Ken Augustine, Vice President of Travel Technology<\/b><\/p>\n
It\u2019s been said that necessity is the mother of invention.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n That came into clear focus for the Acendas Travel team approximately five years ago as travelers were rapidly adopting technology to aid both their business and personal travel. We knew that in order to best serve the changing market, we had to become a travel technology company.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Our investment in technology has had several positive impacts since that day, including the ability to scale up services, offer real-time data, enhance self-service options, improve communications and save our clients money. And, it also allowed us to become more nimble to address quickly changing requirements.<\/span><\/p>\n This played out early last year with the COVID-19 pandemic hit and our clients were hit with new challenges: mass ticket changes\/cancellations and the shifting rules around waivers, travel restrictions, processing and approving travel, communicating with travelers with immediacy, and finding resources that would provide information for all of these areas while they were updating frequently. Here\u2019s a look at what we have rolled out in the past 10 months:<\/span><\/p>\n Acendas Covid Dashboard:<\/b> With our world turned upside down, there was an immediate need for information. Our team immediately created a \u201cdashboard\u201d that clients and prospects could reference. We included airline and airport information, travel restrictions and bans, health and safety protocols, passport details, hotel and car sanitization programs and more. Business and leisure travelers could do their own research and get answers without waiting for a reply or sitting on hold on the phone.<\/span><\/p>\n BCD Travel Trip Authorizer<\/b>: When the pandemic hit, travel was the first thing to come to a halt. Our clients looked to us to help with approval processes that could be flexible and easy to implement.\u00a0 BCD Travel Trip Authorizer is compatible with every online booking tool, and can be implemented with each client\u2019s specific business rules for the appropriate approval steps. It works across global markets, and doesn\u2019t require any log-in for travelers.\u00a0 In fact, it goes right to the traveler\u2019s email to let them know approval status and any next steps that might be required.<\/span><\/p>\n Acendas Inspector Travel Alerts:<\/b> For those who book travel, we arm them with the latest information so that they can travel with confidence. We send an alert email on the same day the trip is booked, making sure that travelers know about their destination\u2019s restrictions, their hotel guidelines, and anything else that is relevant to their trip. If anything has become clear during the pandemic, it\u2019s how quickly information can change.\u00a0 For that reason, we send another alert 72 hours before their departure to make sure that our travelers have the very latest information.\u00a0 Our enroute service is then handed over to Acendas Mission Control, where we monitor our travelers\u2019 flights to proactively alert of any flight delays or cancellations.<\/span><\/p>\n