UTC To Adopt Auto Booking

<I>Hartford, Conn.</I> - Four months after hooking its internal travel department homepage to Internet Travel Network, United Technologies Corp. has wound up its beta test of ITN's automated travel booking system and is planning to roll it out to every employee with Internet access--a total of almost 5,000 users.

UTC corporate travel manager Mike Prado said that the only thing preventing him from making the system available to all 30,000 employees is that not everyone has Web access.

Prado also acknowledged that while the ITN system offers the promise of both cost savings and improved convenience for travelers, he has had to sell the concept to each individual business unit--and it has not been an easy sale. "Security issues remain paramount in any program that attaches our intranet to the outside, and those are issues we are still working through with our security people," he said.

This month, Prado expects to begin offering access to the company's private hotel and preferred vendor agreements as well as to the regular rates offered in the CRS.

In the last quarter of 1996, the UTC beta-test group of 50 frequent travelers booked about 20 tickets a month. That group has since expanded to 100, with the full release scheduled for March.

The UTC travel page offers hyperlinks to Carlson Wagonlit and other preferred vendors, profiles that travelers can update themselves, travel advisories and a searchable hotel database that includes properties in 38 countries.