The Perfect Trip: a Recap of Concur Fusion 2012
Concur staff, clients, and partners descended upon Orlando May 8-11, 2012, for the annual Concur Fusion conference to explore trends and cutting-edge developments in travel technology. Representatives from Travel and Transport were among the 1,600 travel industry professionals (a record number of attendees), making Concur Fusion the second largest U.S. travel conference behind the annual GBTA convention.
Concur Fusion offered a great variety of sessions, but several key themes emerged, including integrating cloud technology and continued evolution of mobile technology for both Concur Travel and Concur Expense. Intended to create a true traveler-centric experience, this integration involves offering customers the opportunity to book and track expenses for GOGO inflight Internet while traveling. Furthermore, Concur Fusion cast a vision of “The Perfect Trip” – a business trip simplified and streamlined thanks to customer-centered technology. This video shows what this “Perfect Trip” might look like.
Beyond technological advancements, the conference also centered on several cornerstones of the travel industry, including service and account management. Sessions focused on methods for heightening organizational dedication to service, including implementing staff bonuses based on service and creating additional service-related positions.
Additionally, presenters stressed the value of bringing “unmanaged” travel back into the managed travel program. Concur estimates that 55% of hotel bookings are still not consolidated within a managed program. To combat this statistic, Concur plans to offer travelers the option of adding bookings outside of a managed travel program to TripIt. These reservations can then be tracked in Concur Expense, making reporting data available. Companies considering this solution would need to weigh the cost of the technology versus the potential benefits of tracking the unmanaged reservations.
Travel and Transport has a deep, long-standing partnership with Concur, and we look forward to continuing to collaborate in order to offer the best customer-focused technology and services. If you attended Concur Fusion 2012, we would love to hear about your experience!
This is the third year that Travel and Transport has recapped Concur Fusion on our blog. Read about the 2010 and 2011 events.






Wednesday, May 23, 2012 at 03:52PM


