Your career travel costs

[Harpoon]

A lot of folks in this forum obviously travel for business. I was having a look back at my travel for first half of 08 and I was quite surprised how much i'd spent, or rather how much work had spent on me to travel.

So then it got me wondering, has anyone done some loose figures as to how much their work has spent on their travel in total? Because I can imagine for some folks in here it would be quite a lot - running into the hundreds of thousands.

I'm talking mostly airfare + accom.

And I don't have a figure of my own but I do know that I certainly could not have afforded to fund it myself looking back at it

 

[simongr]

Hmm for me a quick and dirty summary from this employer $'000:

July 06 US/UK = 28
Sep 06 NZ = 3
Nov 06 US = 15
Dec 06 Asia = 12
Mar 07 US = 12
May 07 Asia = 9
Jul 07 UK/US = 20
Sep 07 Asia/US = 15
Dec 07 Asia = 9
Feb 08 Asia = 9
Mar 08 Asia/US = 15

Total for this employer $147K - ball park :shock:

 

[Harpoon]

Sigh I need to remember to proof read the subject as well as the body. Grrrr

Nice Simon! But I reckon somebody can surely crack the $1m mark...

 

[simongr]

Oh I think many people will crack 1million

 

[serfty]

Sigh I need to remember to proof read the subject as well as the body. Grrrr ...

OK - Done !

 

[DTM1]

I have absolutely no idea how much I have spent over the years, but year to date (mainly dom trips MEL - PER in J), I estimate it to be:

Jan - nil
Feb - $40k (boosted b/c of trip to US in F and trip to HK in J)
Mar - $5k
Apr - $15k
May - $6k
Jun - $10k
Jul - $2.5k
Aug - $3k

YTD - $81.5k

Would expect that my annual spend for the past 3 or few years would average around $60 - $70k per year.

 

[Mal]

$1000 this year (give or take a little) so far.

Previous years have ranged from $1000-$5000 on accom, airfares and similar expenses.

Spot the person who doesn't travel much for work

Personal spend is a lot different. I think the most I spent in a year for personal travel for me was around $30K or $40K. Have toned down the travel a touch since then!

 

[taswegian77]

This year I have done only 1 personal trip and 12 business trips, mainly to BKK and SIN. Average flight costs per trip is about $2.5K with accommodation at about $1K per trip so that would work out to be about total spend of $45K so far this year.

I think my company would average about $70 - $100K each year on me, just depends on how many SIN trips I do as hotels are quite expensive there.

Being doing that level for the past 4 years so I guess my company has spent around $300 - $400K in that time, well our clients end up paying for the majority of my travel.


Now how many FF points that adds up to is the big question? I will work it out and post it later.

 

[taswegian77]

I think I have earned around 300,000 FF points this year on travel. I can add about another 90,000 from Credit card transfer and that adds up to 390,000 points earned. Shame that next month I will apply and if I get it lose 192K point son a MEL-JFK J upgrade. Ouch!

 

[serfty]

I think I have earned around 300,000 FF points this year on travel. I can add about another 90,000 from Credit card transfer and that adds up to 390,000 points earned. Shame that next month I will apply and if I get it lose 192K point son a MEL-JFK J upgrade. Ouch!

Presumably, that's x 2 - 'tis 96K per PAX.

 

[taswegian77]

no it is actually x 1 but will apply in both directions at 96K per direction. 72K for MEL-LAX and 24K for LAX-JFK. I pray I can get both ways but would be great to just get one of them. I feel confident of getting the LAX-JFK legs as I am sure they might be leaner on capacity but will wait and see.

 

[JohnK]

When I did travel for work, 7 trips to SE Asia and 4 domestic trips in 2 years, my guess would be a total spend on airfares and accommodation of around $25,000.

My personal spend on airfares the last few years is ~$8,000 a year although that is now likely to increase by another ~$8,000 commuting SYD-BNE, based on estimate of 40 trips/year, for work.

 

[ejb]

Hi,

Last 3 years average 30 Syd-Per in J ~ $3200 plus 2 nights accom at ~ $600 total approx $342k

ejb

 

[winetraveller]

Nice Simon! But I reckon somebody can surely crack the $1m mark...

Over the last 6 0r seven years I've probably racked up well over a million. F07-08 was $286k, by virtue of over 200 nights in hotels and 148 flights, most if J some in F. We had some very large product launches leading to some monster trips in F, all over the globe.

This year not so bad, I've run at about $15k per month, as a result of being based in the US and not visiting Oz quite so much.

This month is a bit of rare one in that I was on holiday for ten days, and not travelling much for the remainder, until the week end when I'm off to the UK and the continent, but will still run to $10k for the month.

 

[Ikara]

I'm now retired so I don't have access to my (Corporate) Amex statements, but I was averaging $7k - $8k a month, so $80K - $90k a year sounds about right. Over 7 years - probably in excess of "half a big one". All national - no international at all.

But pales into insignificance next to winetraveller.

JB

 

[thegurio]

Over the last 6 0r seven years I've probably racked up well over a million. F07-08 was $286k, by virtue of over 200 nights in hotels and 148 flights, most if J some in F. We had some very large product launches leading to some monster trips in F, all over the globe.

This year not so bad, I've run at about $15k per month, as a result of being based in the US and not visiting Oz quite so much.

You know, this surprises me, i thought that you would have blown this out the water, between you and NYC guy, by virtue of his signature anyway.

As for me, well considering its funded out of my pocket (although for work) it comes to approximately $6406.94. The joys of MYOB! This is from 11/09/2005 till today.

Thanks for this thrread Harpoon, it will be fascinating to see the responses from some.

 

[Harpoon]

By the way, nobody should feel pressured to respond Money can be a very private thing. But I thought since I'm interested in 'work trips' more so than personal holidays, most people wont have too much of an issue talking about it.

 

[kpc]

Maybe we could do a "how much you earn?" or "how much is your house worth?" thread next...

 

[Harpoon]

Maybe we could do a "how much you earn?" or "how much is your house worth?" thread next...

Good idea!!

 

[Febs]

Our expense system is linked with our AMEX cards, so every charge we put on the card appears automatically on our expense system a few days later (then we can allocate it to personal/work-related and claim reimbursement).

Works really well, and it keeps a log of every charge that's gone through the card.

Mine's sitting on around $143,000 at the moment - the majority of which is work travel. That's in about 2.5 years.

Cheers,
- Febs.