TA

Hi all -- this is a broader policy question.

My company is strategizing / enforcing that all employees continue using our Concur corporate booking tool for hotels and directing our spend through our AMEX travel agent, so that we will eventually qualify for corporate rates that make this worth while.

And we should stop booking on our own outside of Concur, using other employee-known corporate discount codes that sometimes save us hundreds of $ per night.

My question is, at what size of company, # of hotel stays per year, or revenue target does this become true? Approximately?

I believe that these claimed corporate discounts will never materialize for us, and Concur/AMEX are just stringing us along, milking unnecessary rates from us because that's to their advantage. We will never get back anything close to what we spend, in hopes of that eventual discount.

What size would we have to be for this corporate policy to make sense?

Thanks. Happy to move to more appropriate forum...

above.the.clouds

Above 100 people?

CPRich

Do they not give you the discount amounts and spend thresholds so you can do the math? With the appropriate data, it doesn't seem like a complex calculation.

I'd contact them and tell "with my company of X employees, with available discount codes saving x% on average, I don't see value in continuing to use you as a travel agent. Please prove me wrong". They have all the data and should want your business.

But I would have thought this analysis would have been done before signing up with them. "We'll give you discounts and save you money, but we'll only tell you how much after you pay us a lot of money" sounds like something I'd get from a Nigerian travel agent.

TA

The thing is I'm a lowly employee and trying to build the back case for why this is silly. I haven't gotten up the gumption to directly challenge the policy and ask for such information...

So I'm just trying to research typical/representative thresholds of spend...

Hite

We just dropped concur after about 6 months. We have about 15 people who do regular travel on a weekly basis and maybe 3-4 who do occasional travel.

Often1

1. Concur is simply software which businesses use to enforce rules which businesses set. Concur isn't a TA, it doesn't give discounts and it doesn't make rules. Your employer makes those.

2. The question isn't how many employees there are, it is about what employees spend. Are we talking Four Seasons or Red Roof Inn? Are we talking about flying paid F or DL E fares? Domestic or international?

3. Amex will run its pitch based on hypotheticals or based on data provided by your CFO projecting travel needs for the next few years.

You don't know or have access to that data and you don't know whether there is a deal for a rebate, rather than a discount.

There are multiple threads on FT from people who swear that their company could do better if only they let people book on their own, but those folks don't have the data to make the business case and, if they did, certainly aren't sharing it on a public internet forum.

TA

Yeah. My point is, does anyone have example discount/rebate thresholds so I can help inform myself? I think we all know that if we had the exact numbers this wouldn't be a question!

How about for a software company of size 75-150 employees, with 7-10 sales people traveling frequently?

Kagehitokiri

might try negotiating directly with hotels, hotel management companies, hotel owners
or contracting someone / bringing someone in house to handle those negotiations
whether that someone is currently a travel agent, or just an experienced negotiator

Often1

And then pay the employee or consultant to do this work, write code which interfaces with your employers AP software, track individual employee spend and compliance and report anomalies.

Or you license Concur and pay a fee to a corporate TA such as Amex and it's all done for you so that you can focus on bottom line issues.

Kagehitokiri

cost of "license Concur and pay a fee to a corporate TA such as Amex" includes a lot of profit and overhead above what they pay their workers

and i said "whether that someone is currently a travel agent"
but was mainly pointing out possibility of negotiating, vs >
ideally, some FTer small business owners might reply

prior threads on travel policies might have information

i wonder if any of the FTer consultants consult on this

tev9999

This is the biggest advantage for the business - control. Outside of a corporate booking tool they really don't know if you are booking the cheapest flights or the full Y fare to get your bonus miles and upgrade - at least not without time consuming research. Concur lets them set rules that will flag anything that is out of policy. When my boss approves my trip he does not have to go look at every single line to see if I booked a cheap flight, reasonable room and intermediate or smaller car. He just looks for exceptions and if he sees none clicks accept.

It is the same with expenses since we do those through Concur. If my meal expenses exceed the normal limit he sees the red exclamation mark and looks at the comments, which Concur requires me to put in if there is an exception. Again he does not have to waste his time looking at every turnpike toll, lunch at Subway and Shell station fill-up. If Concur says there are no issues, he simply skims it and clicks approve.

I also like the fact it interfaces with the corporate Amex. When I finish dinner I simply take a picture of my receipt (only required over $25) and e-mail it to Concur. When it is time to do my expense report the charge and receipt are sitting there in Concur - no more wallet crammed with little pieces of paper that have to be stapled to bigger pieces of paper.

Once the report is approved Concur takes care of the payment - I will usually get my reimbursable expenses in my bank account within 24-48 hours. Amex gets paid that quickly too. I am sure that automation also saves tons of labor for the accounting department.

Sure I would love to use my own credit cards and book directly though the airline/hotel website for the points and bonuses, but that is not a battle I am going to take on. Even if we are not always getting the cheapest price for travel, I do believe that the company is still much farther ahead by using Concur.

Often1

Interfacing with AP software also means that for those businesses billing external clients or internal cost centers, the expense can be directly posted to the correct account and thus become part of AR and be promptly billed.

Most of the issues people whine about here have to do with stupid policies, not Concur itself. Concur will let you book full F if your employer codes it that way.

Philatravelgirl

I've worked as a Global Business Travel Manager and negotiated discounts direct with airlines, hotels and cars as well as leverage the TMC agreements. Using other company rates isn't a good thing IMO (if your company can't spend 100 room nights why piggyback on Accenture or IBM rates that's not cool) nor is trying to tell others how to do their jobs. I've had to justify rates, Internet rates, contracts, etc for years and while I showed a savings to my CFO/CEO not sure why I needed to explain myself to travelers and yet I did everyday without a booking tool.

Concur is as stated above a software tool loaded with negotiated rates by company or travel agency - they are not the ones with the discounts.

Many rates include breakfast, parking or other perk. Also chances are your rate that had great savings is a prepaid, non-refundable rate vs the company refundable rates or different room category.

I used to have a guy ask why he found a lower rate and it was rarely apples to apples. He spent time looking for lower rate instead of working. He got an exception once for his $50 a night savings only to have the Sydney meeting cancel and then wanted me to get a refund which I couldn't bc it was non-refundable. His $50 savings cost us over $1000! He stopped booking his own hotels, used the travel agent and eventually apologized for going around me.

There are deals with many vendors at front and back end that are done as well as TMC rebates that all go in the savings bucket.

sbm12

Are these rates which your travelers are actually eligible to use? Or are you just pretending to be part of another group and hoping no one notices?

Big difference.

MSPeconomist

Good point. The latter could be embarrassing (for example, if a client is with you when you check in and the agent asks you to verify that you're entitled to use the rate) and lead to being forced to pay the rack rate when you're caught. Moreover, if your employer notices that you are doing this, at the very least it would reflect badly on you and your business ethics. It could even be a fireable offense.