Every employer knows the frustration of having employees book travel outside of the corporate policy — it’s hard to track, adds costs, and makes it impossible for the employer to provide the proper duty of care.

According to research from American Express Global Business Travel, the top reasons why employees book travel outside of their company’s travel policy has to do with the location of their accommodation – to stay in the same hotel as the client, to be closer to the meeting/event location, or to stay in a safer location.

Therefore, to encourage more employees to stay within policy, employers need to ensure their corporate travel provider has good accommodation options. Amadeus and Agoda, one of the world’s fastest growing online travel agents (OTAs), are partnering to solve this problem, giving travel agents access to pre-paid hotel content from 150,000 properties globally.

Travel agents all over the world will now be able to view Agoda’s content – available at the same price as Agoda’s website – and compare it to other content through a single screen, and book the content in one PNR with other content.

“Our first partnership with a B2C company in Asia”

Christian Lukey, head of hotels, mobility & insurance, Asia Pacific, Amadeus said: “This is our first partnership with a B2C company in Asia, and an important one because it will enable travel agents to offer a competitive and seamless service while reducing costs and increasing efficiency. We are privileged to be the first company to globally distribute Agoda’s diverse selection of hotels to agents and travellers.”

Pre-paid content

Having access to this hotel content through Amadeus will be especially important for business travel agents, as they will now be able to book Agoda inventory for travelling employees that complies with all the employer’s Duty of Care requirements, and add it to a single PNR with the employee’s other travel arrangements. In addition, Agoda’s content is pre-paid, making it a great option for employees that don’t have a company credit card.

“More benefits to travel agents and their customers”

Ernst Hemmer, senior director for Agoda, said: “This partnership with Amadeus gives Agoda access to the global travel agent market and specifically the business travel sector, which is forecast to grow 5.8% annually to reach USD 1.6 trillion in 2020.

“Agoda customers enjoy access to a huge variety of hotels, apartments or villas for their holidays and leisure use, and through this partnership will now also be able to access these properties for business travel too. We look forward to working closely with Amadeus in the future and building on this partnership to offer more benefits to travel agents and their customers.”