Top 5 Ways to Cut Business Travel Costs

Everyone is looking to trim costs these days and for businesses the travel budget is a tempting target. While some are opting to cut back on travel altogether, there are many business models where this is not feasible or desired. Products need to get from Point A to Point B and a face to face meeting is often more productive than a teleconference. However, there have been a number of articles recently tackling the topic of cutting travel costs without cutting travel and here are some of the best pieces of advice they had to share:

Keep employees informed of finances – One executive interviewed in this MSNBC article suggests keeping employees informed about the business so that they know how money saved now can be used for important projects in the future. This way your employees will be motivated to help keep expenses down.

Look for self service hotels – As this New York Times article notes, there is a trend away from the luxury hotels to self service for increasingly budget-minded business travelers. Why pay for laundry service when there are washers and dryers available in the hotel?

Buy local coupon books – If there are particular cities your employees need to travel to often, a coupon book can offer great discounts on lodging, meals, and other expenses.

Stack trips – Scheduling trips efficiently can go a long way toward saving money. By putting trips on the calendar further in advance, you can see what’s coming up and

Use one card for all travel expenses – While this article mentions credit cards, debit cards and prepaid cards also offer the benefit of having all expenses in one convenient report.

What ways have you cut business travel costs?

Toffer Grant is PEX's Founder and CEO. He founded PEX in 2006 as a prepaid card solution for small businesses. His background in the prepaid industry began at Clarity Payment Solutions, where he initiated 65 prepaid card programs in consumer, corporate, and emerging verticals of the prepaid card industry.