BCD Travel Customer Service Manager, Chris Manias

With 37 years’ experience in the corporate travel industry, BCD Travel’s Customer Service Manager, Chris Manias, is somewhat of an expert.

Based in the business travel company’s Sydney office, Chris manages hundreds of corporate travel bookings for several large companies while also supervising her multi-skilled team and coordinating internal staff procedures in BCD Travel’s three offices in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Her love of geography and languages gave Chris the travel bug early in life. She loves flying and has visited some wonderful global locations over the years. Among her favourites are Israel, Macchu Picchu, New York, Niagara Falls and the Rocky Mountains.

Apart from a brief stint as a Personal Assistant, Chris’ entire career has been in travel. She spent 22 years with the Bank of New South Wales/Westpac Travel (which later merged with American Express), two years with Ansett Airlines prior to its collapse in 2001 and has now spent five years with BCD Travel, the world’s third largest corporate travel agency.

Chris loves working in a fast-paced environment and enjoys negotiating change and navigating the daily challenges of corporate travel management. When she began her career, there were no computers and flights needed several re-fuelling stops to reach their destinations. She jokingly refers to a long-term ambition of “selling a ticket to outer space”.

Chris is well-respected by her team for her advanced business skills, travel industry knowledge, patience and dedication to mentoring staff and increasing efficiency. She thrives on the diverse challenges associated with corporate travel management and considers the people she works with at BCD Travel as the most enjoyable part of her job.

Chris’ professionalism and talent has been recognised several times during her career with formal accolades such as the American Express Pacesetter Award for top achievers.

In early 2008, she was given the responsibility of organising a trip to Australia for BCD Travel founder, John Fentener van Vlissengen, and his wife. Chris escorted the couple on their first tour of Australia and coordinated all of their travel and accommodation.

In her spare time, Chris jumps on a plane as often as possible, but when she is home she enjoys various small hobbies such as cross-stitching, embroidery and fishing.

Keeping Safe with Corporate Travel

The recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, are a sobering reminder of the importance of personal security measures when undertaking business travel abroad, according to leading travel management company (TMC), BCD Travel.

BCD Travel, the world’s third largest business travel company in 1500 locations across 90 countries, recommends that all corporate travellers and leisure travellers register their personal details and itineraries with the Federal Government’s online registration service at smarttraveller.gov.au. The government recently relied on this registration service to track down the scores of Australians staying in Mumbai during the terrorist attacks.

BCD Travel has a ‘traveller tracking’ facility within its corporate travel management program that allows it to immediately identify corporate travel clients in locations where security threats have occurred. In these circumstances, BCD Travel will also contact clients that have booked impending trips to such places to offer information, advice and assistance.

BCD Travel highly recommends travel insurance to its corporate travel clients and suggests that all travellers check the latest travel advisories issued by the Federal Government at smarttraveller.gov.au.

Corporate Travel Tightening In 2008

The last three quarters have presented significant challenges in the business world and corporate travel is among the many facets of business that companies are reviewing to cut costs.

The best way to reduce corporate travel costs is to engage a professional business travel company such as BCD Travel, which is the world’s third largest corporate travel management company, to assist with your business’s corporate travel strategy.

During the second, third and fourth quarters of 2008, BCD Travel worked with many of its business travel clients to assist them in tightening their internal corporate travel policies.

Among the measures taken have been enforcing a same day travel rule when possible, disallowing first or business class seating for short trips and taking the best fare of the day, which often means travelling at relatively inconvenient times.

Over the past year, many of BCD Travel’s Australian corporate travel clients have also chosen domestic locations over international destinations for meetings incentives conferences exhibitions (MICE).

BCD Travel has a dedicated meetings and incentives division offering complete coordination of travel and accommodation as well as event management for conferences, meetings and sales rallies.

Coastal locations along the Eastern Seaboard have been very popular with corporate travel clients in 2008, along with inland locations such as the Hunter Valley in NSW.

BCD Travel Customer Service Manager Chris Manias

With 37 years’ experience in the corporate travel industry, BCD Travel’s Customer Service Manager, Chris Manias, is somewhat of an expert.

Based in the business travel company’s Sydney office, Chris manages hundreds of corporate travel bookings for several large companies while also supervising her multi-skilled team and coordinating internal staff procedures in BCD Travel’s three offices in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Her love of geography and languages gave Chris the travel bug early in life. She loves flying and has visited some wonderful global locations over the years. Among her favourites are Israel, Macchu Picchu, New York, Niagara Falls and the Rocky Mountains.

