Facing significant airport transfer costs and extensive use of traveler time just getting to and from its various airport options, Dutch document solutions firm Océ Technologies developed an innovative taxi sharing, booking and payment initiative that has reduced hassles, improved options and cut expenses.
Using Océ's self-booking tool or emails to the travel management company, travelers send taxi requests that are routed through the Amadeus global distribution system to taxi companies, which arrange combined trips "so you never travel alone," said Océ business travel purchaser Huub van Rumund. Four hours before the airplane's departure, a message is sent "back to the GDS, and you find in your [Internet itinerary] the schedule including taxi pickup time." A new feature enables travelers to receive an SMS message on their mobile phones, indicating whether the taxi is on time.
"You pick up colleagues until [the taxi reaches] a maximum," van Rumund said. "Employees have the ability to take a taxi from their home addresses or offices to any airport they want." In the case of one of Océ's top destinations, Munich, "There is also a taxi there waiting to take the traveler to the hotel." At the office, receptionists and security officers maintain lists of travelers and pickup times in order to direct them to the right cabs. At the airport, taxi drivers wait with signs indicating the company's name.
"It seems like it costs a lot?" van Rumund asked rhetorically during his presentation at the Paragon Business Travel Conference & Expo here. "Not true. You can keep the total cost down." He said Océ receives management information from "a few" taxi companies, enabling the creation of preferred suppliers and negotiated deals. "I heard some here were paying up to €110 to get from Milan-Malpensa to the conference. There's no control on these costs. In the system we're using, we have control of the costs because they are invoiced to the company."
Companies with major facilities in large cities with big airports may not have Océ's problems, but firms located in or traveling to more remote areas in many nations fit Océ's profile of having lots of airport options but no particularly good one. As a result, ground transfers represent a bigger headache and expense. Based in Venlo, the Netherlands, Océ's headquarters are between 64 and 92 kilometers (40 and 57 miles) from five midsize airports in Germany and the Netherlands--but more than 180 kilometers (112 miles) from major metropolitan airports in Amsterdam and Brussels.
With the growth of low-cost carriers in Europe, travelers more than ever are finding lower, one-way airfares that result in itineraries which return them to different airports from where they departed--nullifying the option of personally driving and parking at the airport.
According to van Rumund, such geography and market conditions conspired to create two major travel management problems for the firm: the expense of transfers and the impact on traveler productivity and well-being. "We're near the German border, and Dusseldorf is fairly close [65 km/40 miles]--but you can fly cheap from Cologne [92 km/57 miles]. A lot of people say, 'That's cheap, let's fly from Cologne,' but you pay €200 (US$309) to get to that very far airport and get that cheap ticket--with a huge loss of time.
"Our company stands for the welfare of the traveler," van Rumund said. "They are traveling for our company, and we have to take care of them. Travel isn't that nice. Our travelers get up very early and get home late or stay a few days out of home."
Océ plans to expand its arrangement in Munich to Milan, Paris and Rome.