BCD Travel has unveiled an enhanced version of its TripSource Profile Manager system. The travel management company said the move will offer its corporate clients more robust profile options and access to management capabilities that enable finer control over how traveler data is stored and used.
Set to roll out in the second half of 2019 and powered by SAP's Customer Data Cloud solution, the third-generation iteration of TripSource's profile management system is built around traveler identity management, traveler consent management and traveler profile management, according to BCD.
The goal is to offer corporate travelers more personalized service and support by changing the way traveler profiles are stored, according to BCD SVP of product planning and development Yannis Karmis. "We are trying to get away from … how profiles have been managed for decades, where we have systems that store first names, last names and preferences in structured, relational databases," Karmis said. "We're trying to shift to a paradigm that's more oriented around a traveler's identity."
What that means for the booking experience is that more attributes can be accessed automatically from a single source—a traveler's profile—including preferences that help ensure a positive booking experience, such as loyalty programs, seat preferences and communication preferences. "Now we can start capturing more of that information … and feed that into booking processes," said Karmis. Traveler interactions with BCD agents also benefit from the agents' access to more and better information around the traveler's preferences. Preference data also can flow through to the third-party service providers offered in BCD's SolutionSource marketplace, enabling those providers to access and leverage relevant profile data to better serve the traveler, as well, Karmis added.
The updated profile management is backed by security elements like advanced multifactor authentication, along with a consent solution that enables travelers to control what personal data is stored in the system and how that data is used. The security measures go beyond the minimum standards set by the EU's General Data Protection Rule, offering the more finely tuned consent options corporate clients are beginning to demand, Karmis said. "Where we think the market is going is driving toward more granularity," Karmis said. Rather than simply ensuring data is stored by TMCs in a way that is GDPR compliant, corporate clients are beginning to demand gradients of access levels to enable convenience while maintaining the desired control over data security, he observed. "This is a rapidly evolving space, and what we really want is a tool that gives us flexibility as this evolves."