BTN's 2018 Innovator of the Year just may be the company that finally brings virtual payments into the mainstream for corporate travel. Judges at the BTN Group's recent Innovate conference awarded the prized title to robotic process automation, or RPA, provider Troovo. The company aims to take the pain—and the high price—out of generating and using virtual cards. "Virtual cards remain very clunky to use and are driven by people-powered processes, which makes them very expensive," said Troovo CEO Kurt Knackstedt. "We believe this is the reason virtual cards are still the exception in our industry and not the norm."
Troovo CEO Kurt Knackstedt (left) & chief solutions officer Tarik Sedlarevic
Troovo's solution makes virtual payments "virtually free," Knackstedt said. The RPA platform can integrate with any travel booking platform or enterprise procurement system, connects to all major credit card issuers and can process payment for travel bookings from any source, including travel management companies, online booking tools and chatbots. Once a booking request has been made, Troovo's automated system contacts the card issuer to request a virtual card number, provides the merchant with that payment information and sends detailed payment info to the travel supplier and traveler.
There is no interface for travel agents or back-office teams, so there are no training requirements and human error is removed from the equation. The platform is available in all major markets and can be branded by corporate clients or TMCs. The robotics efficiency enables Troovo to offer its services at a low cost. The system is priced at 25 cents per travel booking/passenger name record, including changes or edits. At that price, virtual cards are viable for transactions beyond their most-common current use case of hotel booking. "We believe virtual cards should be used across air, ground, and whatever else a company decides it wants to centrally bill," Knackstedt said. "We give you that opportunity because at that type of cost" and with the ability to generate multiple cards per booking, "you get more scale out of using virtual cards."
That vision resonated with Innovate's judges. "The industry has been struggling with virtual payments for a long time now, and [Troovo's] use of robotics seems to be way more advanced than other companies within this space," said Norm Rose, Travel Tech Consulting president & Phocuswright senior tech analyst. The judges also praised the company's low cost and microservice approach.
People's Choice: Serko
The International Air Transport Association's New Distribution Capability promises to put ancillary airline products and customization into play for managed travel. There's just one problem: Corporate booking tools can't accommodate the content. Enter Serko. The New Zealand-based provider has developed the first NDC-enabled corporate booking chatbot, dubbed Zeno. The company's Level 3 NDC certification means it can display, price and book ancillary content like seat upgrades, bag fees and meals in real time through an interactive chatbot. The engine pulls content from multiple sources, including all major global distribution systems, as well as NDC exchanges, aggregators and a direct connection with Australian carrier Qantas.
Serko North America SVP Tony D’Astolfo
While the Zeno interface is straightforward, the behind-the-scenes work is complex, noted Serko SVP Tony D'Astolfo. Among those tasks are normalizing data and terminology for content across airlines, fitting NDC content into the booking workflow and applying corporate policies. The result is a seamless process that enables the user to shop for different services easily. Routehappy integration provides photo and video descriptions. Zeno also can use loyalty accounts, now live with Qantas, to customize options.
"This is what the airlines want. They want to be able to retail their product right at the point of purchase," said D'Astolfo. "When you have a multisource engine, you can take content from different sources and make it seamless for the end user." Meanwhile, travel managers enjoy visibility into the true cost of a trip during the booking process, ensuring that booked costs adhere to policy.
Zeno has drawn interest in North America this year. Serko has signed reselling deals with Canadian travel management companies Voyages Encore Travel and Custom Travel Solutions.
The judges praised Zeno's pricing transparency and its integration with loyalty programs, though they suggested more targeted offerings to reduce the number of clicks in the booking process. Zeno's focus on NDC definitely swayed Innovate attendees, who voted to award it People's Choice. "This is where the spend is going and where airlines are moving," D'Astolfo said, "so we're going to jump right in."
Judges' Honorable Mentions
Shep: Shep's open booking policy and expense-capture tool was "one of the more forward-thinking business solutions" presented during the Innovate competition, according to Becca Rabinowitz, a judge for the 2018 competition and head of SpotHero for Business, BTN's 2017 Innovator of the Year. Given the proliferation of unmanaged travel, Shep's strategy of installing a layer of management on top of off-channel bookings will become increasingly important as the travel booking ecosystem evolves, noted Rabinowitz.
