A CASE STUDY

The Problem

The British client, a major manufacturer, had transformed itself through acquisition from being a sole UK based organisation with little travel, to one with international operations, substantially increasing the need for travel.

With Management’s eyes focussed on expansion, travel expenditure cost control was not a priority until the Consultant brought the matter to the attention of the Chief Executive personally.

With the plc being split autonomously into separate companies with no central ‘ownership’ of travel, each adopted its own policy using a range of suppliers. There was little effective tracking of spending being undertaken and few cost-reducing agreements in place.

How Consultancy helped to solve the problem

For cultural reasons the task of bringing in the necessary disciplines for effective cost control was done in two phases, firstly the UK followed by the rest of Europe.

In the UK a full health-check audit was done to identify the different policies in place, the various booking processes, suppliers used, agreements in place, the amount being spent on travel, form of payment, what technology was available.

Once completed the Consultant was then asked to help implement the recommendations he made, resulting in:

• Central ownership of travel at Senior Management level
• A new mandated Policy being issued
• One Travel Agent being appointed to handle all business travel requirements
• More effective use of the considerable purchasing power that existed
• The introduction of travel on the internal Intranet
• An agreement with a card company to put in place a form of payment for all travel costs
• Identifying the person and training them up to become Group Travel Manager
• The formation of a Management travel forum

Once the above was in place a similar audit was done on mainland Europe leading to:

The Group Travel Policy being adopted

The appointment of a single Travel Agent

Supplier agreements being negotiated