Travel managers in Austria, like most of their European counterparts, are feeling the pinch of inflation. According to a recent study by the Austrian Business Travel Association (ABTA), hotel prices and air fares are now 20 to 30 per cent more expensive than pre-pandemic rates. In some cases, hotel room rates have spiked by as much as 40 per cent. 

The report, released in February, notes corporates in Austria are now travelling less frequently but for longer periods compared to 2019. Volumes are expected to continue to recover, but “at a much lower rate than in 2022” due to “clearly noticeable” cost pressure.

As well as slowing the rate of recovery, Angela Lille, head of HR systems and travel management at finance, HR and reporting firm Erste Group Services and ABTA board member believes inflated travel costs are also making it harder for corporates to make greener choices.

“The conflict between sustainability and profitability is a challenge that’s being felt across the entire value chain, and the traveller is often the one who suffers most as a result,” said Lille, who insists more companies need to adopt a top-down and cross-divisional approach when it comes to implementing sustainable travel policies.

“[This challenge] cannot be solved by the travel manager alone,” she said. “Travel managers play an important role in managing internal and external stakeholders, but the final decision is often taken by senior management.”

While there is a “willingness to go green”, Lille said current inflationary pressure is causing many companies to place profit over planet and that when the travel manager has the possibility to choose between cost savings and emissions savings, they are still directed to choose the best price. “And as long as there is a choice, this will continue to be a challenge,” she said.

A raft of new EU legislation – namely the incoming Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) – will help solve this ‘conflict of choice’ and increase the sustainability focus on a management level. Nevertheless, Lille said there is still more the industry can do to support both travel managers and travellers.

“Across the entire market, we still see [suppliers] that are not supporting the travel manager with their new priorities,” said Lille, who leads ABTA’s sustainability committee and who also chairs the sustainability working group for BT4Europe (of which ABTA is a founding member).

“The question is, does the travel industry really understand the needs of the travel manager? And do travel managers really understand the real needs of the travel industry? It is my personal wish to close these gaps and support a dialogue that will strengthen services so that in some years we’ll no longer need to talk about sustainability [or explain how to measure carbon emissions related to travel], it will be self-explanatory and an inherent part of business travel,” she said.

“Our goal shouldn’t be to increase or even maintain [pre-pandemic] travel volumes. Our goal should be sustainability – assessing how we can travel more consciously and potentially slowing down so that we can increase quality and resilience,” she added.

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Feedback from ABTA members highlights that while prices have risen (whether related to eco-friendly choices or otherwise), service levels have plummeted due to supply chain delays and labour shortages.

Lille therefore stresses the importance of creating a “positive” traveller experience as companies look to integrate more environmentally-friendly options.

This includes providing more consistent and digestible emissions data at the point of booking in order to inform decisions and manage expectations.

“We really need to talk more about traveller expectations… because we can drive change through our demand,” Lille said. “It would help that the traveller knows it is also their responsibility to act in an eco-friendly manner… because when people are on the road they can sometimes behave differently – and consume differently – than when they are at home.” 

“We need to give [travellers] a chance to make a difference,” she added. “On the other hand, travellers expect support, smooth booking processes and to have a clear picture of how they can manage their trips effectively.”

In this regard, Lille points to the need for improved rail options and more rail content in online booking tools in order to support the air-to-rail switch.

“At the moment you really need a lot of patience to find the best connection, the best price and the most sustainable way to travel because we don’t have a single point of sale [for all rail options],” she said.

Parity of services – in particular, disruption support – is another sticking point. 

“Service means that the infrastructure is so well established that everybody in [the TMC or customer service] team can address traveller concerns and provide a 24-hour service. This currently isn’t feasible with rail bookings and therefore creates duty of care concerns,” said Lille. “When assessing the location of my travellers, I can always track who took a flight, but I cannot do the same for rail.” 

Assessing rail volume is also difficult, as is accessing data for both financial and non-financial reporting.

Here, Lille once again points to traveller experience and the need for services such as wifi, increased availability of night trains, cross-border ticketing and greater flexibility to make ticket changes.

“I think we’ve always had the chance to challenge rail companies to improve services for business travellers, but the demand was not as strong as it is today,” Lille said.

On a local level, Lille said ABTA is in “active talks” with Austria’s national rail operator ÖBB and that the two organisations are working on a number of pilot projects that will, Lille hopes, create “more openness and connectivity” via partnerships with new mobility as a service (MaaS) start-ups.

On an EU level, Lille said BT4Europe is seeking to raise awareness around the plight of business travellers with regulators in Brussels. Sustainability – and the need for standardised emissions reporting – is a key focus area.

Last month, the network of business travel associations called for legislators in the European Parliament and European Court to go further with its CountEmissions proposal. In June the group, together with nine other industry associations, sent an open letter to the European Commission’s executive vice-president Frans Timmermans urging him not to water down the scope of the new Multimodal Digital Mobility Services (MDMS) regulation.

This followed the launch of BT4Europe’s first position paper last September, led by Lille, which called for improved access to streamlined, accurate and comparable data on carbon emissions related to business travel.

“What we advocate for on the European level is the ability of travel managers to manage their [carbon] footprint because there is currently no reliable data. Calculations are often based on assumptions,” Lille explained.

“So, to ensure the EU Green Deal becomes a reality, we need standardised methodologies for calculating carbon emissions… even if it’s not 100 per cent accurate, it should be a consistent measurement that is applicable to all facets of business travel – not just air and ground transport, but also hotel stays and venues used for conferences,” she said.

As pent-up demand for business travel begins to slow and a ‘new normal’ emerges, Lille believes now is the time to examine how we can make more climate-conscious travel choices because “we do not have the time to wait,” she said.