Shep helps travel management companies and travel managers combat leakage by offering users the same booking experience they've grown accustomed to with consumer booking channels. As a browser extension, it kicks in when consumers use such sites to book flights or hotels, guiding the booking via pop-ups to encourage compliance with corporate travel policy. At the end of the booking, Shep forwards the information to the corporate travel manager for reporting, duty of care, data capture and other uses.
Originally designed for use by small and midsize enterprises just beginning to require corporate travel tools, Shep's technology has attracted interest from larger companies. During the Innovate conference, it announced its first-ever TMC partnership, with Australia's Flight Centre Travel Group.
Trappit: Madrid-based airfare tracking and reshopping tool Trappit gives corporate travel programs the ability to save on particular fares but also offers something that's arguably more powerful: information a corporation can use in negotiations with its airline partners to ensure they're getting the best rates.
Trappit uses an algorithm to monitor airline ticket costs every few seconds from the moment of original booking right up through the day of departure. If a lower fare for the same itinerary is found, the travel agency is notified and the booking is changed to the lower-priced ticket.
The solution works with all global distribution systems but also scours sources like airline websites and travel agencies. Cancellation and rebooking fees are taken into account when calculating whether a fare is lower than the original ticket price. There are no software or IT requirements, and reports are generated on savings.
The judges praised Trappit's ability to offer savings and valuable insight into content travel programs may not be capturing via their travel management companies. "As travel managers, we always have the challenge of someone getting a better rate outside of the program, and to be able to capture that info can have an impact from a sourcing perspective, as well as identifying where there might be gaps in content" from the TMC, said judge Cathy Sharpe, ITW director of global T&E management.
The Competition
AmTrav: One way travel management companies can fight back against the prospect of becoming commodified: offering an end-to-end service that handles trip management from search and booking all the way through to expense reporting. Chicago-based TMC
AmTrav embodies this holistic approach with its a2b platform, which features expanded content aggregation and a new expense reporting tool. For off-channel bookings, travelers can forward their confirmation emails to AmTrav, where email-parsing technology from Traxo automatically relays information to the corporate travel manager. Putting it all together under one roof was no easy task, noted AmTrav president and co-founder Craig Fichtelberg. "We built this from the ground up, and we understand the expectations of corporate customers, so we made it very versatile."
The judges were impressed by the ambition of a2b's single-umbrella design, which they noted would offer simplicity for travel managers. However, they wondered whether the all-in-one approach would constrain clients who want to break out certain services to microservice providers or other TMCs.
FlightGlobal: Flight disruptions are among the most frequently cited reasons for unsuccessful business trips by cor-porate travelers. While flight disruptions can't be eliminated, FlightGlobal aims to make them less painful with its Travel Waiver Services proactive flight waiver program.
The platform automates the typically manual process of issuing waivers for fees for qualifying rebookings. That reduces labor and mitigates the risk of human error during large-scale disruptions resulting from, for example, storms or labor strikes, said traveler services VP Robyn Grassanovits.
The application programming interface-based system aggregates, consolidates and standardizes waivers for different airlines and matches each waiver with a qualifying passenger name record and trip for FlightGlobal's client corporations and travel management companies. The waivers push to travelers directly, reducing the need for TMCs to provide phone support to travelers and to contact airlines to obtain waivers.
The judges commended FlightGlobal's approach to a significant problem and said it is a "great first step," though they look forward to the platform evolving to be more proactive.
HRS: Hotel solutions provider HRS presented its new rate-filtering service, an add-on to its Rate Protector suite, to ensure hotel rates and amenities displayed to travelers and agents adhere to negotiated terms. The artificial intelligence and digital automation tool identifies incorrect rates and prevents them from hitting online booking tools and agent desktops. That avoids rebookings after the fact. "We can now automatically and in real time identify if there is a deviation from the contracted rate," said HRS chief product officer Martin Biermann.
Ensuring that incorrect rates are filtered out at the front end can help corporate clients save an average of 2.8 percent of the savings they negotiated with hotel properties, he said, a significant amount for large corporations. Rate filtering is available at no cost to HRS clients that use its hotel booking solutions.
The judges applauded the proactive approach to ensuring correct rates on the front end of the booking process. However, they characterized the filter as more of an extension of the existing Rate Protector service rather than a standalone innovation.
