Download the new white paper here

John Kwong

Join travel management experts from China, Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia as they discuss the differences in business, cultures and economic structures in the Asia-Pacific region. In an effort to bring the West and East closer together, they will talk about trends, challenges and opportunities for managing travel in the different Asian countries.

Your questions are encouraged and will be addressed during the webinar.

13 October 2009 – 09:00 Singapore time (GMT +8 hours)
(12 October 2009 – 21:00 Washington, DC time (GMT -5 hours))

With Moderator:
Greeley Koch (Acquis Consulting Group)

And Speakers:
Lucy Wang (AirPlus International, China)
John Kwong (AirPlus International, Singapore)
Savin Ma (AirPlus International, Hong Kong)
Andreas Wellauer (Galiant TM-Consultant, Australia)

Topics include:

• Top ways to improve travel management in the Asia-Pacific marketplace
• How travel management varies between different countries within Asia-Pacific
• What will be the biggest challenge for TM in the Asian countries?
• Where do you see chances and opportunities for the national TM?

Registration for travel managers is complimentary. Please register here

For your complimentary copy of the corresponding white paper “Successful Travel Management in Asia Pacific – Challenges and Solutions in a fast changing Region”, simply click on the Research Center

Organized at the Jardin d’Acclimatation in Paris, Univ’AirPlus gathered 250 registrants. Very few French travel managers and purchase managers missed the call in spite of the sunshine or late holidays.

“We want to find answers to problems that occur throughout the year,” explained John Baird-Smith, AirPlus France Country Manager, at the opening. “Our concern is to help travel managers in their daily life.” Three themes have been mainly identified: cost cutting, security and sustainable development.

After less than one year of existence, the AFTM (Association Française des Travel Managers) took this opportunity to introduce its first white paper Profession Travel Manager (sponsored by AirPlus). Then, several AirPlus partners made presentations of their new products & services: Laurent Sautré zoomed in on the new BNP Paribas Corporate Card, Ralph Robail provided details on the development of Notilus (Dimo Gestion Expense management tool), Ziad Minkara introduced its global hotel service CDS Booking, Patrick Sardais mentioned the new Avis Flex service for medium duration (1 to 11 months) car leasing, François Dodane recalled why choosing Thalys keeps travelers comfortable and their travel managers happy with the costs, Traveldoo introduced its security functionalities.

Download the complete article here

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: AFTM
4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: AirPlus

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: Avis

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: BNP Parisbas

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: CDS

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: Dimo Gestion

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: effi21

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: France Telecom / orange

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: Thalys

4th annual French Univ’AirPlus: Traveldoo

John Kwong

Singapore 12-13 August 2009
Redefining Travel Management is the title of the ACTE conference coming up next week in Singapore. The current business environment redefines not only the travel management landscape but also the role of the travel manager himself. With AirPlus you can find out what’s next for the business travel industry.

Key topics are:

• The Business Case for Managed Travel: Measuring the Return on Investment (ROI)
• Is There Room on Your Plate for More? The Evolving Roles of Travel Procurement and Sourcing Professionals
• Integrating Videoconferencing with Your Demand Management Goals
• Two Sides to Every Story: How Outsourcing Can Affect the Travel Programme

Now in its 8th year, the 2009 ACTE Asia-Pacific Education Conference is the primary source for education and networking in the region. Travel buyers, procurement specialists, and meeting planners will have the opportunity to learn the industry trends and best-practices that will enable them to increase the value of their travel, procurement, and meetings programmes; network with the most senior-level industry executives; and help their companies get back on top.

The cumbersome search for compatible providers is a thing of the past. Today, all major car-rental companies – also referred to as the “Big Five” – accept the AirPlus Company Account for booking and payment. For a number of years, AirPlus customers have been able to use their travel-center cards to pay for rental cars at Avis, Europcar and Sixt.

This option has been extended to include Hertz and Budget, two more worldwide leaders in the rental-car sector. The result:

Corporations will be able to use their AirPlus Company Accounts to pay for Hertz vehicles in nine European countries: Germany, Belgium, France, Great Britain, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Spain. Business travelers will enjoy the privilege of complimentary membership in the “Hertz #1 Club Gold” that offers faster rental processes, VIP service and customized hotlines.