Apart from a brief stint as a Personal Assistant, Chris’ entire career has been in travel. She spent 22 years with the Bank of New South Wales/Westpac Travel (which later merged with American Express), two years with Ansett Airlines prior to its collapse in 2001 and has now spent five years with BCD Travel, the world’s third largest corporate travel agency.

Chris loves working in a fast-paced environment and enjoys negotiating change and navigating the daily challenges of corporate travel management. When she began her career, there were no computers and flights needed several re-fuelling stops to reach their destinations. She jokingly refers to a long-term ambition of “selling a ticket to outer space”.

Chris is well-respected by her team for her advanced business skills, travel industry knowledge, patience and dedication to mentoring staff and increasing efficiency. She thrives on the diverse challenges associated with corporate travel management and considers the people she works with at BCD Travel as the most enjoyable part of her job.

Chris’ professionalism and talent has been recognised several times during her career with formal accolades such as the American Express Pacesetter Award for top achievers.

In early 2008, she was given the responsibility of organising a trip to Australia for BCD Travel founder, John Fentener van Vlissengen, and his wife. Chris escorted the couple on their first tour of Australia and coordinated all of their travel and accommodation.

In her spare time, Chris jumps on a plane as often as possible, but when she is home she enjoys various small hobbies such as cross-stitching, embroidery and fishing.

Santa's Coporate Travel Management Program

I would personally like to thank David Sumich for managing not only our day to day travel arrangements but the extensive logistical elements during the festive season. Mrs Clause and I value our partnership with BCD Travel and BCD Travel continues to exceed our expectations.

You have proven to us that your company is extremely client focused, in touch with industry trends and in touch with our specific needs.

Since appointing BCD Travel, we have seen a considerable reduction in costs through the introduction of a cost saving initiatives driven by our dedicated Account Manager.

We would also like to take this opportunity to thank our dedicated consultants who tirelessly take care of our travel requirements. They are always friendly, courteous and professional to deal with. As a thank you for their hard work, I will ensure they receive pleasant gifts this coming Christmas.

FYI - I would not hesitate in recommending BCD Travel to any other company who may be looking to appoint a Travel Management Company.

Thank you once again for your hard work and dedication. Mrs Clause and I look forward to continuing our partnership with BCD Travel into the future.

Testimonial from Santa’s Corporate Travel Management Program

BCD Reports: Companies travel further afield for conferences and incentives

More Australian businesses are travelling further afield for their conferences and incentives due to the more favourable currency conditions over the past 12 months, according to Corporate Travel Management Company, BCD Australia.

BCD Australia’s Sydney office reports a significant increase in overseas bookings for major company events over the past financial year...

New Zealand and the broader Asia Pacific region has long been the most popular region for overseas conferences and incentives held by Australian companies, but this year more Australian companies have been choosing destinations in Europe, the US, China and India.

Among the locations selected by BCD Sydney’s corporate travel management clients in FY07-08 are Monaco, Istanbul, Hawaii, Cancun, Mauritius and various cities throughout China and India.

As the world’s two most important emerging economies, China and India have extra appeal, with many Australian companies recently establishing new business ties there. Both countries are undergoing significant leisure and corporate travel booms as more foreigners, including Australians, choose to visit on personal holidays or business excursions. New hotels and resorts are popping up all over both countries, with Hilton Hotels Corp recently announcing that 75 new hotels will be built in India over the next five years, along with 18 in China.

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In flight email and SMS for Qantas

Domestic travellers flying Qantas will soon be able to send SMS messages and emails while in the air, but voice calls are off limits for now.

Qantas has committed to implementing the technology following a trial on one of its domestic 767 planes, which ran from April last year to January this year.

Vanessa Hudson, general manager of Qantas products and services, said the first of its 767 and A330 domestic fleets would be equipped with mobile phone connectivity in November or December this year.

“Our goal is to introduce it progressively and we’re currently working through those details at the moment but our goal would be by the end of 2009 to have 50 per cent of our wide-bodied fleets with the technology enabled,” Hudson said.

Although the technology also supports in-flight voice calls, Qantas has decided to disable it, saying feedback from customers during the trial showed that people only wanted SMS and email connectivity.

Hudson said Qantas was “evaluating” whether to offer the SMS and email feature on international flights.

“Particularly with the domestic market and the distances that the domestic travelling market fly, the in-flight experience is a really significant part of their working day,” she said.

“A lot of people fly up and back to Melbourne within a day and they want to be connected during the flight.”

