Corporate travel is a vital aspect of any organization that frequently sends its employees on business tours. Multiple trips round the year are a challenge to manage for any HR in the absence of a proper travel policy. Thus, if your company deals with cross-border clients and vendors, you must make sure to have a well-articulate travel policy in place.

To start with, a proper travel policy will help to save costs on trips. Travel consumes a fair share of organizational expenses, next to employee salary & rent. Lack of a proper travel policy allows room for overspending that could take toll on the company treasury. A well-organized travel policy will eliminate such woes and also encourage saving. Moreover, you would be leaving your team in confusion if you don’t provide them the exact regulations regarding their official tours. A structured corporate travel policy prevents misunderstanding with clear statement of all the guidelines employees have to follow while on business tour.

How to draft the travel policy?

Settle contracts with vendors

A part of corporate travel policy includes booking with specific vendors. To ensure that, first, you have to settle long-standing contracts with vendors. You can tie up with a reliable travel agency who all take care of every aspect of the travel. Otherwise, you can individually negotiate with flight booking companies, hotels and restaurants.

One tip - don’t just settle with one particular vendor, like one single hotel or one specific restaurant. Employees would prefer options.

Write an insightful introduction

The introduction would set prelude to the actual travel policy. It will cover an overview of the main purpose of your policy, responsibilities of employees and the significance of the policy.

Points to include in the travel policy

This is certainly the most important aspect of a corporate travel policy. Your policy will include a number of vital sections pertaining to the business tours. These include:

All expense categories eligible for reimbursement

There are certain travel expense categories which your company should reimburse when an employee is on an official tour. You would not only specify the particular categories for reimbursement but also the pertaining regulations for each. These categories are:

• The vendors
• Advance booking specifications. Mention the time-period to maintain for advance booking, such as 2 weeks or 3 weeks.
• Booking tool. If the company wants the employees to use a particular tool while booking, do notify it in the policy.
• Payment process. If your office needs the employees to maintain some particular payment modes during business tours, you should specify it on the travel policy.

Don’t forget the non-refundables

A business organization reimburses most of the expense categories while employees are on official tour. But there are certain expense categories that the employee should meet himself/herself. These are mostly those that are of personal interests of the staff. The list would include:

• In-room movies
• Dry-cleaning
• Childcare
• Parking tickets
• Seat upgradations in airplane
• Tips
• Personal shopping expenses
• Pet boarding

Reimbursement reporting

Employees certainly have the right to ask for reimbursement where applicable but first they should provide the proof of their expenses. It will eliminate risks of inflated reimbursement proposals to the company. Your travel policy should be very particular about the specifics to be maintained by the employees while asking for travel reimbursement. These include-

• Specific documentations (receipts or forms) the employee should submit while asking for reimbursement.
• Timeline to maintain for submission of these documents.
• Penalties to be faced on non-compliance of these policies
• Pre-approval required for expense categories, if any.
• Designation & contact details of the person to report to for approval of expense reports or trip requests.

Specifications to ensure safe travel

A part of your corporate travel policy includes specifications to ensure safe travel for employees while on business tours. The guidelines to be followed by employees in this regard are:

• Submission of itineraries before travel.
• Submission of contact details of hotels.
• Phone number of the person to contact during travel emergencies
• You should also mention about the travel insurance policy provided by employees on part of the company.

 A perfect corporate travel policy should be structured keeping in mind comfort of the employees and also convenience of the company.