Budget will accept the centralized AirPlus settlement account as a means of payment at its more than 140 locations in Germany. With the increased acceptance of the AirPlus Company Account, AirPlus will respond to customer requests and further extend its role as a neutral, international BTM solutions provider. Via AirPlus, travel managers can now comfortably pay for the services rendered by their mobility partners. All they need is an agreement between their corporation and the respective car-rental company regulating the acceptance of the AirPlus Company Account. In most cases, corporations can decide whether their staff is provided with a personal customer card issued by the car-rental company – in which case the Company Account will be saved in the profile as the preferred means of payment – or with a central company password to be used at the time of reservation. Rental cars can be booked and paid for via the diverse booking channels supported by the rental-car company; online as well as offline. Hence, reservations may be over the Internet or through the provider’s call center, via the self-booking tool or Intranet used within the corporation, or via a travel agency. A “walk-in” may also be possible, i.e., a car rented directly at the location with payment via the AirPlus Company Account without a previous reservation. The corporation will then receive an AirPlus invoice for all the car bookings that include detailed descriptions of the services rendered. These descriptions list pick-up and return dates, types of vehicles, number of covered kilometers, insurance coverage and other fees. The invoices also facilitate controlling staff’s compliance with the corporate travel guidelines: did the staff member book the allowed car category? Did the staff member return the car with a full tank? Was the car rental worth it, considering the duration or route?

In addition, the AirPlus collective invoice enables allocation of costs in accordance with the generators by means of several company-internal supplementary data, such as cost centers, project numbers or staff IDs. Electronic invoicing and seamless integration into ERP systems are also possible. Ultimately, car-rental expenses can be analyzed in a more detailed fashion with the AirPlus Information Manager: it is the best tool for keeping travel expenses under control and strengthening the basis for the corporation’s negotiations with travel-service providers. In cooperation with the major car-rental companies, AirPlus is further extending its global acceptance networks, so that its customers can pay via their Company Accounts, if possible at every single rental location. With Europcar and Sixt, car rental in Germany and many other European countries, such as France, Switzerland and Great Britain, is possible. Customers who hold a German Company Account can rent cars the world over if they book via AVIS Germany. Moreover, more car-rental companies will be included in the networks to meet local customers’ demands as well. The most recent example is the current integration of Enterprise Rent-A-Car. This company, which by its own account is the largest car-rental company in North America – with locations in Canada, the US, Ireland, Great Britain and Germany – and which has recently announced its alliance with Europcar, is also now accepting the AirPlus Company Account as a means of payment in Germany.

Andreas Diaz

As a Product Manager, Andreas Diaz is responsible for the development of the AirPlus Company Account and ensures that customers can make optimal use of their travel-center cards in the car-rental business.

Learn how to draw the right conclusions from your data and convert raw information into valuable knowledge.

Start the complete Information Tour here.

The Webinar covered:

• The structure and layout of the AirPlus Information Manager site for navigation
• Administration functions – covering everything from how to set your currency to preferred data layouts
• Setting user rights and authorizations
• How the AirPlus accounts can be mapped to your organization chart
• What portfolios are and how to use them
• All the AirPlus Information Manager standard reports: Air, Hotel, Car, Rail and Other.  We illustrated how to drill down into the reports and look at the data with multiple viewpoints.

Download the Webniar here

The next FREE Webinar “AirPlus Information Manager II: Custom Reports” will be held at 2:00pm (US Eastern Daylight Savings Time) on Friday, April 24th.   Simply email me at mtalbot@airplus.com should you wish to participate!

By Matthew Talbot, Business Intelligence Technology Manager, AirPlus International, Inc.

Ina Beringer, AirPlus

The principle of a cooperation is based on the idea that the joint capabilities of two companies are greater than the sum of their individual capabilities (synergy effect). The companies’ goals and interests must harmonize with one another with regard to the cooperation intention. It involves each partner in the cooperation being able to contribute to the whole and participating accordingly in the overall result.

