Running a Corporate Travel Program

The questions travel managers and approvers actually ask — writing a policy, approval workflows, duty of care, starting and auditing a program — answered independently, not by a vendor selling you software.

These are the questions the people who run corporate travel ask — travel managers, approvers, finance leads — and almost every answer online is a software vendor’s marketing. Here they are, answered independently.

General information — rules and policies change. Confirm current specifics with the relevant authority (your company, the airline, the government) or a professional. Where a public rule applies, its primary source is linked.

What does a corporate travel manager do?

A corporate travel manager owns the travel program end to end: they set and enforce the travel policy, negotiate rates with airlines, hotels, and a travel management company (TMC), run the booking tools, control spend, and — the part that increasingly matters most — carry duty of care, meaning they are responsible for knowing where travelers are and getting them help if something goes wrong. In smaller companies it is a hat worn by finance, HR, or an office manager; in larger ones it is a dedicated role or team. The job is equal parts procurement, operations, and risk management.

How do I write a corporate travel policy?

Start with the decisions travelers actually face and write the rule for each: who can travel and who approves it, how and where to book (usually a required tool or TMC), class-of-service and hotel caps by trip type, meal and per-diem limits, and what is reimbursable. Keep it short enough that people read it and clear enough that they do not have to guess. Ground the spend limits in something defensible — the U.S. GSA per-diem rates are a common, credible benchmark for domestic caps. The best policies explain the why (cost control, duty of care, tax compliance), because a policy people understand is a policy people follow. Source: GSA per diem rates ↗.

What is a travel approval workflow?

It is the defined path a trip takes from request to booking: who signs off, in what order, and against what criteria — typically a manager for the business justification and sometimes finance for the budget. A good workflow captures the reason for the trip (not just the cost), routes exceptions to the right approver, and moves fast enough that it does not become the reason a trip does not happen. The goal is not to make travel hard; it is to make sure every trip has an owner and a justification before the money is spent.

What is duty of care in business travel?

Duty of care is the employer’s legal and ethical obligation to protect employees while they travel for work — knowing where they are, communicating risk, and being able to reach and assist them in an emergency. It is not optional: a company that sends someone on a trip is responsible for their reasonable safety on it. In practice that means traveler tracking, a way to reach people during a disruption, clear emergency procedures, and vetted suppliers. It is the part of the travel program that turns from a nice-to-have into a liability the moment something goes wrong.

How do I start a corporate travel program?

Begin by measuring what is already happening — pull the last year of travel spend and bookings to see the volume, the top routes, and where the money and the risk actually sit. That baseline tells you whether you need a full travel management company, a self-booking tool, or just a written policy and a card program to start. Then write the policy, choose the booking channel, negotiate the two or three suppliers you use most, and stand up duty of care. Start with the highest-spend, highest-risk categories; a program you can actually run beats a comprehensive one nobody follows.

What is a travel program audit?

A travel program audit is a systematic review of whether your travel spend, bookings, and behavior match your policy and your goals. It checks leakage (trips booked outside the tool), exceptions (how often the policy is overridden, and by whom), supplier performance against what was negotiated, duty-of-care coverage, and whether the spend is producing value. The point is not to catch travelers out — it is to find where the policy, the tools, or the suppliers are failing so you can fix the program, not just police it.

How do I handle travel policy exceptions?

Expect them and design for them, rather than pretending a policy covers every case. Define who can approve an exception and on what grounds, require a short written reason, and log every one — because the pattern of exceptions is the single best signal that your policy is out of step with reality. If the same exception keeps getting approved, it is not an exception; it is a gap in the policy you should close. Handle them fast and transparently; a rigid policy with a slow exception process just pushes people to book around it entirely.

How do I get employees to follow the travel policy?

Compliance follows from three things: make the compliant path the easiest path (a booking tool people prefer to using their own), explain the why so the rules feel reasonable rather than arbitrary, and enforce consistently so the policy is not a suggestion. Punishing violations while making compliance painful guarantees leakage. The programs with the highest adoption are not the strictest — they are the ones where booking in policy is genuinely less hassle than booking around it, and where travelers understand that the rules protect them, not just the budget.

More answers for the road in the Field Guide.