How to Plan Better Than a Corporate Travel Manager
Planning corporate travel is not straightforward – you’ve got to find the right flight, the right seat and the right hotel. And, then you need to link it all up with a transport plan. Bringing it all together can be a serious undertaking. If you’re not a hugely experienced travel manager, you may find all of this a little daunting. In fact, it will almost certainly consume a lot of time and effort from your already busy day. For this reason, this post brings you a list of things to consider to ensure that your travel planning does not become overwhelming.
Ground Transportation – the options
When considering how you are going to get your tired and pressurized employees from the point of arrival to where they need to be, you need to consider your options against a cold series of priorities. Taxis, can work but often unreliable, inflexible and the time saved going direct from the airport to the hotel is often lost in actually waiting for a cab. You’ve got to think of a ground transportation solution for the whole program; will ad-hoc taxi bookings cover this with a sufficient probability of success.
Hire cars are difficult for a number of reasons: the logistics of hire cars mean that you would need to plan on an approximate extra 20% of you employees time being taken up with pick, up drop off and parking. This may mean flying in a day early. Second, you’ve got to ensure that your employees can navigate themselves and that parking is a realistic proposition. Lastly, consider the actual quality of this hire cars; firms hold cars now for up to two years – this leads to middle-aged car issues, such as flat or bald tires, flat batteries and faulty wiper blades. Can you afford to subject your travelling employees to this?
Quality and Reliability
A quality, legitimate and reliable ground Transportation Company is really the only risk-free option that you’re presented with. The advantages it offers your employees are three fold. First, you can guarantee they will get where they need to be on time – the company will worry about all the details, like, parking routing round traffic and single issues. Second, a transportation company offers you the most flexibility: you can ask for them to plan a large move – often much cheaper than cabs or hire cars – in a series of luxury mini coaches or SUVs, as well as a simple point to point chauffeur service. Lastly, a chauffeur driven limousine, offers the best chance of arriving in the right frame of mind to perform. The executive will have the chance to work, communicate or prepare themselves in an ideal environment and they receive the most pleasant surroundings possible in that situation; no lugging bags across airports or having to walk to a distant parking place.
Negotiation
A little secret: Successful ground transportation companies make their money through repeat business. This means your repeat business will be very valuable to them and they, in turn, will try to offer the most attractive deal possible to secure it. This is equally applicable to airlines and hotels. So, armed with this knowledge you should realize that you’re actually in a strong negotiating position. It also means that you should seek to build long term relationships with service providers that you really like and give you the level of service that you need. This will be a win-win situation for you both. KEE Limousine has been servicing the Litchfield County/Danbury CT area for over 30 years, and is a trusted ground transportation partner to many area businesses. Call us today to get started!
