Company: UnitedHealth Group
Headquarters: Minneapolis
2007 U.S. Booked Air Volume: $45.5 millionUnitedHealth Group this year implemented a new online booking system in conjunction with pre-trip authorization and ticket tracking tools, which the company estimates, along with the three-year renewal of its travel management company contract with American Express Business Travel, would save several million dollars this year.
In just 12 weeks, global travel and meetings manager Tamara Gordon led the Minneapolis-based health and insurance services provider's conversion from a 90 percent off-line booking environment to one with an 81 percent online adoption rate after implementing the Cliqbook self-booking tool. That evolution entailed training 13,000 U.S. travelers and finance personnel to monitor compliance and manage reporting automation. Gordon estimated the booking transition to generate $750,000 to $1 million this year in reduced agency service fees.
The pre-trip authorization and ticket tracking tools helped UnitedHealth realize a $23 per-ticket decrease from the average price before implementation. The average ticket price decrease is projected to total $200,000 by year-end.
Online booking tool successes did not come overnight for UnitedHealth. Two months before the Cliqbook deployment, Gordon initiated a multiplatform communications strategy, including senior-management-endorsed e-mails and six online training sessions. "It's a bit time-consuming to go through that process, but we have great compliance if we do that," she said. "If we don't, then we don't have compliance, so why even bother rolling out the program?"
In parallel, UnitedHealth implemented Amex's Pre-Trip Auditor for noncompliance notifications and approval for out-of-policy bookings. Cost compliance personnel within the finance department receive notifications of out-of-policy bookings and contact travelers or notify their supervisors for approval when necessary.
Such automation can cause bottlenecks in the reservation process. To prevent the loss of reserved seats and other potential roadblocks, Gordon set the tool to stop ticketing only bookings that are $350 more than the lowest logical airfare. The travel policy allows bookings of $25 above the lowest logical airfare within a two-hour departure window.
"Because we book so many tickets, we didn't want to convolute this," she said.
UnitedHealth also expects to save $100,000 to $150,000 this year in reduced unused ticket liability through the Ticket Trax tool, which applies refundable tickets within the previous 60 days to eligible trips and notifies travelers and administrators of outstanding tickets that are eligible for name changes within the parameters of UnitedHealth's airline contracts.
UnitedHealth has set its sights on developing a global travel policy and global corporate card program that will encompass the 5 percent of the travel volume that is booked from international points of origin, which is fueling the company's travel spending growth. Through September, the
Corporate Travel 100 company's year-over-year air volume is up 10 percent and ticket increases are up 5 percent.
UnitedHealth also is developing a more formal meetings management program by consolidating preferred vendors and applying common procedures and policy for in-house business unit meeting planners and 10 dedicated American Express Business Travel planners. The company's meetings team handles about 1,000 meetings annually, including about 100 large conferences, events and incentive trips. "If we look at it across the board," Gordon said, "it's a huge amount of spend, but companies just don't know that."