Hudson said Qantas would not be charging people to use their mobile in the air but any communication done while flying was considered international by mobile carriers, so prices for each message would vary.

A global roaming account and a GSM phone is required to send SMS messages, while emailing requires a GRPS-enabled device such as a BlackBerry or a laptop with built-in wireless broadband.

Qantas is one of the first carriers in the world to commit to rolling out in-flight mobile phone services outside of small trials.

However, Emirates this week went one step further than Qantas by allowing customers to make voice calls.

Emirates has already installed the technology in one of its Airbus A340 planes and the first in-flight call was made during a flight between Dubai and Casablanca.

BBC News reported that Emirates planned to expand the system to more aircraft later this year.

The technology, built by the same company that supplied Qantas, AeroMobile, can be configured to switch off voice calls at certain times such as on night flights or when the plane is not at cruising altitude.

BCD Business Travel

Technology Trends: Security and Risk Management

Airline disruptions, rail strikes, airport closures. Bird flu and the London Tube bombings.

Ongoing significant travel events have triggered the ever increasing need for rigorous destination and security intelligence. From pandemics and fires to impending natural disasters and union strikes, automation and centralized information build business resilience while reducing risks to travel plans.

Today, companies recognize the need to prepare and protect employees, evaluate risks and respond to events around the world.

Mitigating risk is an essential responsibility of companies charged with providing a duty of care. And that responsibility is increasingly cutting across organizational boundaries, says Leslie West, senior vice president of Client Data Solutions (CDS) for BCD Travel:

“Customers are increasingly asking groups like travel management, human resources and health and security departments within their companies to work together to protect their employees. In this cross-functional environment, it is vital to have a solution that couples the categorization of travel disruptions, risk exposure and crisis situations with relevant information and business processes to safeguard travelers, before and during their trip. As a result, we have seen a 55 percent increase in customers adopting DecisionSourceTM: Security Manager in 2007 over its previous year – evidence of the trend, need, and value BCD Travel offers customers.”

Companies should be able to answer tough questions such as:

• What is the political, cultural and economic climate in countries around the world?
• Where are my travelers right now?
• Has an event occurred that puts my travelers at risk?
• How can I reach travelers in time of need?

Pull and push information to travelers

Accurate and timely information is the cornerstone of effective risk mitigation. Having the right information at the right time – and on the appropriate device – benefits travelers and the travel program prior to booking, at booking, and while en-route.

Relevant information takes a wide variety of forms, ranging from security and risk briefings on countries and major cities worldwide to weather alerts, cultural etiquette and consular requirements.

An abundance of data requires a blend of automation and process to prevent information overload, says West. As part of its DecisionSource: Security Manager risk mitigation solution, BCD Travel provides travelers and travel managers with destination information and security intelligence from over 400 different sources, based on specific filters set at the company and employee level. Subscribers may filter delivery of security and travel news alerts by destination, urgency level and category; such as health, weather and transportation type.

The categories currently in use by DecisionSource: Security Manager customers include:

• Any major airline or airport disruption
• Travel warnings from official Government sources
• Any weather condition that has a significant effect on major transportation systems
• Any event that causes widespread cancellations, delays of more than two hours or a total shutdown of a major airline, airport or railway
• Flights canceled for other reasons
• Any violent attack that causes damage or injuries at a major hotel
• Direct impact on travel from an outbreak of disease

Although destination and risk information is available through DecisionSource: Security Manager, realistically, travelers with access to valuable information may not always seek it out. For that reason, clients can enable the solution to proactively send relevant e-mails, based on event severity categories they’ve set as well as PNRs booked, to potentially impacted travelers.

Monitor, protect and respond with traveler tracking

Today, says West, over 185 BCD Travel customers are using DecisionSource: Security Manager to collect data from over 50 countries to track and monitor travelers and provide risk intelligence for their travel programs.

Coupled with specific traveler reservations, detailed situational views are updated every 60 minutes, giving companies the ability to locate travelers across the globe, while incorporating en route changes, same plane travel and flight tracking, and hotel bookings

With this overview, West says, action is a click away: “It’s crucial to have both a pictorial global view and traveler-level detail. In the event the company has the need to deploy an incident response team, they can easily share the details by printing, exporting, or e-mailing the details to the appropriate individuals within the company.

