The Business Travel Magazine December/January 2018/19

TMCs / Technology
Investing in tech
Achieving all this is challenge enough but to
do it and keep up with the rattling pace at
which technology moves requires a massive
investment of time and money.
Some TMCs employ large teams to do the
R&D themselves; some buy it in, on the basis
that their core expertise is managing travel,
not technology; and some do a combination
of the two. Commercial Director of travel
management company Gray Dawes, David
Bishop, managed to marry up the two by
working at Atriis for four years to launch the
product Gray Dawes has bought.
“If you only have an internal team, you risk
missing out on innovative technology being
developed on the market, and if you only
partner with external developers, teams
may lack the first-hand overview of your
company’s inner workings,” says Director,
Product & Services Marketing, EMEA for
Carlson Wagonlit Travel, Dan Kelly.
At the top of the aspiration list is for travel
bookers to be able to see exactly the same
information as their travel agent and at the
same time. This means bringing all data
sources into one platform.
Gray Dawes’ YourTrip does exactly that,
providing a huge hub that aggregates GDS,
NDC, hotels, ground transportation, parking,
rail and more. Not only does this provide
excellent MI, it also brings efficiencies.
Travellers like to
fragment their
purchasing. They might book
a flight with an agent, use a
booking tool to book their
hotel and use a mobile website
to book ground transport”
“Travellers like to fragment their purchasing.
They might book a flight with an agent, go to
an online booking tool to research and book
hotels and use a mobile website to book
ground transportation,” says David Bishop
“And because we have one view of the trip,
we won’t have to ask questions to which we
already know the answer, which really
frustrates clients.” And in the event of a trip
cancellation, agents have a view of the whole
trip and one element lurking on another
booking site does not get forgotten.
The app conundrum
Although many TMCs have invested
considerably in providing a versatile mobile
app, “The whole idea of having everything
pinned on an app makes me quite nervous,”
says Bishop.
“A lot of people download apps but
adoption by travellers is really low. The one
exception to that is Concur. YourTrip’s mobile
enabled website gives a lot more functionality
and we get to market quicker as it is updated.”
Gray Dawes is now testing a
communications platform to work with
YourTrip and give travellers numerous ways
to communicate with agents and book – sms,
Facebook messenger, WhatsApp, WeChat.
Potential launch is Q1 2019.
And if, for example, snow disrupts
travel, this technology allows agents
to let travellers know
simultaneously, in their
preferred channel, that they
are on the case. “We can
spend more time managing
travel instead of managing
phone calls,” says Bishop.
An inhouse approach
Reed & Mackay has a booking
tool, R&M mobile, analytics,
schedule reporting, approval and
R&M protect on one platform, which gives
both agent and customer concurrent access
to all information. The TMC builds its
technology in house.
“The disadvantage of building your own
technology can be complexity and finding
the talent. It isn’t necessarily a travel
company’s core competency and it might
take up a disproportionate amount of your
budget compared to takings,” says Global IT
Director, Antoine Boatwright.
On the upside, “You move at your own
pace to evolve the technology, not at the
pace of your supplier, when you are at their
mercy regarding what functionality you get
and that affects the service you might deliver.”
And when client requirements are exacting,
bespoke is the only way. One Reed & Mackay
client’s employees travel frequently in the
former Soviet Union and the company needs
to know the age of the plane its people are
travelling on, whether it is still under
maintenance and whether the airline has a
monopoly on that route and if that plane is
the only option.
“They don’t want employees flying on high
risk planes,” he says. And that kind of
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