The crisis seemed to take the business travel community completely by surprise, yet recent events near to home in France and Belgium suggests it is now something we must prepare to live with on a long term basis. Chaos and disruption appears to be the new normal and therefore crisis management structures need to be robust and flexible to any type of situation. But how effective is your organisation and do you have a risk management plan in place?

The Institute of Travel & Management (ITM), of which Expense reduction Analysts is a member, undertook research into this area of concern.

Providing Support – A series of events over the years have contributed to pretty responsive crisis management plans. Over 50% of buyers instigated their crisis management programme on the day that the ash cloud and its potential impact.

More than 10% were already aware of the potential: the advantage such companies have in terms of operational servicing cannot be underestimated.

Managing and resolving a traveller issue, whether it be an ash cloud disruption or being in caught in a hotel or restaurant at the time of a terrorist action is a real boost for an organisations programme in terms of their duty of care and in meeting the Corporate Manslaughter Act requirements.

In all cases where organisations booked travel through a Travel Management Company (TMC), the TMC played an important part in managing the operational reaction to the crisis. It’s not easy, for example, for a PA to deal with a major problem when it’s late on a Sunday evening.

Responsive Reaction – The guidance provided by buyers to their travellers varied significantly and is to be expected as one traveller’s requirements are likely to be quite different to another. Over half (54%) provided those stranded with a broad range of guidance depending on specific situations and all sorts of communication and tracking tools were implemented to assist companies to stay in touch and manage staff requirements.

As far as repatriation from the ash cloud disturbance was concerned, most buyers initiated the use of sea (62%) and other ground transportation (54%) options, but a minority (27%) actually collaborated with other buyers to find alternative solutions. Somewhat surprisingly social media does not appear to have been widely used (16%) and there appears to be limited demand even if it were offered in a controlled environment with peer companies only.

Interestingly, approximately only 10% of buyers were able to identify the ash cloud as a major threat and implement their crisis systems at least one day in advance.

Early implementation of any crisis support though a defined risk management plan is clearly necessary for any organisation in the world we live in today.