TMCs Rethink Duty of Care To Keep Pace With Changing Risks

Editor’s note: This story has been revised for greater clarity and to correct errors made during the editing process.

As the world grows smaller and seemingly more dangerous, corporations with employees in motion around the globe are rethinking their “duty of care” policies to cope with emerging threats. And travel management companies are responding with new tools and services.

In a year that has seen its share of travel-related disasters and dangers – including two downed Boeing 777 passenger jets and the threat posed by brutal guerrilla forces in the Middle East, to name just a few – the need to protect traveling employees is top of mind for travel management companies and their clients.

It has to be.

“The obligation of the corporation is to exercise a reasonable standard of care to protect the health, safety and security of employees while on company business. If a corporation fails to meet this standard, it may be considered legally negligent,” said Eric Hankins, senior director of travel risk solutions for NC4, a California-based company that provides travel risk management solutions.

Information is key
“Duty of care’s main duty is to inform – what did you know, when did you know, when did you deliver it?” Hankins said during a panel on travel disruptions at the Global Business Travel Association conference in July.

The mandate for duty of care hasn’t changed, but the tools and services available to TMC clients certainly have.

“If we go back a few years, there was limited info, printed lists of where a traveler had been,” said Nicolas Buc, vice president of new product development at American Express Global Business Travel.

This summer, American Express launched risk management services that go far beyond that, promising to take some of the sting out of tracking and servicing traveling employees.

“Our first focus has been bringing data together – collecting information from travel systems and GDS systems and providing a simpler way to track people. The next step was looking at smartphones and figuring out how we can best communicate with these people,” Buc said.

For next gen travelers
American Express Global Business Travel introduced one resulting product, a new tier of service called “First,” at the GBTA convention. First is designed for next gen travelers who want 24/7 access to dedicated travel counselors.

Travelers elect to sign up for First and, following a set of interviews and set-ups, are assigned a team of travel advisors that proactively handles problems as they arise, pushing communications to their clients throughout the travel process.

First travel experts also have access to AX CONNECT, a separate service offered by American Express. The company recently announced an enhancement for AX CONNECT called “Card Swipe” to further facilitate communications between travel managers and traveling employees in an emerging crisis.

The card swipe functionality gives travel managers or company security teams an integrated view of a traveler’s itinerary and recent transactions on their corporate American Express charge card, helping them pinpoint the employee’s location during an emergency and ensure their safety.

An intuitive user interface enables travel managers to push crucial information to clients via SMS, email, or a mobile app, as well as prioritize aid to those travelers in need.

Serious threats
TMCs deal with relatively minor travel disruptions such as flight delays all the time, but the card swipe solution from American Express was aimed at more threatening situations.

“These incidents can be very serious, like terrorist attack, the Boston bombing, an ash cloud or Hurricane Sandy-level storm,” said Buc. He noted that American Express Global Business Travel works with companies that have thousands of travelers on the road who at any time “may need to be rebooked or may be in the midst of a precarious situation.”

War rooms
While large TMCs use internal and client data to track and assist travelers in need, other providers such as iJet and NC4 run central data centers like war rooms, picking up on alerts and threats around the clock. Such providers create customized assessments and analyses for client companies that can be acted upon according to the policies of each client company.

Staying on top of emerging risks is vital, but “documentation is key here,” said Hankins of NC4. “There are plenty of things out there to slow us down or cause problems, and we have to monitor them. But you don’t manage threats, you manage risks.”

Costly disruptions
For client companies, handling travel disruptions, whether from terrorist threats or mundane weather-related delays, is about more than traveler safety and comfort.

A DOT study on the economic impact of disruptions found a $39 million cost from airline delays alone, according to Amy Hyatt, vice president of operations and global account management for BCD Travel, which has clients in 92 countries.

Travel managers “need to understand your top city airlines and their on-time performances. Newark-to-Atlanta, for instance, you may get stuck a lot,” said Hyatt, who joined Hankins on the GBTA’s panel about duty of care.

“If we can get to a traveler before an airline call center is overwhelmed in a storm or a shutdown, we can expect to see a 67% gain in productivity,” said Hyatt.