to consumers (sometimes at a different price), IATA recognised that it was time to improve the way airline content is distributed.

NDC addresses the industry’s current distribution limitations, and also provides access to full and rich air content with a transparent shopping experience, NDC will enable TMCs that use technology to aggregate content and therefore transform the way that air products are retailed to business travellers.

Official Journal of European Union (OJEU)

A central database where public sector organisations such as NHS Trusts, Local Authorities and Central Government Departments can publish their tenders for indirect services like business travel management.

Under legislation public sector tenders above a certain financial threshold have to be published on the journal. OJEU currently has over 40,000 registered organisations with approximately 2,500 notices per week and a grand total of 160,000 invitations per year.


Online adoption

The percentage of bookings made directly via your approved ‘online’ booking tool, instead of being made ‘offline’ using traditional booking methods such as email or telephone.

Achieving a high level of online adoption is often key to achieving large savings, as booking online can harness lower transaction fees and visual guilt.

Your TMC can help you achieve a high level of online adoption by regularly monitoring performance, setting achievable online targets and sharing best practice.

Online booking tool

A tool used by organisations to manage their business travel online.

As well as making bookings, online booking tools usually allow organisations to view real-time data on their business travel spend, track their travellers online and enforce business travel policy.Online booking tools were introduced as an add on to many TMCs’ services as technology developed.

Therefore, most TMCs utilise 3rd party software and resell it to their customers. However, there are a small number of innovative TMCs that develop their own software, which can deliver an improved user experience.


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Open booking

The practice of allowing travellers to book their travel however they prefer, whether that’s direct with a hotel, airline, rail provider, or via a third party website.

Although open booking provides travellers with the freedom to book their travel using methods they are already comfortable with, its lack of prescription makes it hard to enforce travel policies. It can also compromise duty of care and hinder the accuracy of management information.

OpenRail

A rail platform that Click Travel developed in-house in 2011.

At that time, the rail industry consisted of two main online rail fulfillment services, Evolvi and TheTrainline. As a TMC with a technological background, Click Travel decided to create its own rail platform with the aim of cutting a layer of cost out of the ticketing process whilst providing a better end user experience.

OpenRail is built on a cloud platform that provides extra layers of fault tolerance and on Click Travel’s unique online booking tool.


Payment on departure (POD)

When a client pays for a hotel room once they have completed their stay.

One way TMCs can help companies manage their travel strategy is by providing them with a credit account. In this way, the TMC pays the POD fee for the traveller and then later bills their client to reclaim the money.

The benefit of this method of payment is that it saves the traveller from having to sort payment and reclaim it from their organisation via expenses.

Post-trip approval

A mechanism by which approval is gained for business travel after the trip has taken place.

Typically this manifests itself in the form of an expense claim process, whereby a traveller books and pays for a trip for which they subsequently gain approval for by claiming the cost back from their organisation.

Post-trip approval has a significant disadvantage vs. pre-trip approval in that it takes place after the horse has bolted, hence if approval is not granted, then the claimant is left out of pocket. It also doesn’t result in best value in overall travel procurement.


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Prepayment

When you pay for something in advance. When booking a hotel, this means you pay for the cost of the room at the time of booking instead of on departure or arrival.

The benefit of paying upfront means that all costs are accounted for at the time of reservation and travellers don’t need to part with any of their own money or submit an expense claim.

However, it’s important to review the terms and conditions of the booking, as more often than not the booking will be non-refundable if you cancel.

Pre-qualification questionnaire tender (PQQ)

Commonly used by companies who are on the cusp of placing their travel contract out to tender.

This exercise is designed to simplify and reduce the costs associated with a tender by ruling out TMCs that don’t fit their desired criteria.

Through asking questions based on financials, accreditations, location of office & number of employees, the questionnaire’s purpose is to ascertain a TMC’s financial, operational & commercial capabilities and ultimately whether they could be a potential supplier.


Pre-trip approval

A mechanism by which approval for business travel is gained before the trip actually takes place.

