Why SMBs Need a Centralized Booking Platform

Content

• How self-booking creates challenges for SMBs 
• The power of centralized platforms
• Why travel platforms work for growing SMBs
• Roundtrip — business travel made smooth
• Simplify business travel

How self-booking creates challenges for SMBs

While allowing employees to book their own business trips may seem practical, it can have significant impacts on your overall travel costs. Direct-booking leads to higher costs for your company, and here’s how:

1. Budget compliance becomes difficult

Imagine you have five employees heading out on a business trip in a few weeks. Each employee is instructed to self-book their flights, transportation, and hotels, planning to reimburse them afterwards. 

One employee books an early, low-cost flight to help reduce expenses, while another waits until the last minute, resulting in a much higher fare. A third books in advance to save on airfare but opts for premium accommodations, pushing the total cost over budget.

These are the impacts of allowing employees to self-book without any clear policies or budget guidelines in place. While some corporate travelers may be considerate of the company’s budget, others may not recognize that there is one at all. 

2. Reduced transparency and coordination issues

Without centralized booking and travel calendars, managers and team leads often lack visibility into employee travel plans. Self-booking results in fragmented travel data, leaving the organization without a clear overview of company-wide travel activity. This lack of visibility can lead to missed meetings, misaligned team schedules, and potential safety risks in the event of an emergency.

3. Missing or inaccurate expense reports

In order for your finance team or corporate travel managers to accurately assess and identify the costs of business trips, they must have complete and organized expense reports at their disposal. However, when team members are given the option to self-book, these reports can easily be inconsistent, incomplete, or missing altogether. And sometimes, even when filed correctly, these reports can be full of unapproved costs that push you way over budget. 

The result is time-consuming manual work, sorting receipts, reconciling expenses, and trying to piece together the true cost of business travel. This lack of structure increases the risk of errors, duplicate reimbursements, and even potential fraud.

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The power of centralized platforms

A B2B travel platform like Roundtrip is designed to solve all these problems, without adding complexity. It makes business travel simpler cheaper for everyone involved. Here’s why:

Built-In travel policy compliance

Companies can easily create clear travel polices that work for their team and keep the business under budget. Options like setting spending and suggesting appropriate hotel choices can keep costs in check without constantly hovering or micromanaging. Once you’ve set the rules, the platform does the rest. It only shows employees’ options that follow your policy and meet your budgetary needs.

Real-time travel oversight

Collaborative features such as a real-time travel calendar give managers, finance teams, and even colleagues a clear view of who’s traveling, where they’re headed, and how long they’ll be gone. No more endless email threads or Slack messages asking. Whether you’re trying to coordinate a team meeting, plan around someone’s travel schedule, or just stay informed, the shared calendar keeps everyone on the same page.

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Automated expense reports

As a manager, one of your duties of care is to ensure all expenses are filed. With automated expense reports, your finance team won’t have to chase receipts or dread reconciling business travel ever again. Flights, hotels, and even ground transport booked through the platform are automatically tracked and reported. This means no more lost receipts, no more manual entry, and no more late expense submissions.

With a travel platform, finance teams get clean, complete reports that are easy to balance, and employees save hours of paperwork. 

User-friendly design, business-grade oversight

The beauty of a platform like Roundtrip is that it feels just as intuitive as booking personal travel, but with the added control that small and mid-sized businesses need. Employees can browse, select, and book their trips, knowing that every option has already been vetted by the company. Meanwhile, managers maintain full visibility into travel plans without needing to micromanage. It’s the ideal blend of freedom and structure.

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Why travel platforms work for growing SMBs

Many small business leaders assume that travel platforms are designed only for large corporations with extensive travel budgets. But that’s no longer the case. In fact, if you’re running a growing company, you might be the one who needs it most. Here’s why:

Meaningful travel cost reductions

When you’re watching every dollar, even small inefficiencies can snowball. A travel platform helps you catch waste before it happens by enforcing budgets, showing the best deals, and keeping everything in one place. Over time, that adds up to serious savings.

Reduce operational burden

Small and mid-sized businesses often operate with lean teams and limited resources, making efficiency a top priority. A centralized travel platform helps streamline the travel process, minimizing time spent on manual coordination and reducing the risk of disorganization.

Travel platforms enhance the employee experience

Today’s employees expect work tools to be just as easy to use as the apps on their phones, and booking business travel shouldn’t feel like a chore. A simple, intuitive platform takes the hassle out of confusing systems and messy reimbursements, letting people focus on the trip instead of the logistics.

When travel is straightforward, employees are less stressed, more productive, and better equipped. It might seem like a small change, but it can make a big difference in how supported your team feels.

Allows room for growth

Growth is exciting, but it often brings new challenges, especially when it comes to managing travel. As your company scales, so will the number of trips, employees, policies, and approvals. Starting with a travel platform now means you’re building a solid foundation that can grow with you and lead to successful corporate travel programs.

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Roundtrip — business travel made smooth

Roundtrip gives SMBs access to over 2.7 million hotels in 220+ countries. Here’s how a travel platform like Roundtrip helps you book affordable, safe, and secure accommodations for every corporate trip:

Roundtrip is the rare tool that makes life easier for everyone involved—from the CFO to the intern booking their first business trip.

Simplify your business travel

Work today is more mobile than ever. Business travel, whether it’s to meet with clients, attend industry events, or strengthen partnerships, is still a key driver of growth. For small and mid-sized businesses focused on maximizing every dollar, minimizing complexity, and staying competitive, a solution like Roundtrip is more than a convenience — it’s a modern-day corporate travel essential.

Discover Roundtrip and how we can make business travel smooth by streamlining your team’s bookings, cutting costs, and reducing stress without giving up flexibility or convenience.  

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Cover image: Photo by Jakub Żerdzicki on Unsplash