Corporate spending management provider Coupa has rolled out a new analytics tool designed to help companies mine air booking data to identify opportunities to reduce costs and gain leverage for supplier negotiations. Launched Thursday, Coupa Travel Saver Insights for Air joins Coupa's Travel Saver Insights for Hotel tool, both of which were built on the platform of Yapta, the price assurance technology provider Coupa acquired in January 2020.
Travel Saver Insights for Air captures pricing data on available, booked and contracted airfares when a traveler purchases a ticket and updates that information until the time of travel in order to provide pricing visibility throughout the trip lifecycle, according to Coupa. Travel and spending managers subsequently can use that data to gain insight into spending, rate policy adherence and potential renegotiation opportunities for suppliers and/or routes.
With corporate cost savings more important than ever amid economic turmoil sown by the Covid-19 pandemic, there's plenty of low-hanging fruit when it comes to reducing travel spending for many companies, according to Coupa data. Of the top 10 percent of routes across Coupa's customer base in 2019, 78 percent of bookings used negotiated rates, yet only 18 percent of those were at the lowest available rate, the company said.