Business travel costs – how to control them and save on business trips?

Alina, a travel manager, believed a year ago that she had control over the delegation budget and had an influence on the total cost of the trip. She believed that careful manual planning and bookings would be enough for the company to save money and successfully carry out domestic and foreign delegations. However, reality quickly verified her optimism - more and more employees were traveling, changing bus, train, and plane travel costs, rising fuel prices, and various unforeseen expenses meant that the whole process began to be associated with stress and chaos. Regardless of the length of the employee's business trip, the travel budget was almost always exceeded. So Alina decided to look for a modern tool that would make her work easier and help optimize the expenses for employees' business trips, regardless of the minimum duration of the delegation and the purpose of the trip. Did she succeed? Read about it in the article below!

Why is controlling business travel expenses so important?

International and domestic business trips – especially with a large number of employees travelling regularly – are a significant expense for any organisation. The total cost of a business trip, in addition to accommodation, also includes air and train bookings, car rental, travel insurance, and other additional expenses. Although all these elements were included in the business travel policy, Alina noticed that their non-compliance led to unnecessary costs. And manual settlement of business trips caused mistakes, delays, and difficulties in budget control. This resulted in:

• unplanned budget overruns,
• difficulties in financial settlements,
• inefficient use of resources,
• unnecessary losses for the company.

Business travel costs – what elements are worth controlling?

Effective management of business travel costs is not only a matter of savings, but also of optimizing the entire delegation process. Elements of the trip that are worth paying attention to avoid unnecessary costs and streamline the organisation of business trips are:

• business flight tickets - Alina discovered that companies that use the worktrips.com platform can save up to 30%. The booking period, flight class, and date changes have a huge impact on the cost of a business trip,
• business hotels - booking accommodation facilities according to your budget allows you to avoid higher travel costs. It is therefore worth taking care to determine the maximum amounts for hotels - a night in a hotel abroad costs much more than, for example, in Gdansk or another city in Poland. In this matter, the option of precise budget limits on the wokrtips.com platform comes in handy, which allows you to adjust the budget to the country or city. You can also use the option of combining different rooms within one offer, which allows for flexible cost management and adjustment to individual needs,
• company car rental - Alina noticed that some companies pay more for taxis or employee private car rides than for renting a car for a few days. Transport optimization is an important element that affects the total cost of domestic and international travel,
• public transport - an often underestimated option, and in many cases cheaper and emitting a smaller carbon footprint. The cost of travelling by train or bus can be lower than a business trip in an employee's car, especially if we take into account fuel costs and fuel consumption per 100 km. Choosing public transport can help to achieve ESG goals and influence a positive image of the company,
• travel expense reimbursement - the employee should know what additional expenses the company will pay for and how to properly document them. The worktrips.com platform allows you to shorten the time needed to settle a business trip. Thanks to the system, reimbursement of incurred costs and formalities related to documents is a thing of the past. There is no need to engage the employee's private funds. Everything happens on the worktrips.com platform, where the traveler has access to the document adding module and can attach invoices, receipts, and other confirmations of expenses independently.

How to optimize business travel costs?

After months of fighting chaos, Alina has found some effective methods. What are they? More on that below:

• use of the worktrips.com platform - automation of bookings, access to better offers on airline tickets, hotels, and car rentals,
• management of business travel policy - clarification of rules regarding budget, food, accommodation, and transport expenses, which minimized additional travel costs,
• automatic settlement of business trips - the worktrips.com platform allows for quick allocation of costs and generation of reports, and one collective invoice for the trip,
• no more travel expense reimbursement - the worktrips.com system allows you to avoid using the employee's private funds - everything is done in the system,
• negotiating rates with suppliers - long-term cooperation with hotels may result in more attractive prices,
• tracking financial reports - domestic and foreign business trips can be regularly analyzed, which allows you to detect inefficiencies and optimize the budget.

worktrips.com platform - Your friend in organizing business trips

As part of a business trip, the best tool to streamline the planning and management process is the worktrips.com platform. It allows you to compare prices and emissions of different transport options and make automatic reservations in line with the company's travel policy. The system works as a kind of travel cost calculator. It makes it easier to track expenses spent on business trips, automates processes, and significantly reduces errors in settlements. Alina has learned that she no longer has to ask traveling employees for documents for reimbursement or worry that the employee will be responsible for covering the expenses. Thanks to the worktrips.com platform, the entire process is cashless.

Domestic and international business travel – save money and time

Travel expenses abroad can be a significant burden for a company, but proper organization and modern tools allow them to be reduced. Alina could finally breathe a sigh of relief – instead of struggling with endless tables and invoices, she had a system that did it for her, regardless of the distance traveled, the minimum duration of the delegation, and the purpose of the employee's trip. Documents for reimbursement of expenses and calculation of fuel consumption became a thing of the past. From now on, Alina has everything in one place and much more time for other tasks. Do you want to act like Alina? Schedule a presentation of the worktrips.com platform and see how modern solutions can optimize the total cost of travel and simplify the management of business trips in your company!