Campus Travel Management

In our view, university travel is a multi-faceted aspect of university life encompassing not only that which is official academic and administrative business, but incoming/outgoing group and discretionary student/faculty leisure as well. Our expertise includes the intricacies of retail travel, airline/vendor negotiation and administrative procedures and, after five years and dozens of success stories, we believe that our practical knowledge and resourcefulness can help you with all of it.

CTM provides an end-to-end service, including overall strategy, travel agency RFP, collection and consolidation of travel agency data and negotiation/conflict resolution with vendors (airlines, hotels, travel agencies and car rental companies). We have no direct or indirect travel agency ties. All airline, hotel and/or car rental hard and/or soft dollar incentives, whether front or back end, revert to our clients.

For the first time, you will see exactly how your travel dollar is being spent:

• Because we are a non-competitive third party, we are in a position to collect and consolidate data from multiple sources.

• Unlike canned travel agency reports which were developed primarily for airline commission overrides, our data is understandable; the format easy to read.

• Our reports are multi-faceted. They can be used as a department management tool, or can assist in budgeting, internal charge card reconciliation, travel policy compliance and/or agency performance benchmarking. They won’t be thrown away.

• The software used in our data processing and reporting is custom-written and proprietary. It is enhanced on an ongoing basis.

• Our benchmarking is realistic. Instead of calculating savings/lost savings using a price no one pays, we compare ticket cost to that which is lowest applicable given the nature of the trip and the priorities of the passenger.

• We monitor lowest fare five different ways. Like most other systems, lowest fare is guaranteed by contract and explained through an agent’s comments in the PNR "reason field," but using our approach, you get more. You can benchmark (1) one agency to another, (2) one airport to another, (3) one city to another and (4) one passenger to another.

• Unlike others who rely on expensive third party audits, we make creative use of the travel agency reservations process (PNR), giving you more information with less expense, immediately.

• Non-calculated data can be exported to the spreadsheet database of your choice.

• We simplify travel: Hundreds of fare basis codes are reduced to five, city pairs are calculated in round trips not segments, airline connections are omitted and airport codes are supplemented with the principal city and country written in English.

• We expand your insight into any particular trip. We document the airline contract, show whether or not there was a Saturday night stay and calculate the number of days in-between the dates of departure and ticketing.

• We take the mystery out of commission. In each transaction, you see not only the travel agency dollars earned, but the percentage as well.

• We can evaluate the potential for student travel and, where possible, assist in coordinating the bid for a specialized student travel RFP for your union or student center.

• We identify special campus travel situations that can either be administered in-house or on a net-rate corporate basis.

• We assist in the identification of incoming university sponsored group and/or conference travel, a program which can cut traveler cost while at the same time increasing contracted travel agency sales, airline volume and university revenue.

• We attempt to share discounts. This is sometimes possible due to the fact that our contracts are CTM-specific and thus not limited to any one institution.

CTM believes in the concept of "coop-etition," a non-adversarial, off-site competition between commercial organizations operating in a university controlled system. Not only does this approach satisfy university travelers seeking reasonable choice in the selection of their travel agency, it maintains the long-term motivation required for high qualities of service and low pricing in a decentralized, non-mandated environment.

At a time when university purchasing budgets are crunched, a revenue-financed outsourcing of travel management makes good sense. Using travel agency revenue share as funding, your work load is reduced, your travel costs lowered and your ability to control data is enhanced.