Business Travel Executive, Dec 2020/Jan 2021

12 Business Travel Executive askBTE com December 2020 January 2021 process But the impact of COVID 19 is making buyers feel uncertain about the direction of their hotel programs Do they and their hotel partners hunker down with fixed rates they already have on the books or try dynamic rates In a fixed RFP rate environment there are times when your fixed rate may be higher than the public rate based on specific market demand or current level of hotel occupancy Hatfield notes So while it may be more difficult to monitor and audit a dynamic rate product offers the assurance that you are always paying less than the public rate which may not always be the case with a fixed rate especially in todays fluctuating business environment she says Continuous monitoring is the answer advises Robin Buyers have the possibility to partner with sourcing professionals in the industry who have access to the right data tools benchmarking and local markets intelligence to understand exactly how savings can be captured while ensuring traveler satisfaction safety and security objectives are also met Steve Reynolds CEO of Tripbam breaks the differences down further COVID has caused massive layoffs across the hotel industry and a dramatic reduction in hotel bookings Companies that try to use the traditional process will struggle to get a response from their chain or property and will find it difficult to obtain a static rate due to inability to forecast rates and volumes in 2021 In addition most of the chains are willing to provide a dynamic discount over a static We are advising clients that they should go dynamic as long as it is a fair discount based upon client volume evergreen and automatically renews can be audited rate caps in place in the online booking tool LRA provided and no seasonality That said most buyers are still leery How do they know if theyre getting the best deal We take the data we have collected across 2000 clients over several years to establish a good discount for our clients continues Reynolds This formula takes the clients volume at the property in the market and globally along with the TI TRENDS INSIGHTS