How do office managers manage business travel? Effective business travel management is important for a successful office manager. It can help businesses save costs, improve productivity, ensure compliance with policies and regulations, and enhance the traveller experience. In this article, we break down for you the secret to mastering business travel management.
1. Planning Ahead
Planning ahead for your travel can offer numerous benefits. To start with, by starting your travel arrangements early, you can save costs by taking advantage of early-bird discounts, promotions, and deals. You will also have a wider range of options to choose from, including more flight times, hotel room types, and activities. In addition, planning early can help reduce the stress associated with last-minute bookings and uncertainty.
2. Establishing Travel Policies
As an office manager, having clear travel and expense policy for travel expenses and allowances is essential. These policies help to establish guidelines for what is considered acceptable and reasonable travel expenses, ensuring that employees are aware of what they can and cannot expense while travelling. Moreover, clear policies help to promote transparency and fairness, as all employees are held to the same standards and expectations for travel expenses. If you want to take a look at a travel policy template, check our article right here.
In order to share the maximum knowledge with you, here are some tips for developing and implementing effective travel policies:
Define your company’s travel policy goals and objectives.
Identify eligible travel expenses.
Set guidelines for booking travel. This may include booking through specific travel agencies or websites, or requiring pre-approval for certain types of travel.
Provide guidelines for international travel.
Review and update policies regularly.
Download a FREE Travel Policy Template !
A detailed template with the best practices to ensure compliance with your company policy.
3. Using Technology to manage business trips
Technology offers many benefits for office managers, including cost savings, increased efficiency, and improved traveller experience. By using travel management software or apps, you can manage your travel programs more effectively, streamline booking and expense tracking, and gain visibility into employee travel.
Here are some tips for choosing and using travel management software or apps:
Look for software that meets your specific needs: When choosing travel management software or apps, consider your company’s unique needs, such as the number of travellers, the types of trips, and the travel policy. Choose a tool that can handle all aspects of travel management, from booking to expense tracking. Ayruu is the perfect business travel management technology for both office managers and business travellers. Why? Because it centralises the whole process from planning and booking to payment and invoices.
Train employees on how to use the software: Once you have selected your travel management software or app, provide training to your employees on how to use it effectively. By choosing Ayruu, your employees will have access to their user-friendly and intuitive travel app.
Monitor employee travels: Use Ayruu to monitor your employees’ travel and ensure compliance with your organization’s travel policy. This can include setting up alerts for policy violations, approval workflows, filters, etc.
4. Staying Organized
Organization is key for a successful office manager. Keeping track of all travel details is important for both the traveller and the organization. For the traveller, having all the necessary information easily accessible and organized can reduce stress and ensure a smooth travel experience. For the office manager, tracking travel details is essential for monitoring expenses and ensuring compliance with the company’s travel policy. Here is what Ayruu can offer you to help you keep organized when managing the company business travel:
Share travel information with the traveller: By using our corporate travel solution, you will ensure that the traveller has all the necessary travel information, including itinerary, flight and hotel reservations, and any other relevant details. This can be done through the travel timeline present on their Ayruu mobile app. Do you want more details? You can ask for a demo and we will offer you a free demonstration of the solution.
Delete the heavy workload that comes with treating expense reports. Ayruu deletes expense reports. We offer your company different payment methods included in our solutions. As a result, employees will no longer need to advance payment with their personal cards.
