Global travel management company (TMC) BCD Travel has announced its second third-party technology deal in a week.
BCD picks US tech firm to power hotel booking platform
Global travel management company (TMC) BCD Travel has announced its second third-party technology deal in a week.
Following news of its tie-up with Texas-based TripBAM, the Dutch-based business travel firm revealed American outfit GetGoing would provide technology to power its RoomSource hotel-booking platform.
BCD developed RoomSource to give corporate customers access to hotels and rates not available in the traditional global distribution systems (GDSs) and to help travel buyers tighten control of the amount their companies spend on accommodation.
Vice-president of corporate intelligence and product planning, Torsten Kriedt, said GetGoing was chosen because users found it to be similar to travel websites for ordinary consumers.
The decision is in line with the recent industry trend towards providing business travellers with the same products, services and experiences they expect from their personal use of travel sites and social media.
Alek Vernitsky, chief executive and co-founder of GetGoing, said the common objective was to make trips easier to plan and book.
When rolled out later this year, RoomSource will give agents and customers access to more than 400,000 hotel properties worldwide.
Rooms will be available in the GDSs, online booking tools, through hotel booking agencies (HBAs) and via mobile channels.
Travel buyers’ negotiated and agency preferred rates will be automatically loaded alongside published rates, which are available to any shopper or booker.
Kriedt said: “Many companies today are making an unhappy trade-off using multiple booking channels to secure rooms for business travellers.
“Companies might book air, rail, and car with their TMC, but see hotels booked out-of-programme through consumer and other web-based hotel booking channels.”
He said GetGoing would help corporates mitigate out-of-policy bookings, which would strengthen negotiations with accommodation providers, and bolster their ability to track travellers and fulfill duty of care obligations.
