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BCD Travel reported it has been asked by a number of regional multinational companies to assist in converting their local programs to a broader regional or global program. Drawing on its success in implementing global accounts in the Asia Pacific region in 2006 and 2007, BCD Travel has identified several critical factors that must be addressed by corporations and their travel management companies to ensure higher levels of success.
According to Roger Pfund, general manager and vice president, Asia Pacific Operations, BCD Travel, “A successful consolidation program must clearly identify financial and service benefits to the corporation. Beyond that, however, a detailed implementation and communication program is essential. We work jointly with the key individual or team in a company responsible for carrying out a consolidation.”
“We have a highly skilled regional support team in Singapore, our regional headquarters. They work closely with our local country BCD Travel operations and our current or prospective client to fully develop and communicate proper expectations and then to implement the key service standards required by our multinational accounts. Each customer is different and unique and even within a single client, there are variations of needs due to local practices and customs.”
“We have even been a testing ground for clients considering doing business with BCD Travel elsewhere in the world,” said Pfund. “They’ve assumed that if our company could handle successful implementations in the complex and geographically broad Asia Pacific region, we could do it in other regions with perhaps fewer challenges. We have succeeded in passing that test several times.”
