Egencia is adding a "self-service experience" to its guest travel booking capabilities that it says will make it easier for guests to select travel options and for companies to track and enforce compliance with those trips.
The features enable guest travelers to get their own profiles when they register via an invitation link. The travelers then can self-book their travel on the Egencia platform and mobile app, through which they also can receive service, alerts and updates, while companies can monitor the trips via Egencia Traveler Tracker, according to Egencia. Companies can grant different levels of access with the profiles, and they also can set a predetermined "shelf life" so travel managers do not have to manually remove the accounts later.
"Booking business travel for non-employees of a company is on the rise, whether it is inviting job candidates for face-to-face interviews, onboarding remote employees or bringing in contractors," Egencia VP of product and technology John Sturino said in a statement, adding that Egencia supported more than 800,000 guest trips in 2022.
Egencia has been piloting the new features with 20 clients in North America and Europe, whose input helped to influence them according to Egencia. Stacy Heck, global travel manager for food product manufacturer The Giorgi Companies said the features "are invaluable for speeding up the process of making travel arrangements" for such travelers outside the company as temporary project teams and job interview candidates. "Now multiple bookings can be made at once, and guests can input their own personal information themselves," she said in a statement.
Egencia said the new features will be available to all clients by early April. American Express Global Business Travel, which acquired Egencia in 2021, also plans to add guest profile capabilities to its Neo tool later this year.