The advantage of pre-trip approval vs. post-trip approval is that the trip can typically be cancelled if approval is not granted, thus avoiding unnecessary costs being incurred.

A variety of pre-trip approval systems are available in the marketplace, but most only support bookings with traditional air carriers that provide the ability to “hold” reservations temporarily, and thus provide a window for the approval process to take place. There are however a number of new pre-trip approval systems that work across all travel types.

Price benchmarking

An exercise conducted by a company in order to qualify TMCs during the early stages of a tender process.

The aim is for TMCs to provide the cheapest rates available to certain routes through their booking tool. This process ostensibly allows a company to put each solution into context to see who can provide the best rates.

However, the system is open to abuse as there’s no guarantee that any TMC will be able to quote the same price in the future, due to the constantly variable nature of travel prices.

Pure transaction fees

A commercial model where organisations pay for each applicable transaction and the TMC retains all supplier commissions, enabling them to keep their transaction fees low.

This allows for high levels of transparency and simple TMC price comparisons. However, it’s susceptible to TMCs applying a bias towards particular suppliers who offer more commission.


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The Rail Delivery Group (RDG)

RDG was founded in 1993 by railway operators during the privatisation of the United Kingdom’s railways.

It consists of 23 train operators that provide passenger services on the privatised British railway sector.

RDG owns the brand National Rail and provides a number of key services to the railway industry, such as managing the railcard discounts schemes and National Rail enquiries.

Rebate in corporate travel contracts

When a customer pays a transaction fee for making a booking and the TMC returns to the customer any revenue it receives from the supplier.

Whilst this commercial model promises rebate received on any supplier commission and a fixed fee for scope of work, it is fundamentally flawed.

A rebate commercial model doesn’t represent best value for an organisation. There’s no guarantee that you will receive anything, it’s un-auditable and allows the TMC to take the pressure off the supply chain.

Review pack

A comprehensive resource created by an account manager at intervals that have been agreed with the client.

A review pack uses the client’s raw travel data to highlight key stats and analysis on the entirety of an organisation’s travel spend, such as online adoption rates, policy compliance and average rates paid for hotels, rail and flights. Using this data, a proactive AM can make recommendations to maximise savings potential.

Furthermore, a review pack provides a clear overview of what a travel management company has accomplished for an organisation, demonstrating the value of using a TMC.


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RevPAR

A key performance indicator used by the hotel industry to calculate a given hotel’s financial performance.

It stands for revenue per available room and it’s calculated by multiplying the average daily rate (ADR) with the occupancy rate.

For example, if a hotel sold 100 of its 150 available rooms for a total of £11,500, the RevPAR would be: ADR £115 (11,500 / 100) x occupancy rate 0.67 (100 / 150) = £77.05 RevPAR

However RevPAR is limited as a KPI, in the sense that it doesn’t take into consideration revenue generated from amenities and other hotel services such as spas and gyms.

Rogue traveller

Somebody who doesn’t follow an organisation’s defined travel structure and books their own travel. This can cause headaches for travel managers as it creates leakage and makes it difficult to analyse MI due to uncaptured data.

Rogue travellers may book travel despite a cheaper rate potentially being available via their TMC. This also creates a security and safety issue as it can negate duty of care obligations.

Schengen Visa

A visa created after an agreement between 5 countries back in 1985 in a town not far from Schengen, Luxembourg with the intention of progressively reducing border checks throughout the participating countries.

Today, the Schengen Visa policy has since been enforced by the European Union; it’s active in 22 EU member countries and 4 non EU country members (the UK and Ireland have both opted out), and allows citizens of participating nations to move and reside in each other’s country without the need for a visa.

Service adoption

A rate commonly used by companies to measure what proportion of people within the organisation are using their contracted supplier for their travel management services, instead of booking travel themselves and claiming it back through expenses.

Having a TMC in place helps eradicate rogue travellers through driving change in staff behaviour, which can be measured using service adoption rate.

