Duty of care will continue to be a crucial responsibility for any corporation regardless of the amount of business travel. As companies increase globalization, a heightened safety for employees and operations will also remain. According to a recent GBTA/AIG survey, 41% of corporations provide risk management services and 17% plan to offer crisis training in the next 12 months. With the increased number of companies providing risk management services, the communication and education regarding these tools and processes is imperative.
An organization should implement a methodical, planned approach to travel risk management. The duty of care obligation includes communicating important information and assisting travelers during a crisis. Maintaining duty of care requirements is difficult if a company does not have a way to locate travelers.
Acendas suggests the following basic guidelines for a company interested in implementing duty of care policies:
- Promote an understanding of duty of care and meet with top stakeholders.
- Investigate cautiously and enhance procedures.
- Inform and explain new policies to travelers.
- Evaluate potential threats before booking travel.
- Utilize traveler locater tools.
- Employ a crisis communication process and other risk management tactics.
- Confirm that suppliers support your crisis plan.
There are numerous risk management tools offered by travel management companies and other third-party suppliers such as FocusPoint International, International SOS (ISOS), iJET, and Anvil. The tools should, at a minimum, provide traveler tracking. In addition to providing crisis management planning before and during a trip, a company is obligated as part of duty of care compliance to record these events and deliver reporting to management. This process will allow a corporation to evaluate the results from previous events and enhance the risk management plan.
Acendas developed Mission Control, which is the backbone of our crisis management process to track and assist our clients during events that impact traveler safety. When emergencies or other issues occur, Acendas’ operations team utilize the SafeToGo real-time traveler-tracking map and Mission Control to safeguard travelers and provide other options. Acendas’ process includes automating critical level alerts that are sent to impacted travelers, as well as specific notifications that are sent to travelers or travel arrangers for pre-travel, flight delays, and cancellations.
Though duty of care is possibly the most significant facet of a travel risk management (TRM) program, there are additional kinds of travel-related risk that can hurt a company. These risk instances include operations/productivity, data/equipment, financial/legal, and reputation. Corporations should be introducing programs to recognize, evaluate, alleviate, and examine risk in an increased methodical approach. To assist companies with this daunting task, Acendas developed the initial steps to establish a TRM program. For more information, download our white paper on the Building Blocks to a Travel Risk Management Program.
