Report Assesses Online Corp. Booking

U.S. corporate travelers will book nearly half of the estimated $105 billion market online in 2008, according to a report jointly released last month by PhoCusWright and Travel Tech Consulting that analyzes the trends and emerging technologies of corporate travel.

"Corporate Travel Today and Tomorrow" author and president of Belmont, Calif.-based Travel Tech Consulting Norm Rose said that online adoption is increasing because management information systems are yielding data that show the benefits of online travel booking to travelers and senior management.

"There is an effort to push through travel-specific information to finance, division and department managers, other departments and play one against the other," said Rose. "There is a direct connection between the amount of flexibility and knowledge you have of what goes into travel costs and being able to distribute that to decision makers throughout the company in order to drive better compliance."

Although other recent data suggest the bottom range is higher for even the largest companies, the report said the range of current self-booked touchless transaction pricing is between $4 and $8, an amount that the report claims will continue to fall due to competition in the marketplace.

The report also provides a look at costs travel management companies incur to provide touchless service, including mid-office quality control products, which cost between 55 cents and $5.55 per passenger name record, management information system reporting software that enables Web-based reporting, which costs between 12 cents and 40 cents per transaction by third-party vendors who also charge licensing fees of between $600 and $10,000.

"Buyers need to be aware of the cost the TMC incurs and have that as part of the discussion," Rose said. "There is more to it than having 95 percent touchless reservations. There is more analysis that should be done to understand how they achieve those touchless reservations."