What's your company travel policy?

[Mattg]

For those of you who travel for work, I'm curious as to how flexible and generous (or not) your employer's travel policy is.

Which class of travel/ticket types are you permitted to book? And do you get to choose your own airline, or is it purely BFOD (Best Fare Of Day)? Or are you perhaps obliged to fly with one particular airline?

 

[blackcat20]

Ours is BFOD but you're also allowed to fly your preferred carrier (ie QF or VA). Y only, no matter the distance. I used to be able to sneak PE through but it gets checked now. However we can book PE or J if the head of school writes an email approving it. Often flights are reimbursed by conferences etc so its easier to push those up from Y (though if we pay to start with technically it still has to be Y unless we have permission).

 

[Ade]

I work as an IT contractor for an insurance company based in Sydney. The travel policy, on a return trip, allows one restricted (red e-deal/getaway) fare and one flexi (Flex/Freedom) fare.

And domestic travel is in Economy only

Intl - depending on distance/time - PE or J can be availed with appropriate approvals

Can fly carrier of choice (QF or VA), and no LCC. JQ is approved sometimes, not always

 

[defurax]

The policy at work is Y for everyone, but there are so many exceptions it's kind of irrelevant. Pretty much on a case by case basis taking into account seniority, relevance of event/meeting, time to rest on arrival, flexibility, etc.
Some smart people get PE or J travel included in their contract. F is never approved.

 

[Himeno]

They got rid of all store managers having their own company cars years ago. They started giving store managers fuel cards instead, but I think they've since gotten rid of that as well. Only managers above store level have company cars now.

If someone has to travel to a different store for work, they'll only reimburse fuel on a per km basis as listed in the EBA.
Work required travel (such as to meetings or training) has to be longer then a 90 minute drive each way before they even consider arranging other transport or accommodation.

 

[levelnine]

An annoying policy is where one has to book travel through a corporate portal as that means one cannot take advantage of double SC offers using the GC method (ie well beyond the limited booking window).

 

[Denali]

Pretty good for flights, if I want to book my own flights ect outside Corp Traveller I need permission from my boss (not hard to get as Ive always proved my pricing was same or better).

Y for less than 8hrs. Anything longer than 8hrs is min PE but Ive noticed everyone is getting J for the past couple of years so I expect nothing less and will fight for it. We've had a few employees forgo their J seat for 2 x PE seats for family member. No family on conferences.

Upgrades to any bookings are at the employees personal expense.

Strangely its the getting to/from the airport is my biggest gripe, policy says "should utilise the least expensive mode of transport". Load of rubbish to expect me to take a train or shuttle so I use my driver service/taxi and claim it via expenses but otherwise our policy is very good/happy with it.

 

[SeaWolf]

I'm Federal Government and our policy is now "Lowest Practical Fare"

http://www.finance.gov.au/sites/default/files/RMG-404v2.pdf

What this means is that we have to choose whatever is cheapest giving consideration to the circumstances. So there's a bit of flexibility there. We have a dedicated booking portal provided by a travel agency and it will show us what's available to us (no Tiger) but for most staff we have to fly Y everywhere. The price difference on Gov fares between Restricted and Flexible airfares is usually very small and if it's a busy day sometimes the Restricted tickets will even cost more, so if there's a chance our plans could change at all we'd book the Flexible ticket because the extra cost is almost always smaller than the change fee on a Restricted ticket. For me, I'm usually travelling for meetings etc. that are frequently rescheduled, cancelled, rescheduled again etc. so unless I'm certain it's going to go ahead I'll go for the flexible ticket.

For me I almost always travel VA because for the SYD-CBR run their Gov Flexible fares are a little cheaper than QF, but they have a lot less frequency on that route so I have to watch out that I'm not saving a few dollars on airfare but costing a lot more in travel allowance because the schedule will result in me being stuck in the airport for an extra few hours. This sometimes requires a bit of maths on my part before I decide which flights will be best.

Overall I think the policy does strike the right balance between securing the cheapest airfares but giving us some flexibility to ensure we're not wasting money in other ways because we're compulsively chasing a few dollars off the seat.

When it comes to hotels we have a booking portal that shows us Gov rates and limits us to a per-night rate set for each location by the ATO. We can override the rate under certain circumstances (like staying at the hotel a conference is being held at to save on cab-charge) but usually we'd just stick to below the limit. We do get flexible cancellation rules with Gov rates, so that's pretty handy. The limits set by the ATO, however, can sometimes lead to some odd results. For example there's a different rate in Canberra and in Queanbeyan, even though for travel purposes they're basically the same place. Also, the rate limit doesn't change just because it's a sitting week for Parliament and everything is booked out and very expensive.

Also, while this is fairly consistent across Fed Gov (and if you love policy docs you can find all this info and more at the Department of Finance's website) it isn't universal and some departments and agencies (depending on how Gov procurement rules apply to them) may still have their own arrangements (particularly for hotels) rather than going in on the whole-of-gov arrangements. Also, it's a little known fact that the first whole-of-gov arrangement for travel only happened in 2010 and before that every agency and department was just doing its own thing.

 

[zenyattamondatta]

We get J for anything beyond SIN as we have a Perth office that handles stuff there.

Price bands for J, and within those you’re free to make a case for anything better... we do a lot of work for airlines and loyalty programs, so we are, ahem, *strongly encouraged* to stay on top of what’s possible. Anecdotes about our more creative trips can often go down well with clients.

Possibilities include using leave to take the long way around, companion fares, nested flights, and returns originating overseas. We have a sympathetic ear at the top, but frivolous proposals get rejected quite abruptly. So we tend to workshop them amongst ourselves first.