A cooperation’s success does not just depend on a good idea: not every company is suited for a cooperation. Finding cooperative solutions is not only a question of negotiation skill and the power of self-assertion. On the contrary, personal commitment, social skills, competitive orientation and strategic considerations are required. Having an international cooperation team with global expertise ensures profitability across industries and markets.

AirPlus tries to satisfy corporate customers’ current and future needs via our cooperation network by actively creating and managing win-win situations for all parties globally.

Selected benefits for corporate customers:

• Broadened acceptance channels and global network for the AirPlus Company Account
• Detailed data (e.g. flown data) for renegotiations with providers and travel policy compliance checks
• Gaining USP’s (special features such as corporate net rates, loyalty programs, flown data)
• Extended market access (infrastructure/state institutions)

We frequently review our partnerships and try to make the most out of them for AirPlus customers worldwide.

Good things come to those who wait – this clearly also applies to the use of electronic bills. No matter how current a company’s IT equipment or networks are, paperless billing is still far from being the standard in travel management. Quite the opposite: the recently released AirPlus International Travel Management Study shows that a quarter of companies prefer old-fashioned paper bills. Another quarter relies on a ‘mixture’ of paper and electronic records. In Western Europe, almost 40% would not give up hard copies – it’s even over 60% in Germany. The reasons for this (especially in Germany) are the complicated laws and tax system which require all expenses to be recorded in paper form.

It appears that this devotion to paper will continue to endure – the number of companies that still work with paper bills has fallen by 12% to around 50% in the past 3 years, while the number of those who receive electronic bills has doubled to around 20%. Leading this trend are the countries of Australia, China, South Africa and Brazil.

But management consultants and software experts alike are surprised at the reluctance of companies in Europe and the United States to use electronic travel statements. Even though 80% of companies analyze their travel expenses (in some travel-intensive industries it is even 90%), only a third use professional software. That is despite the fact that more than half of the companies are of the opinion that using electronic bills and professional software would bring advantages through saving time and money. But apparently tight budgets and a lack of individualized evidence scare most companies away from making that investment.

In general the paper/ electronic question is met with an ‘either/ or’ strategy: 43% of the companies surveyed want to switch completely to electronic bills in the long run, and 31% wish to remain entirely with paper. Companies increasingly want to avoid a ‘mix’ of the two.

Nearly 1,500 travel managers from Europe, the USA, Mexico and Brazil, South Africa, as well as China, Singapore and Australia were interviewed for the latest AirPlus International Travel Management Study.

Bernhard Hain, AirPlus

Low-cost carriers now control almost a third of the market. In order for low-cost airlines to live up to their name for business travelers, however, they need to adapt their booking processes to meet companies’ expectations.

Low-cost carriers have ascended to dizzying heights in the past few years: 20% annual growth rates have resulted in nearly every third passenger in Europe booking his or her trip on a low-cost airline. Even though growth has slowed down considerably this year, 40 airlines in Europe cover a capacity of 6 million seats on almost 6,000 travel routes. RyanAir, the European market leader, alone offered over 1,200 routes at a “no-frills” cost.

Low-cost carriers are increasingly being used by “normal” passengers, and these airlines are also becoming attractive to small and mid-sized companies. Many of them offer similarly high standards of quality to the established airlines.

But just because they fly in the same calm air space as established airlines doesn’t mean that “turbulence” on the ground can be ruled out: in addition to the often decisive question of distance from the airport to the point of departure and actually intended arrival, it can be “annoying” (to put it mildly) when the flight bookings cannot be integrated into a company’s accounting system. For a travel manager, the most important thing is whether and how well the data can be integrated into existing accounting and reporting systems. The potential savings made at a discount airline will only be fully justified when this data can be entered seamlessly into existing business processes – otherwise, the potential benefits are outweighed by the additional work and operating expense. If, for example, business travelers have to buy a “no-frills” ticket with their private credit card, then important billing data are lost to the firm or must be added in manually – and that is expensive.

This “Achilles heel” in the battle for business travelers has been acknowledged by many low-cost carriers, many of which now offer systems which can be actively tailored to meet the needs of travel managers. Among other things, for example, many low-cost airlines now accept the AirPlus Company Account as a form of payment, which allows important information such as personal identification number, project number or cost center to be registered at the time of booking.