Understand and act with relevant, viable data

Different companies and travel programs have different needs when it comes to pulling data from risk mitigation technology. At BCD Travel, DecisionSource: Security Manager incorporates a full library of reports. Among the most commonly used:

• Hot Spot: Quick snapshot around the globe of U.S. Department of State or Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s cities and locations of risk, combined with travelers in those locations
• Flight Arrival / Departure Grid: Quickly identify numbers of travelers arriving or departing certain cities by date or date range
• Flight Arrival / Departure Detail: Getting more specific to identify the travelers and airports
• Flight, Hotel or City Incident Reports: Across flights, hotels, or a city itself, companies can quickly find travelers
• Same Plane Travelers: Due to possible insurance or overall risk mitigation policies, companies can report on employees traveling on the same plane. Reporting on dimensions like number of travelers, business unit, flight number or carrier, companies can provide the appropriate level of care for their employees

In addition to analyzing travel plans prior to travel for risk management, there are many opportunities to further support travel programs and reveal both cost and safety when looking at pre-travel reservation data. Tracking policy compliance issues, shifting market share to preferred vendors, identifying meeting opportunities or even preventing unnecessary trips – all aid in aligning spend before it occurs.

BCD Corporate Travel

Travel advisories part of corporate travel management

Travel management company, BCD Travel, keeps its corporate travel clients abreast of major security alerts and advisories as they are issued by the Federal Government, providing advice and assistance to business travel clients intending to visit countries for business or leisure where alerts have been issued.

Alerts can be issued for a number of reasons, including security and health. The most recent advisories related to security involve the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Spain, Thailand and Somalia. Health advisories have been issued for countries such as Vanuatu, where a series of dengue fever outbreaks have been recently recorded.

Part of corporate travel management is keeping corporate travel clients updated on major new alerts. The five levels of travel advisories are: ‘be alert to your own security’; ‘exercise caution and monitor developments that might affect your safety’; ‘exercise a high degree of caution’; ‘reconsider your need to travel’ and ‘advised not to travel’.

Compliance a major issue in corporate travel management

Travel management company, BCD Travel, has released its 2008 Travel Program Survey, revealing a 23 per cent increase in companies whose corporate travel policy enforcement is either “strict” or “moderate to strict”, compared to 2007.

The corporate travel management report showed that 59 per cent of respondents were proactively seeking to increase corporate travel compliance in their organizations compared to 36 per cent in 2007.

During tough economic times, corporate travel clients are appreciating even more the quality and value of advice provided by travel management companies such as BCD Travel.

Among the measures being taken is increased usage of online booking tools to reduce corporate travel processing costs and setting tighter parameters regarding preferred suppliers. Companies can customize their individual policies using BCD Travel’s online booking system. With the click of a button, BCD Travel’s business travel management clients can change their company rules any time they like.

BCD Corporate Travel Event Management

Whether you want to control annual meeting spend – leverage your meetings volume to gain efficiencies – increase sales or market share through incentives – recognize your employees – or improve your employee and customer communications, BCD Corporate Travel Event Management can help. The event management team in BCD corporate travel Australia combines the experience and expertise of our staff to achieve an unparalleled depth of service and talent across the meetings and incentives industry. This in turn makes us well positioned to meet the demands of a growing global business environment.

The event management team in BCD corporate travel has a wealth of experience in understanding and meeting the needs of a variety of corporate clients. Our people are key in our success. In all their dealings they are uncompromising in their focus on our clients – we seek to establish a mutual commercial relationship that meets your travel, conference, meetings and incentive needs. We back up the strengths of our people with technology that allows us to work faster and smarter.

Stay tuned for more Business Travel updates from BCD Express.

BCD Corporate Travel Recommends Hanoi

Vietnam’s thousand-year-old capital is one of the most beguiling cities in Southeast Asia – a stylish, European-influenced metropolis with manicured lakeside promenades, tree-lined boulevards, ancient pagodas and French-colonial buildings painted in a peeling palette of jade, turquoise and burgundy.

Following years of rampant inflation, poverty and repression, the government introduced economic reform (doi moi) in 1986, allowing people to own their own businesses. Nearly sixty percent of the population in Vietnam was born after the war ended in 1975, and Hanoi feels like a city of teenagers.

More information at BCD Corporate Travel.

Confidence with corporate travel

Corporate travel management agency, BCD Travel, is acutely aware of how the global financial crisis is impacting its corporate travel clients and is ideally placed to provide guidance and support with corporate travel programs, internal policies and compliance measures to assist clients in reducing costs.

With 30 years’ experience locally, this travel management company has seen rough economic times before and has greatly assisted their corporate travel clients in the past with these circumstances. 

