Nowadays business traveling has reached new dimensions with the use of video conferences and webinars and costs have been substantially reduced due to less traveling.
Although some companies are actually eliminating business travel from their budget, meeting clients and conference attendance is still an important part of business development.
You can prepare your travel schedules wisely and considerably reduce costs without having to eliminate business travel altogether, by following a few basic rules.
The first initiative to take is to create a team for travelling purposes. Put all the business travelers of your entire company into one specific team.
Every business goal that requires traveling will take into account the needs of the company as a whole, and not individual areas.
Meet up with the travel team and go through all the existing policies adopted by your company to try and improve or eliminate those that cause useless expenses. There are certainly many areas you can cut down on to create more cost-effective travelling.
When programming flights and hotel reservations, keep to favorite hotels, airlines and car rental companies, for these will offer good reductions to committed clients and even offer good travel plans or large discounts during low traffic periods.
If you plan your flights using connecting plans you can save quite a bit of money as opposed to using direct flight.
Although this may seem a nuisance, it can work for your benefit if you schedule appointments using the cities you connect with, it is just a matter of planning beforehand.
If you book your trip months before and schedule all travelling in the middle of the week you can save a lot of money.
You can also choose alternative airports and avoid those with frequent passengers, for these offer good discounts to promote the new routes.
Look for good deals on the Internet, where many good airfares, hotel deals and other services related to business travel are available even at the last minute.
Think of checking in your luggage beforehand and paying for any extras you have online, for this can save you a lot of money, although it is best to avoid checking in baggage at all.
If you really have to drive to the airport, there are specific long-term parking areas you can use or even parking sites that are outside the airport area. Use the shuttle service to get to the terminal and save on parking expense.
During your business trip you can save on hotel and food expense if you choose a certain area of town as opposed to another.
Some hotels are equipped with kitchenettes so you can prepare your own meals and shop at the local grocery store instead of going to the restaurant, when you do not have a business dinner.
By using this option you will really cut down on costs, for restaurant dinners can be five times more expensive than self-prepared meals.
Avoid room service and take advantage of free breakfast that most hotels offer. Buy your own drinks and snack at the grocery store and store them in your rooms mini bar.
With a few small changes in your traveling routine you can cut down considerably on business travel expenses.
