Heightened Need For Travels & Expense Technology Adoption Amongst Indian Business Travellers

As India continues to take rapid steps towards digitalization, India’s business travelers demonstrate a strong preference for tech-forward travel solutions as well as a clear need for safety tools. SAP SE has announced the launch of a new SAP® Concur® survey that highlighted the preference for an integrated travel solution that could help ensure the safety of Indian business travelers.

Emerging as one of the world’s fastest growing business travel markets, corporate travel in India is propelled by end-to-end technology centric solutions, preferences and mindset. Aimed at understanding the impact of business travel on individuals – how they prioritize safety, comfort and convenience on every trip. The online survey that was conducted amongst 500 Indian business travelers, sheds light on the top concerns among modern business travelers in India. Notable highlights from the survey include:

Opportunities for employers to adopt travel technologies –
* 77% of Indian business travelers agree their employers are behind when it comes to adopting latest technologies to manage business travel
* 67% of Indian business travelers believe in experiencing gap in technology adoption for booking and expense reporting tools
* 66% of Indian business travelers rated that there is a gap in adoption of travel safety tools such as automated safety alerts about their destination

Opportunity to improve productivity, compliance and control over business expenses -
* 32% Indian business travelers rated that their company took 3-5 days to reimburse for a business trip expense
* 56% Indian business travelers believe it’s more likely to have their expenses reimbursed on time than having their plane leave on time.
* 55% Indian business travelers said that they forfeited or lost money on a travel-related business expense because either they didn’t think it was worth reporting or because their company failed to reimburse them.

Travelers do not put safety as a priority despite their experiences with risk, while traveling, scope to adopt travel safety tools -
While 28% say, they prioritize safety first, 29% say, they put business first.
88% have experienced safety concerns while on a business trip in the last 12 months.


* Business travel isn’t getting easier or less stressful
* 36% say that the most stressful part of a business trip is during the trip itself
* 68% say they have changed their travel accommodations owing to safety concerns
* Nearly all Indian business travelers (98%) have shared their location while travelling for business, the most of all markets surveyed (global average: 91%). This includes nearly 3 in 4 (73%) who did so for safety specifically, second only to Mexico (76%) as the most likely to do so (global average: 58%).

Millennial business travelers are more sensitive to current events

In the last 12 months, 52% have reduced travel to a location because of political unrest or health hazards, compared to 43% of Gen Xers and 50% of Boomers
50% millennial business travelers have also selected a flight based on aircraft type, compared to 48% of Gen Xers and 29% of Boomers.

73% Indian business travelers book using online travel agencies or sites and over 45% Indian business travelers rated the ability to book a hotel via a mobile app as the most desired service, closely followed by 41% who rated booking air travel as the most desired.

Female travelers report high levels of harassment - 87% of female Indian business travelers have been harassed on a business trip, especially 62% say they have suffered the indignity of being asked if they were traveling with their husband

Mankiran Chowhan, Managing Director, SAP Concur India said, “I believe there is great potential in the Indian market for the adoption of latest automated travel technologies. Since India is an evolving and fast-growing business travel market, it’s imperative for us to ensure a safe and secure environment for all business travelers. Therefore, at SAP Concur, we are constantly innovating to help organizations streamline and integrate their travel, expense and invoice solutions enabling them to prioritize duty of care.”

“Societal issues and employee experiences are increasingly impacting the way we travel. With these shifts come new expectations from traveling employees that shouldn’t go unnoticed,” said Christopher A. Juneau, Senior Vice President, Global Cloud Strategic Programs, SAP Concur. “While companies continue to try and maximize traveler satisfaction, the reality is that employees are hungry for more empathy, guidance and better technology as they run into both common frustrations and unique individual concerns, leaving room for improvement among organizations of all sizes.”

Attached is the full SAP Concur White Paper Addendum for India report for your reference.

The survey was conducted by Wakefield Research (www.wakefieldresearch.com), a leading independent provider of quantitative, qualitative and hybrid market research, among 7,850 business travelers, defined as those who travel for business three or more times annually from the following markets: Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, India, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Malaysia, Sweden, United Kingdom and the United States. The survey took place July–August 2019.