Buyers set to face costing pressure in 2018, says Business Travel Show

Buyers expect the continued pressure to cut costs will be the biggest issue to impact them next year, a Business Travel Show survey has found.

A poll of 243 business travel buyers were asked ‘what is the biggest issue facing you over the next 12 months?’, with respondents citing cutting costs as the biggest issue for a third year, followed by an increased focus on duty of care for the second time.

In third place comes rising hotel rates and availability, while an increase in airfares came in at sixth place, a drop of three positions.

Brexit stars in fourth place, enforcing compliance features seventh and GDPR, which comes into force in May 2018, made it to tenth place.

“It’s not surprising to see cost cutting and duty of care as the top two challenges facing buyers over the next 12 months, especially given the recent spate of terrorist attacks across Europe and further afield; it’s simply not an opportunity for buyers to ignore traveller risk anymore, it must be a priority for them, their organisations and their partners,” said David Chapple, event director of Business Travel Show.

“Buyers have been so vocal about the debate around hotel availability this year that it was also not unexpected to see the issue around hotel rates rate so highly. But I was a little surprised to see Brexit so high on the table, given that many people feel the initial instability it caused for corporate travel was short-lived and the after effects will remain somewhat of an unknown until March 2019 at the earliest.”

The Business Travel Show kicks off on February 21st to 22nd, 2018, at London’s Olympia.