A proactive AM can use an accurate service adoption rate to highlight and understand any leakage, making it a crucial tool in analysing a company’s travel strategy.


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Service level agreement (SLA)

The minimum service standard you expect to receive from your TMC. The SLA should be mutually agreed and incorporated into your travel management contract. It usually includes targets for response times, service availability and % of complaints to name a few.

Some SLAs contain performance incentives and/or penalty provisions where the supplier is rewarded for meeting targets or penalised for failing to achieve them.

When agreeing an SLA in place, make sure your TMC can measure every target automatically and will share this information with you on a monthly or quarterly basis.

Single sign-on (SSO)

A way of accessing multiple software systems by logging in once to gain access to all of them.

This is used frequently in business travel because most TMCs re-sell online booking tools. The user often ends up using many different booking tools that look and behave differently to one another, with a single-sign-on page providing a façade of simplicity.

Some TMCs offer a single solution where you log in once and remain within a single software system; this usually results in higher adoption rates and a better user experience.

Sold outside, ticketed outside ticket (SOTO)

An airline ticket that has been bought and issued from a country that doesn’t feature in the travel itinerary

For example, if a UK traveller buys their ticket in the UK but they’re travelling from New York to Los Angeles.

Split ticketing

Buying separate train tickets for different parts of a journey instead of buying a ticket for the whole route, often making the journey cheaper.

It’s also within the train operating companies’ terms and conditions, so you don’t have to worry about breaking the rules.

By splitting your tickets at route calling points, you can still travel on the same train and you don’t have to get off on the way!

For example, if travelling from Manchester to London, buying a ticket from Manchester to Milton Keynes and another ticket from Milton Keynes to London may reduce the cost.


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Standstill period

Also known as the Alcatel mandatory standstill process, the standstill period was introduced in the UK back in 2005 by the Office of Government Commerce.

It states that any contract that has been tendered via the OJEU must have a standstill period of a minimum of 10 days after an award decision has been made.

The purpose of this period is to allow unsuccessful bidders to challenge the final decision before the contract is signed off.

Tail spend

Used when organisations analyse expenditure, such as their business travel spend, within their supply and procurement departments.

Based upon the Pareto Principle - commonly referred to as the 80/20 rule. The theory states that for numerous events approximately 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes, for example 80% of your suppliers will account for 20% of your total spend.

The 20% of total spend is what is known as the tail spend, which allows companies to focus on how to optimise their supply and procurement departments to achieve process and cost benefits.

Third place working

Working at a place in between your home and the office, such as a train station, petrol or service station, cafe or on the bus.

There are a growing number of dedicated third place facilities springing up that specifically cater for flexible and mobile workers.

In the world of business travel it’s becoming ever more important as workers demand the ability to make better use of their time whilst travelling.

Transportation Network Company (TNC)

TNCs provide users with transportation through an online platform that connects them to drivers that are nearby.

Examples of such companies include Uber and Lyft.

TNCs have been steadily increasing in number due to increased demand, based on the ability to book a taxi via an app and the ability to register a debit card to the account.


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Travelport

One of the world’s largest GDS, which distributes travel products to various agents around the world.

With Travelport you can call and make a booking via an agent who can access the system, but bookers can also link into the system via an online booking tool.

Travelport aggregates information from various channels in order to enable TMCs to make travel reservations on behalf of their customers. Travelport then redirects the user to the chosen product’s service, providing access to multiple travel suppliers rates in one place.

Travel Management Company (TMC)

A business travel agent that manages an organisation’s business travel requirements. In addition to making reservations, a TMC will help an organisation gain control and visibility of their travel spend.

Services such as an online booking tool, MI, strategic account management, crisis management, traveller tracking and supplier negotiation are all commonplace amongst business travel agents in the UK.

Some TMCs have also developed their own technology or offer content aggregation services to ensure their clients have access to the best rates at all times.

Travel Management Company (RFP)

When a company decides to go out to tender for their travel management requirements. This involves the company inviting TMCs to submit a proposal on how they would fulfill their travel needs.

