What added value have travel management companies (TMCs) brought to their customers over the last five years? What are the current priorities for travel managers worldwide? What challenges will they be facing in the short term? These are just some of the questions that Egencia and the GBTA Foundation have set out to answer in their latest study on "The Evolution of Business Travel Management". In particular, it shows that reporting is the focus of attention for European travel managers, who make it their number 1 priority in 82% of cases for the coming years, and even more so for North Americans (88%). On a global scale, however, it is cost control (74%) that is the priority issue. This is followed by reporting (73%), flexibility (68%), mobile technology (65%) and finally adaptation to different types of traveller (55%). The use of standardised travel programmes on a global scale would therefore be preferred to global programmes that meet local needs: 81% of travel managers worldwide report objectives that are common to all countries. This trend is particularly prevalent in Asian companies, where the rate rises to 83%, while it falls to 72% in the European market. The Egencia-GBTA study also reveals significant geographical disparities in the importance attached by travel managers to mobile technologies. European professionals are lagging behind in this area, with only a minority (41%) using a mobile application to organise their trip, compared to 56% in Latin America, 59% in the United States and even 61% in Asia. Similarly, only 59% of European respondents would use a smartphone to organise a business trip, compared with over 80% in North America and Asia.