Read more at BCD Corporate Travel.

About BCD Corporate Travel

BCD Corporate Travel is your all inclusive corporate travel agency offering competitive ongoing corporate travel management solutions to companies across Australia. We do more than simply organise your corporate travel, we also coordinate conferences and incentives and assist staff with personal holiday planning to any destination worldwide.

Part of the BCD Global Network, BCD Corporate Travel Australia has access to a huge network of domestic and international suppliers, enabling us to source the best fares and rates available and negotiate exclusive deals for our corporate travel clients. Our state-of-the-art online travel booking tools make it all so easy.       

A unique balance of local focus with global opportunity is how we meet this challenge.

Our unified BCD Travel global network, leveraged by one of the most experienced travel teams in Australia, provides each client with an accurate view of where and how their resources are being spent. With integrated global technology and financial management systems, we are able to meet each client’s particular needs with expert understanding.

Reducing costs of corporate travel

Corporate travel clients across Australia are increasing concerned with reducing corporate travel costs in light of the global financial crisis and anticipated slow down in the Australian economy, according to corporate travel management company, BCD Travel.

In its 2008 Travel Program Survey, 97 per cent of respondents cited reducing corporate travel costs as a major priority for the coming 12 months.

In line with this, BCD Corporate Travel, which has offices in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne, has noted a significant decline in bookings for overseas corporate travel over the past few months, as local companies become more frugal and the Australian dollar continues its decline against the greenback.

Corporate travel management clients are also tightening their policies on the frequency and type of corporate travel allowed in their organizations, with options such as business class now strictly reserved for longer haul corporate travel flights.

BCD Travel offers significant flexibility and customization with its online corporate travel management programs, allowing clients to change their corporate travel rules with the click of a button. Comprehensive reporting functions also enable managers to quickly identify their organisation’s corporate travel habits and take measures to change them through compliance and communication.

Building The Perfect M.I.C.E Trap

Improved expertise and technology are enabling organizations to capture and deal with their meetings expenditure more effectively than ever before.

An estimated $325 billion is spent annually on corporate meetings, incentives, conventions and events (MICE), of which the US and Europe account for roughly $120 billion each.

MICE usually represents 25-40 percent of a company’s total travel spend and yet, says BCD Meetings & Incentives president Scott Graf, nearly 70 percent of global companies cannot or do not accurately identify their meetings spend, mainly because they fail to track as many as four out of five events that they organize.

Both the size of the meetings market and the difficulty of measuring and managing it explain why Graf describes MICE as the last frontier of travel management. Graf believes that is changing fast, if only because of a growing appreciation of how important an area of spend this is. According to Graf, meetings are more important then ever based on the rapid evolution of telecommuting and more of a global world. It is critically important for leaders and managers to get together to personally interact with employees, customers and supply partners.

Fortunately, buyers are understanding not only how much of a problem MICE spend is but also that there are solutions available to them. One part of the solution is to apply the same strategic management processes that they have already used successfully for managing transient travel spend. This includes using professionals such as BCD Meetings & Incentives which have grown a significant base of expertise in MICE to match their knowledge in corporate travel. Clients are telling us: "I’ve seen you control our transient travel; please repeat the same for our meetings spend", says Graf. BCD Travel’s meetings subsidiary, BCD Meetings & Incentives, now has 350 employees and operates in nearly 30 countries.

The other resource available to MICE managers is technology. Tools have appeared on the market that help buyers and meeting planners to organize every step of an event and monitor overall expenditure. One such provider is StarCite, BCD Meetings & Incentives strategic technology partner.

When organizing a meeting, an online tool can help with the following tasks:

Plan plot scope of meeting and gain approval

Budget build budget and manage expenditure

Buy build, conduct and review RFPs

Attend create registration site to market the event and manage bookings for the event itself as well as travel, accommodation and entertainment

Measure includes expenditure reports, benchmarks and return on investment calculator

Using technology of this kind can help push companies towards significant savings, says Graf. In the case of businesses which have never previously attempted to manage their MICE spend, this could easily amount to a cost reduction in the order of 18 percent. It often proves to be the case that unmanaged companies have not previously even negotiated attractive group rates and consistent terms and conditions with hotels. Graf describes tackling accommodation as well as food and beverage as easy pickings but also substantial ones because they often represent more than three-quarters of the cost of an event, if air fares are not included.

With savings as substantial as these possible, many more companies can be expected to join the trend for capturing the MICE in their organizations.

Find out more about this story as well as other corporate travel management solutions at our website.