An RFP is a company’s chance to set a number of objectives and specifications they would like to achieve, which in turn gives TMCs an opportunity to describe how they will meet those goals.

This practice can be a great way to differentiate between TMCs, not just on service, but also other important factors such as company culture.

Travel policy

A policy document that outlines an organisation’s guidelines when it comes to booking business travel.

Whilst different organisations will vary in complexity, it basically tells employees what they can and can’t book when they’re travelling on business.

For example, it may prevent them travelling in 1st class on the train or may only allow them to spend £80 on a hotel room. A business travel policy is crucial if you want to control what your organisation is spending on travel.


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Travel risk policy

Organisations have a duty of care obligation to all their travellers whilst they’re away on business; part of this duty may be the production of a travel risk policy.

A travel risk policy details what organisation-specific dangers a company is susceptible to, e.g. a mining company that has frequent trips to a country with a high level of conflict.

The travel risk policy then details how any risks should be managed, clearly detailing the process, and who is responsible for what action. Travel management companies can help organisations define and implement travel risk policies.

Travel transaction fee

A way TMCs charge for their services. Every transaction type will incur a fee that the TMC will agree with the client at contract commencement - some fees can be zero!

You’ll usually find that transaction fees for online bookings are lower than those booked by more traditional methods like telephone or email.

When reviewing transaction fees it’s important to understand what happens to any commission that the TMC receives. Some keep it, but give you lower fees; some charge higher fees with the promise of a rebate.

Traveller behaviour

A way to describe certain recurring patterns that travellers perform throughout an organisation.

Traveller behaviour can either have a positive or negative impact on an organisation’s travel goals; an example of good behaviour is booking train tickets a month in advance - creating savings, whereas bad behaviour would be booking a few days before a trip - meaning unnecessarily expensive fares.

Organisations often work with TMCs to create a travel policy that encourages desired traveller behaviour. Achieving these changes can lead to significant savings on business travel.


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Traveller friction

The negative impact business travel can have on a traveller when they travel too much or the business travel they undertake does not best satisfy their well-being.

Traveller friction can result in reduced productivity, low employee engagement, reluctance to travel and could lead to employees taking more time off sick. To reduce the risk of traveller friction affecting your employees, it’s important to consider it when reviewing your business travel policy.

Aim to strike a balance between minimising the cost of business travel whilst keeping your travellers happy.

Traveller tracking

The ability to track business travellers when they travel on company business.

Organisations have a duty of care to their employees so it’s important that they know where their travellers are and can contact them quickly in the event of an emergency.

Traveller tracking software is often provided by TMCs so authorised users can access this information online in real time whenever they need to.


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Unmanaged travel

When an organisation arranges its own business travel. This system usually sees business travellers booking their own travel and claiming back through expenses.

Unmanaged business travel is usually found in smaller organisations, which either rarely travel on business or have too few travellers to warrant third party travel management.

Organisations with unmanaged travel can find that they suffer from a lack of transparency in their business travel programme without the invaluable MI data and industry knowledge a TMC can provide.

VAT recovery

Only possible on hotel & car rental bookings made within the EU area.

This means that you cannot compare rates purely on face value because a £100 pre-paid rate on Expedia is actually comparable with a £120 rate appearing via your TMC - the latter £20 of VAT can be reclaimed, making the net cost £100.

Some TMCs may offer you the choice to use a credit account for all of your travel purchases, which they will then consolidate into a single document from which you can recover all VAT that you’re eligible for.



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Visual guilt

The technique of prompting a user to reconsider the travel product they are about to purchase if a more cost effective alternative option is available.

It is used in travel management programmes to reduce travel costs by driving behavioural change.

Examples include marking a product as non-compliant with the organisation’s travel policy, requiring the user to tick a checkbox to confirm they understand that they are not buying the cheapest available option or requiring a user to provide a reason that they are not buying the cheapest available option.


Want more travelinsight managment and advice?

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