New Rearden Dashboard Tracks, Analyzes Ancillary Booking Spending

Rearden Commerce today announced the release of a Web-based dashboard-style management information system for its online platform that enables companies to monitor and analyze spending and usage data for online bookings, including off-airport parking reservations, packaged shipping, event tickets and Webconferencing data.

In addition, the dashboard also provides policy and preferred vendor compliance statistics and enables travel managers, administrators and travel management companies to track spending and compliance for individual travelers and across business units.

While similar dashboard technology exists in the self-booking tool marketplace, Rearden's system now provides visibility into such ancillary booking categories as dining reservations and packaged shipping for metrics that include express and overnight service—segments that previously were cited by some travel buyers as difficult to track, leaving them hesitant to offer those services to employees.

According to vice president of worldwide sales Tony D'Astolfo, Rearden is developing analytical tools so travel buyers and TMCs can measure preferred vendor performance and agreements. Rearden also will integrate adjustable rules so travel managers can determine the potential savings derived from proposed policy changes before implementing them.

The new dashboard uses booked online data that can be supplemented with other agency data, and the company plans to build capabilities for integration with expense data in later product releases, D'Astolfo said. Other enhancements in the works include the development of a data warehouse of all Rearden data to provide benchmarking capabilities.

Rearden also today announced the launch of mobile dining reservation capabilities for Rearden users on BlackBerry mobile devices. The mobile version also is available for American Express Anywhere, Amex's version of the Rearden mobile platform.