Can a Travel Management Company really find you cheaper accommodation?

One of the most popular questions we receive on a regular basis from prospective business travel clients, is “How can a travel management company (TMC) save my business money on my accommodation?”

And surprisingly, sometimes even those who already use a TMC for particular aspects of their business travel will still assume it’s cheaper to book their own accommodation. So, what’s the reality? Does it work out cheaper to DIY or should you leave it up to your TMC? Let’s find out!

Recently, the purchasing department of one our clients threw a challenge our way to tangibly demonstrate our value in the booking of their business hotels, after claims from a traveller that they could find cheaper hotel rates by securing reservations directly with the hotel or via third-party consumer websites.

There’s nothing we love better at Gray Dawes than a challenge, so we began undertaking a thorough benchmarking exercise during the month of May, to review multiple room rate options. We compared our negotiated rates, our aggregator rates, property direct rates, and well-known consumer hotel aggregator rates to see which offered the very best rates.

The client’s needs:

Throughout the month of May 2018 the client in questions spent £279,606 on mid-week UK and European hotel stays – amounting to a total of 1237 room nights. These encompassed a range of different hotel properties, from 3-5*.

In addition to the substantial financial saving made by our client they also benefit from the following:

• Saving a huge amount of time by not having to trawl the internet on the hunt for best rates- through Gray Dawes they get access to the very best rates with one simple search of our online system or one call to their travel team
• The ability to enforce travel policy, billing and reconciliation completed to meet their corporate needs – no expense claims or declarations that the Four Seasons was the only property to have rooms available when they came to book
• Duty of Care protocols – meaning they can locate their travellers at any time, during a crisis or emergency

Want to find out more about our hotel booking? Find out exactly what we offer here. If you’d like to speak to a member of our team about your Travel Management, please get in touch.