Obex Solutions: Obex Solutions offers a mobile corporate travel platform that plays well with others. Designed to incorporate tools and aggregate data from multiple service providers into one cohesive experience for the user, Obex enables users to book and manage travel via a variety of channels while connecting that information to the travel manager on the back end. Incubated by travel management company Frosch Travel, the platform can integrate with major T&E services, including Concur and Chrome River, along with communication channels like Slack and Skype for Business. A WhatsApp integration is also in the works, said chief technology officer and co-founder Sridhar Balaji. On the booking side, Obex offers content from global distribution system and non-GDS sources and can access New Distribution Capability content. A real-time chat function assists travelers during the entire travel process, from booking through expense reporting.
The judges praised Obex's mobile-first strategy but said corporate buy-in on an app-based product could be tough due to perceived security risks. Judges also liked Obex's openness to third parties but would like to see Obex be able to provide services to other TMCs rather than aiming to replace companies' existing TMC relationships.
RoomIt by CWT: Travelers often book directly with hotels to get more loyalty points, and a recent study commissioned by Carlson Wagonlit Travel showed that three of 10 travelers prioritize receiving points even over staying in safer hotels. Thus CWT has turned that premium on points around to incentivize travelers to make channel-compliant bookings through its RoomIt hotel distribution channel.
RoomIt's Loyalty Booster function offers travelers extra loyalty points for booking through RoomIt and displays those point offers while users shop for rooms. Messaging through corporate clients promotes Loyalty Booster bonuses that drive travelers to companies' preferred booking channels.
The results of using points as a carrot have been encouraging since Loyalty Booster launched earlier this year, noted RoomIt by CWT chief growth officer and founder Scott Brennan. Early data showed that the program drove as much as a 12 percent increase in hotel attachment rates for clients and an 11 percent increase in preferred supplier spend.
The judges called Loyalty Booster "the right offering for the right audience" but encouraged more transparency in the business model around how points are applied and how hotels are selected for inclusion in the program.
TravelBank: TravelBank bills itself as a "next-generation TMC," according to chief revenue officer Josh Abich The booking and expense management app was built with design in mind, including a mobile-centric strategy and 24/7 customer support. Hotel and air bookings are available now, with ground transportation and train bookings planned for the near future.
But what differentiates TravelBank is a rewards feature that incentivizes travelers, with rewards cards, to beat an artificial intellgence-generated budget prediction for a given trip. To help travelers save, the platform includes bookings with Airbnb, VRBO and HomeAway.
TravelBank's mobile-first model helps attract customers, and the judges noted the potential within TravelBank's integrated approach and rewards engine. But, as with any challenger to the travel management company model, the company faces a tall task in convincing corporations to switch from their existing providers.
TripStreak: TripStreak's TripScore technology offers travel management companies a way to harmonize the desires of business travelers and their corporations, said CEO Charles Ralston. It increases chan-nel compliance on hotel, air and car rental bookings. TripStreak's search engine prioritizes search results along not only preset preferences from travelers but also travel policy and preferences from their companies, resulting in a search process that's more efficient for both parties. TripStreak enables corporates to set different levels of priority around variables like cost and preferred suppliers to fine-tune the search results, and an algorithm-generated TripScore applies to each flight, hotel or car option so travelers can compare them easily. TMCs can integrate TripStreak via application programming interface or software license.
The judges were pleased with TripStreak's focus on personalization and the scoring model but were concerned with the time, up to five seconds, to generate scores within the search process and about the need for each traveler to enter their preferences as they're onboarded.
Urbandoor: Despite the rising demand for corporate furnished/serviced apartments, a need remains for a simple way to search for them. Urbandoor aims to fill that gap with its digital marketplace, which connects travelers with apartment operators around the world.
Employees enjoy better living experiences in professionally operated apartments, there's one point of contact for duty of care and there's transparent reporting, said CEO Erik Eccles. Costs for apartments, meanwhile, average 40 percent less than hotel rates for a comparable time of stay, and the marketplace model brings in hundreds of apartments that otherwise wouldn't be visible to travelers.
Urbandoor works in over 1,300 global markets, and since its start in 2015 has signed up 125 corporate clients directly, along with seven travel management companies and a number of managed relocation firms, Eccles said.
The judges appreciated the savings, curation of content and high-quality user experience but encouraged a deeper integration into the corporate travel ecosystem, such as connecting with an expense tool.