Alex Puig
International SOS in January polled more than 570 U.S.-based corporate security professionals, travel managers, human resources executives and medical professionals, and found that the opportunity to better understand risk levels in specific regions (cited by 44 percent of respondents) is the benefit most likely to persuade senior executives to improve traveler safety and security programs. That was followed by business continuity issues/brand reputation issues (25 percent) and corporate social responsibility issues and legal issues (each 15 percent). Meanwhile, Latin America was the region cited by the largest number of respondents (40 percent) as the most risky for business travelers in 2011, followed by the Middle East (31 percent) and Asia (20 percent). The Transnationalrecently spoke with Alex Puig, regional security director for the Americas for Travel Security Services, a joint venture between International SOS and Control Risks Group. Excerpts follow.
Some have said the recession made some companies lose focus on environmental initiatives, as they were trying to survive financially. On the duty-of-care side, how are corporations now addressing that in ways that may be different than what they had done previously?
During the recession, those issues gained prominence. There was a bit of a pause in the level of travel. Some organizations kept it neutral but many dialed it back a bit, simply because they didn't know what was coming and figured it was an area in which they could easily cut back to a certain extent and continue to operate. It was during that time period--all of '08 through the latter part of '09--when companies spent a little bit of time examining their practices: "This is what we have been doing up until now, but what about when we start traveling again?" They started looking around to see what was going on in the market--with duty of care particularly--and that caught their attention as a risk management approach. All these issues--legal issues, CSR issues, etc.--are tied into risk management. And as a risk manager, you never have enough information. You will never be able to sleep well at night, no matter how many inputs you have around your corporate risks. You are just never satisfied. And that is where you want to be, because the moment you become satisfied, you fall asleep at the wheel and start missing things.
On legal issues and risk of punitive damages, certainly there have been new rules applied in certain countries, and we live in a very litigious society. Can these type of legal concerns related to a corporation's liability and responsibility hinder business development by persuading them not to send employees, or maybe not as many employees, to high-risk areas?
At this point, my opinion is that they do not hinder. But they have prompted companies to think long and hard about their internal processes. Companies are trying to get out ahead of the curve and do the right thing by their employees. There is a balance, of course. You don't want to scare your employees. If you are sending them on business to a malaria-infested country, you don't want to simply tell them, "You are going to a malaria-infested country. Take some pills." You have to educate them in the proper way. The language that you use as it pertains to a particular corporate culture should be a very nuanced approach. Companies are looking around at the Manslaughter Act [in the United Kingdom]and [a similar one] in Australia and seeing the potential for a law like that [in their home country] and saying, "Let's just do the right thing by our people and make sure we put in place all the things we know we should have in place."
About 40 percent of respondents to the recent survey said they see an increase in employees extending business trips for personal vacations. What security red flags does that raise, and what is the best way to mitigate risk in those cases where corporate liability may not be entirely clear?
A lot of companies are asking themselves that same question. There are no hard-and-fast rules in the books in terms of laws, saying what a company should or should not have in place to cover their employee if they decide to take an extra three days after a business trip to go see the temples on the border between Cambodia and Thailand. A lot of companies that know their employees do partake in these activities have decided to step up and do what is right: ensure that those employees still would be covered under their program, even if it means the company would have to pay for a portion or all of it, or the traveler would have to pay for a portion or all of the services that need to be in place--assistance services, etc.
We have received some feedback suggesting that tracking systems used by some large corporate travel agencies, generally tied into global distribution systems, aren't as effective as some would like. How is information fed into the International SOS TravelTracker system?
It is fed by GDSs and passenger name records. Like any system, whatever you put into it is what you get out of it. So if the information becomes old--a person changes the reservation at the last second and hops another flight--there are vulnerabilities. International SOS has started designing the next phase, which is the incorporation of a location-based systemthat would tie into the TravelTracker. A lot of people who travel overseas these days have international phones. We are beta testing several location-based systems, which is a fancy way of saying a GPS- or cell tower-based system, that would allow for the tracking of that individual. That can be passive or active tracking. An international traveler who has this loaded on his phone can elect to be tracked or elect not to be tracked. If an incident occurs, we can go on the system and see who is in that exact spot and be able to reach out to them immediately. There are challenges around that. There are organizations that say that want that right now, and there are others that think it is the next version of the Patriot Act and don't want that kind of employee tracking. The option is there.
Where are companies generally deficient when it comes to traveler safety and security?
The biggest deficiency is not necessarily that they don't know where their people are--you can always find out where your people have gone--it's knowing how to get into contact with them. As a general rule, applying to many organizations that we deal with, companies do not give their traveling employees an international phone and/or require them to leave behind their international cell phone number if they have one. Inevitably, lots of companies struggle with this, even big ones. It's the ability on a moment's notice, when an incident occurs, to call that individual on their cell phone and ask them, "Are you OK? Where are you? These are our instructions to you." We see this over and over again, every time there is a crisis. There always is that gap, and it is not an easy one to overcome because it costs a lot of money to give everybody a mobile phone they can take overseas in case something bad happens. So, what other technological solutions are there? Sometimes technology is your biggest enemy, like we saw in Egypt when the Internet went down and the cell phones went down as the government clamped down on people communicating. Then the challenge was, "Do we have a land line to call our people on?" because that was it, they were down to land lines. Fortunately, they didn't turn those off, because if they did, Egypt would have been a very different story in terms of companies finding out if their people were OK. Satellite phones are an option, but they are a very rare thing. So, lots of challenges still out there.