In the hierarchy of travel data, payment and expense data reign supreme. But where does one learn how to mine, marry and maximize payment data to improve travel policy, performance and programs?
At AirPlus International, the "where" occurs in a specially designed data lab located at its Alexandria, Va., offices. Run by business intelligence technology manager Matthew Talbot and a colleague, the lab was created to help clients and prospects learn to experiment with data. The glass-walled room opened nearly a year ago and features digital wall displays, touchscreen monitors and cool keyboards.
Formerly a management consultant and card program implementation manager, Talbot now consults with corporations seeking to unlock the knowledge in their companies' payment transaction data. Most of the corporate visitors spend about three hours in the data lab, Talbot said. After first identifying with each visitor their travel management pain points, such as rising spending, late bookings or policy violations, and what they want to learn--whether that is how to use ghost card accounts, the reporting tool, invoice management, carbon offset tracking, global capabilities or travel management best practices--Talbot demonstrates how the reporting can resolve their particular problems and then turns the keyboard over to clients.
Last year, Talbot said, he was unable to identify the top pain points of visitors, as some cited "travel policy, negotiations and a need for quick graphs." This year, the focus is clearly on "cost management, or 'how can I save on costs?' "
Talbot demonstrates how companies could use the reporting to monitor policy or contract compliance, build a case for a policy change or to monitor supplier negotiations. He also identifies the standard reports that can help with specific travel management concerns, such as advance-purchase missed opportunities or the cost of policy violations. The data repository holds two calendar years of data plus the current year to allow users to run two year over-year comparisons. Users have the ability to drill down from big picture to business unit to individual traveler to find savings opportunities or trends, Talbot said, and plot it all in charts and graphs.
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The gold, according to Talbot, lies in the custom reporting module that allows customers to easily query the database, as well as save and schedule unique reports. Here, customers can also perform "what if" scenarios to calculate savings opportunities from policy changes, such as class-of-service or advance-purchase rules. While customers can use the tools to create dashboards for each business unit, policy goal or executive hot button, "because of data security, we don't actually send out the data," Talbot said. "We run the report, then they log in and get it here. The volume of data you can create with any of these reports is huge."
In a major upgrade to the AirPlus Information Manager last summer, the Lufthansa-owned global card vendor enhanced the hotel reporting and analytical capabilities of the tool and redefined 40 standard reports, based on recommendations of a "think tank" of top customers. The reporting system can accept data feeds from accounting systems, global distribution systems, expense management systems, other payment cards, suppliers, travel management companies and other sources. Some global clients with multiple agencies rely on the tool to provide a global view of their spending. Visitors have yet to send external data in advance for the training, Talbot said. However, he shows them how they could enrich their reporting using such functionality.
In one visit with committee members of a large company with 15 semi-autonomous business units, Talbot showed them how to use the reporting to estimate the total number of travelers across the organization. Each manager previously only knew traveler and trending data for their own business units.
For companies that use multileg, multicarrier tickets, Talbot helps them understand that AirPlus actually uses the same prorations as the airlines to calculate spend by carrier. Others use segment- or mileage-based formulas, which can skew results, he said. Such proof of volume is important in airline negotiations when companies buy tickets from one carrier but actually fly on others, Talbot explained.
Novice payment managers can learn how to use supplementary fields, such as cost centers, employee numbers, product codes and other identifiers, to sort data or compliance to contract. "Part of my role is to get them to that level of comfort and show them how to use the data," Talbot said. "I don't want them to go away with a binder to stick on a shelf and never refer to it again."