 

[SeaWolf]

Oh, one other note that's probably of interest. Fed Gov airfares do not get frequent flyer points. We get status credits, but no points.

 

[blackcat20]

An annoying policy is where one has to book travel through a corporate portal as that means one cannot take advantage of double SC offers using the GC method (ie well beyond the limited booking window).

We have a travel portal, I just ignore it.

 

[jsoprano]

PE for trips longer than 8 hours, Y for everything under. CEO direct reports get to fly J on longhaul. Preferred airline is QF (must for domestic, optional for intl). Can fly other airlines international if QF is not practical or more expensive, so usually end up flying others more than QF.

We have two online portals to book through, one is your conventional Serko corporate TA portal, the other an Expedia-type self-service corporate portal which is pretty poor.

 

[kpc]

J but BFOD, not including Chinese airlines. Previously, it was J ANY airline.

 

[dajop]

In the last 10 years worked for three different companies, with similar rules around travel, albeit with different parameters. Overriding rule in all three is managing within travel policy and travel budget (so defacto rule for J at times is only for travel outside of Asia Pacific region), and invariably times when travel was cut or eliminated altogether due to financial concerns.

Company 1 - > 6 hrs for business class,
Company 2 - 5 hrs for business class + short overnight flights from India -SIN where evening flights are lacking
Current company - >8 hrs for business class.

Also have seen exemption for regional lead at one company - fly business class irrespective of length.

In theory supposed to take lowest logical fare, but being based in Singapore, the way this works in practice most are happy with SQ, MI, QF, EK, TG, CX etc but avoid taking LCC, Chinese, Indian, and Indonesian carriers. And some do to rig their travels such that SQ is only choice.

No contemplation of Y+ in policy. Hotels, supposedly booked through corporate TA at preferred hotels where we have negotiated rates, chain agnostic (ie. a bit all over the place as to chains they belong to). However they are typically similar priced to comparable properties in each city where one can align to a specific chain for status benefits.

Food - last two companies "reasonable" for the city you are in. Company 1 - $50USD max for a meal, and no more than $80 USD a day. Probably OK with an exchange rate of 1USD = 0.67 AUD, was challenging when AUD>USD!

 

[Lemon_Party]

We are free to choose our fares & airlines to best suit schedule, but expected to be in Y and reasonable when compared to other options.
In reality this means no LCCs, and its ok to pay a little more to fly QF over VA say, but if the price is $100's different then you can't fly your favourite.
Sadly it is worldwide Y, or LCC in "business" - so star class to Japan is used a bit for those who prefer QF to VA/SQ.
Generally upper tier airlines only; I wouldn't book China Eastern/Southern etc.

 

[amaroo]

When I worked for others it was - Y for Dom EC, J for Dom WC and J for all Int.

Now I'm doing things my way - it's whatever I want. Still fly Y for most short hops, but have pushed the J > F wherever possible.

 

[ish]

Ours is discount Y ....fully flex Y by exception only, but the preference is to use discount Y and just pay the change fee if required. Apparently they modelled it out and figured out that was more cost effective overall for the whole firm.

International is J for client work, but one team I used to work in it was an unwritten ‘rule’ that Aus <> Asia (eg. HKG) for internal stuff like training courses was in Y... (and then pray that the points upgrade request goes through!)

But we do get to keep points and SC, plus the booking portal is self-service so occasionally works out for things like DSC etc.

However, most of my flying is self funded anyway, so firm policy and mine (ie. discount Y) align!

 

[Ausbt]

Free choice of airline. Domestic is Y only for me, but these days I do very little anyway. International (LHR & JFK) is PE but for quite a few years I had to make do with Y. You can add on personal side-trips 'provided it does not cost us any extra'. I regard it as a reasonably generous policy.

Now something to note: this policy is not universally adhered to. There are 'special people' here who simply insist on flying J and their managers sign-off on it. Not much you can really do about it, from my perspective as long as people continue to sign off on my PE trips I'm more than happy and won't rock the boat. Oh yeah, we have a couple of real DYKWIA clowns here too. They jump on FB and post "so-and-so is at the US J lounge flying from here to here". We ...don't ...care !

 

[tdimdad]

Best fare within the +/- 30 minutes (choice between QF and VA), though managers routinely approve small overruns so we keep flying the preferred airline. All bookings through Serko engine / Corporate Travel.

For hotels, whichever the hotel the online booking engine lists and is within the staff allowed limits (varies between cities). E.g. in Melbourne I have about 30 to choose from. Would like to try Holiday Inn but even that's above my limits - my boss would probably approve that without even thinking but I don't want to push the friendship since our Finance is pretty switched on about these things.

 

[harvyk]

I'm allowed to book my own travel, stuck in Y (although I can upgrade with points if available). Doesn't need to be BFOD, although needs to be reasonable, so I tend to go for sales / red-e-deals, and will go the slightly earlier / slightly later flight if there is some savings, within reason of course.

However we also have a government client, and on this project they are arranging travel. Whilst I'm getting a combination of Discount Y and Flexi-Y, again all on QF, it's government fares so no points. Annoyingly I've got enough SC's for SG already, but I'm not going to end up with WP. I'll probably end up somewhere around the 800SC range this year, so the SC's earned from this project are sort of going to waste as "lifetime" only. I'd still prefer QF even if the SC's are going to waste as I at least get QP on QF, as I'm a nothing on VA.

Hotels I tend to follow ATO rates as my guide, at least in AU. In the US I'll simply go for what's convenient (again without blowing the bank, so no 5 star for me). This government client project, well they've booked me into a somewhat nice hotel each time close to where I've been working, so no complaints from me. No idea what they are paying for the room (my guess is it's a special government rate, but I don't really worry about that side of things).