Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - (Page 6) NEWS United, Sabre To Enable Point-Of-Sale Upselling BY JAY BOEHMER PROFILES IN TRAVEL MANAGEMENT UnitedHealth Adds Heavy Dose Of Travel Technology UnitedHealth Group this year implemented compliance personnel within the finance departa new online booking system in conjunction with ment receive notifications of out-of-policy bookpre-trip authorization and ticket tracking tools, ings and contact travelers or notify their superviwhich the company estimates, along with the sors for approval when necessary. Such automation can cause bottlenecks in three-year renewal of its travel management company contract with American Express Business the reservation process. To prevent the loss of reTravel, would save several million dollars this year. served seats and other potential roadblocks, Gordon set the tool to stop ticketing In just 12 weeks, global travonly bookings that are $350 el and meetings manager Tamore than the lowest logical airmara Gordon led the Minfare. The travel policy allows neapolis-based health and bookings of $25 above the lowinsurance services provider’s est logical airfare within a twoconversion from a 90 percent hour departure window. off-line booking environment “Because we book so many to one with an 81 percent ontickets, we didn’t want to conline adoption rate after implevolute this,” she said. menting the Cliqbook selfUnitedHealth also expects booking tool. That evolution to save $100,000 to $150,000 entailed training 13,000 U.S. this year in reduced unused ticktravelers and finance personet liability through the Ticket nel to monitor compliance and Trax tool, which applies refundmanage reporting automation. TAMARA GORDON able tickets within the previous Gordon estimated the booking Global travel and meetings mgr. 60 days to eligible trips and notransition to generate $750,000 tifies travelers and administrato $1 million this year in retors of outstanding tickets that are eligible for duced agency service fees. The pre-trip authorization and ticket tracking name changes within the parameters of Unittools helped UnitedHealth realize a $23 per-tick- edHealth’s airline contracts. UnitedHealth has set its sights on developing et decrease from the average price before implementation. The average ticket price decrease is a global travel policy and global corporate card program that will encompass the 5 percent of projected to total $200,000 by year-end. the travel volume that is booked from international points of origin, which is fueling the comCOMPANY: UNITEDHEALTH GROUP pany’s travel spending growth. Through SeptemHEADQUARTERS: MINNEAPOLIS ber, the Corporate Travel 100 company’s 2007 U.S. BOOKED AIR VOLUME: $45.5 MILLION year-over-year air volume is up 10 percent and ticket increases are up 5 percent. UnitedHealth also is developing a more forOnline booking tool successes did not come overnight for UnitedHealth. Two months before mal meetings management program by consolthe Cliqbook deployment, Gordon initiated a idating preferred vendors and applying common multiplatform communications strategy, includ- procedures and policy for in-house business unit meeting planners and 10 dedicating senior-management-endorsed ed American Express Business e-mails and six online training ses- Access the 2008 Corporate Travel 100 Travel planners. The company’s sions. “It’s a bit time-consuming to see btnonline.com/CT100 meetings team handles about go through that process, but we have great compliance if we do that,” she said. “If 1,000 meetings annually, including about 100 we don’t, then we don’t have compliance, so why large conferences, events and incentive trips. “If we look at it across the board,” Gordon said, “it’s a even bother rolling out the program?” In parallel, UnitedHealth implemented Amex’s huge amount of spend, but companies just don’t Pre-Trip Auditor for noncompliance notifications know that.” and approval for out-of-policy bookings. Cost —Seth Harris United Airlines and Sabre are working to enable the global distribution system’s subscribers to upsell economy passengers to the carrier’s Economy Plus cabin at the point of sale. Officials said the option would be available to Sabre-subscribing travel agencies in the first quarter of 2009. The move makes United the first U.S. legacy carrier to take advantage of new GDS initiatives that enable merchandizing options at the point of sale. Most carriers thus far have assessed unbundling and upselling charges at the time of checkin, on the airplane or exclusively through their Web sites, which corporate travel buyers say makes their use difficult to track (BTNonline, April 28). GDSs in the past year have stepped up efforts to make their merchandizing and shopping capabilities more in line with those that airlines deploy through their own channels (BTNonline, July 23, 2007). Like many carriers, United earlier this year launched capabilities on its Web site to purchase such upgrades prior to travel. Those efforts have lagged in the GDS Visit the BTN Archive environment. Midsee btnonline.com/archive west Airlines this year unveiled a comparable program with Sabre to upsell customers who elect to pay more for its higher-tier Signature economy seat at the time of booking (BTNonline, July 21). “We built the solution initially for Midwest so it could be further leveraged by additional carriers as they came into the fray, and United is the first to elect to do that,” Sabre vice president of product marketing Kyle Moore said this month. Moore noted that more carriers are working to launch their own upselling and unbundling initiatives through the GDS, anticipating a snowball effect and eventual tipping point for new capabilities. Likening the rollout process to that for direct connects several years ago, Moore said, “The first carrier you do, the implementation is long and arduous. The next one is less so, and the next one is less so, until you get to the point where it really does just become configurations and flip-of-the-switch stuff.” Still, Moore said carriers want different capabilities, precluding any one-size-fits-all approach. Moore said the GDS capabilities eventually would be as varied as the ancillary items carriers sell. “We will leverage the same capabilities to address not just seats, but ultimately baggage and lounge Continued on page 8 6 Monday, December 15, 2008 www.BTNonline.com Business Travel News http://www.btnonline.com/archive http://www.btnonline.com/ct100 http://www.BTNonline.com
Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 Contents Inside Track Profiles In Travel Mgmt Forum Aviation Lodging Ground Transportation Travel Management Meetings Today Washington Wire Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 (Page 1) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 (Page 2) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Contents (Page 3) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Inside Track (Page 4) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Inside Track (Page 5) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Profiles In Travel Mgmt (Page 6) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Profiles In Travel Mgmt (Page 7) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Profiles In Travel Mgmt (Page 8) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Profiles In Travel Mgmt (Page 9) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Forum (Page 10) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Forum (Page 11) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Forum (Page 12) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Forum (Page 13) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Aviation (Page 14) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Aviation (Page 15) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Lodging (Page 16) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Lodging (Page 17) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Ground Transportation (Page 18) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Ground Transportation (Page 19) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Travel Management (Page 20) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Meetings Today (Page 21) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Meetings Today (Page 22) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Meetings Today (Page 23) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Meetings Today (Page 24) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Meetings Today (Page 25) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Washington Wire (Page 26) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Washington Wire (Page 27) Business Travel News - December 15, 2008 - Washington Wire (Page 28)
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