Travel policy compliance is an incredibly complicated issue. Are employees blatantly disregarding your policy in order to enjoy pricier hotel rooms? Or are your employees purposefully booking on consumer travel sites instead of with your travel agency in an effort to fly with low-cost carriers and save you money?Compliance problems can be caused by so many different factors:Here are the top ways to improve travel policy compliance, no matter where the issues lie.

Maybe your compliance problem is a simple one. If your policy is completely outdated, it’s no wonder why your company can’t comply with it.Here are some common reasons why you may need to revise your policy document or update the settings on the automated travel policy in your booking tool.Updating your policy is a balancing act. Because it does involve multiple stakeholders, you don’t want to do it more than necessary. But it will need to adapt as your company grows and changes, so keep that in mind.

You should note when and why people book out of policy and keep score. When using software that includes the above features, you’ll be able to track compliance issues automatically.Tracking out-of-policy bookings will help you understand if it is your policy that is it fault, not simply your colleagues. By doing this you can discover what percentage of trips are out of policy, and start to locate the causes for compliance issues and trends.For example, let’s say you find that while the company travel is only 70% compliant, the majority of compliance issues are for last-minute trips that are required to serve customers. In that case, you might just want to recategorize those trips and create a separate policy for them so they’re not skewing your data. Common out-of-policy bookings are:However, if you find that certain teams or individuals are needlessly booking out of policy, then you know who to have a conversation with.

If you don’t already have a booking tool that allows travelers to book for themselves within policy, you might want to consider it. When your policy is baked into the travel booking process, then travelers have the freedom to choose the itinerary and experience they want within budget.Without self-booking, you’re more likely to have travelers who book outside of the approved tool or process.For example, if you’re using a

corporate travel agency

that requires employees to call their number to book a trip and share their preferences, not every employee is going to do this. Most people are used to booking their own trips for vacations. They’ll be frustrated at having to go back and forth with an agent over options, and might book for themselves anyways. But if you don’t have an approved too for self-booking, they’ll use a consumer website, making it very difficult for your admin team to track.

Self-booking isn’t the only thing that travelers want.They’ll also ditch your

business travel tool

in favor of better UX or trip options. If you’re using travel software that is clunky, difficult to navigate, or otherwise annoying, travelers won’t use it to book their trip. Any trip that isn’t booked with your approved tool isn’t in compliance.Instead of fighting against the tide,

choose a travel tool that your employees love

.When your employees book inside of one tool, it’s so much easier to handle your administrative and financial processes. Plus, you can collect data on travel spend and compliance so you can discover trends and issues instead of having to guess.In a business travel tool, look for…

You can improve policy compliance by creating an automatic travel policy that works at the time of booking to allow or bar travelers from booking certain trips.To get better compliance results from your travel booking tool, consider customizing your built-in, automated policy for the following:The more accurately your automated policy reflects reality, the better job it can do to improve compliance around the clock with no micromanaging.