Pricing is buyers' top priority with car rental suppliers, though for chauffeured transportation suppliers, service quality and security trumped all other factors, according to a new Business Travel News survey.
In the survey of 123 corporate travel buyers, overall price value ranked highest on a six-point scale in terms of importance for car rental suppliers. Buyers also rated complaint/problem resolution and vehicle cleanliness as highly important.
Car rental suppliers seem to be hitting the mark on all three of those attributes, as buyers gave them the highest satisfaction ratings of all attributes.
In open-ended questions in the survey, many buyers gave high praise to their car rental partners, several even saying "nothing" when asked what their supplier could do to improve the relationship. When asked how car rental suppliers are improving their relationships, rapid resolution of customer-service issues, detailed reporting and better availability of cars in remote markets were some of the most frequently cited accomplishments.
A few cited other ways in which car rental suppliers had stepped up service, including partnering to develop a carpool program and partnering with a third-party company to develop a driving-safety program for travelers.
At the same time, business traveler satisfaction with car rental suppliers has been improving. In the J.D. Power & Associates 2014 North America Rental Car Satisfaction Study, which tabulated more than 12,300 responses from car rental customers, satisfaction among business travelers improved slightly year over year while overall satisfaction dropped. Efficient service, including shuttles and car pickup and drop-offs, was the differentiator, said Jennifer Corwin, associate practice lead with J.D. Power.
"For the business traveler, the wait time is about four minutes less," she said. "We also assume this is in part because the business traveler is more familiar with the processes."
Open-ended responses in the BTN survey reinforced the importance of car rental pricing to buyers. Asked how car rental suppliers could improve their relationship, several buyers cited keeping rates low and/or flat as essential. A few others expressed dissatisfaction with refueling policies and upselling at the counter.
Though such technology add-ons as express-toll devices and GPS devices rated at the bottom in terms of importance, several buyers in the survey praised their car rental suppliers for adding those items at no cost.
In terms of chauffeured transportation service, in contrast, overall price value rated fifth in overall importance, taking a backseat to complaint/problem resolution, insurance for drivers, ease of making bookings and licensing of drivers. Flexibility in negotiating transient pricing ranked even lower, though that attribute also scored lowest of all attributes in terms of buyer satisfaction.
A recurring theme in buyer open-ended responses was the need for "reliable, safe and impeccable" service, particularly as company VIPs tended to be the ones who used the services most often.
Additionally, the survey illustrated the growing influence of such on-demand driver services as Uber and Lyft on business travel. Nearly 40 percent of respondents said they allow their travelers to use those services. Earlier this month, Morgan Stanley announced that it was allowing employees to expense Uber rides through its corporate travel policy, claiming to be one of the first large companies to do so.
"Employees expressed their strong affinity for the convenience Uber offers them in their personal lives and wanted that flexibility for their business travel needs as well," Morgan Stanley chief human resources officer Jeff Brodsky said in a statement.
Those effects are spilling over even for those buyers who are not using the service. One buyer in the survey, for example, implored their chauffeured transportation supplier to add a working app similar to the Uber model. Another noted that "Uber has had this effect on the availability of drivers during peak times, since they can now 'troll' for rides, which seems to have decreased the number of available cars for corporate-negotiated rides."
BTN in October and November 2014 conducted the online survey through SurveyMonkey. BTN surveyed travel manager members of The BTN Group Advisory Board and Research Council, as well as qualified buyer subscribers of BTN Group publications, including BTN and Travel Procurement magazine.
This report originally appeared in the Nov. 24, 2014, edition of Business Travel News.