Companies to be more optimistic about Business Travel, survey says
Industry leaders give higher importance to safety and health than ever before.
During the past few weeks, we conducted a large-scale survey, in order to measure the Coronavirus effect on Business Travel industry. The survey included companies from all over the world and was answered by industry-leading professionals. We are excited to share the results with you. The full report is available here.
Among the main findings:
Most of the respondents, 53% to be exact, assume their company will return to business travel between July and September (Q3) of 2020.
However, almost half of the respondents (48%) assume it will take more time to get back to the same volume of travel as it was before the Coronavirus, expecting it to be back to normal only in Q1 2021.
Nearly half of the respondents believe that virtual meetings and video calls will replace business travel in 30-70% of business trips following the Coronavirus pandemic, and 74% believe that only essential trips will be allowed in the near future.
Furthermore, 26% anticipate that additional approval process will be required and 21% have already implemented that kind of process within their company.
Approximately 75% of companies would be willing to pay more for using hotels and airlines with strict health and hygiene practices.
As it seems by the results, the most crucial factors when choosing a hotel is health, safety, and hygiene standards. Hotel cancellation policy and distance from the destination point, which were previously very important factors for choosing a hotel, come only after health and safety. Surprisingly enough, only 36% of respondents said price is important in their decision when choosing which hotel to book.
To summarize with cautious optimism, the Travel industry will gradually increase its activity and hopefully will return to the same volume as known prior to the pandemic. However, our world will look different, and it will be necessary to make adjustments; by travellers, travel coordinators, hotels and suppliers