Online
booking and expense tool provider KDS signed a partnership deal with security
services and medical assistance company International SOS, according to KDS vice
president for product strategy Oliver Quayle. Though the partnership initially will
consist of the two companies recommending their customers to each other, Quayle
said the companies also are looking to build a data link from the KDS Maverick
product, which captures information on bookings made outside authorized
reservation channels, to the ISOS traveler tracking system.
Maverick
is the KDS solution to the much-discussed challenge of rogue, out-of-policy travel
bookings. Using technology developed by ProcureApp, Maverick can be configured
to direct travelers to the KDS booking tool if they attempt to make a purchase directly
on a supplier website. However, if the traveler persists with the unauthorized booking,
Maverick can capture the reservations data and feed it into the KDS expense
tool.
Now KDS
is exploring whether the data also can be routed to ISOS. One of the biggest
concerns about noncompliant bookings is the increased risk faced by corporations
unable to track employees in the event of an emergency. Traveler tracking tools
currently offered by companies like ISOS usually can track travelers only if
their reservations were made through a global distribution system channel.
"Maverick
travel is a duty-of-care issue," said Quayle. "We have been speaking
with [International SOS] for a long time about how to solve the problem of
people booking elsewhere. We think that having a duty-of-care company like ISOS
is the perfect partner because that is the biggest gap in the concept of flexible
travel management. It is great to have the ecosystem start to pull
together."