Whether it’s your strong suit or not, making travel arrangements for your VIPs will more than likely be an integral part of your career. What differentiates this from booking regular travel is that there is less, or no, room for error. You know that when an Executive is travelling, your phone needs to be switched on, charged and by your side 24/7. We’re not trying to provoke a panic attack, so we won’t list all the things that could go wrong ; we’re guessing that your imagination already runs wild whenever someone is away on business.

However, we are here to help ease the process. To do so, we rounded up our specialist VIP team, all with over 10 years of experience, and asked them to share some tips they have learned along the way.

If you require more information, click here and see how we can help you better your current VIP travel program.

Announce your VIP

When booking travel, always mention that your traveller is a VIP and announce their job title. Most hotels, specifically 4 or 5 star suppliers, will have their own in-house system for handling VIP guests. This can mean a myriad of benefits for your VIP, such as a personalised check-in process, extra amenities on arrival, room upgrades and late check-out. If your VIP frequents a particular hotel, you can ask them to note down some key preferences for every stay, so that if you forget to ask for it, it will already be on their file.

Keep a VIP cheat sheet

It’s time to crack out the Excel worksheets and keep tabs (no pun intended) on all your VIPs. This is the easiest way to ensure that you’ll book according to their preferences every single time. It’s also the simplest way to keep all your VIP’s requirements in one consolidated place. So create a profile for each one and start by adding some of the following fields:

• Position

• Preferred Name

• Passport details

• Preferred Car Type

• Preferred Car Company

• Accommodation special requirements

• Airline seating preference

It might be something as small as your Executive arriving to a suite with their favourite fruit awaiting them that will really set you apart.

Offer leisure options

Executives are human too and no doubt by the end of the day, they will be exhausted and in need of some downtime. Here is where you can be proactive and provide them with a list of nearby attractions, restaurants, bars or shopping precincts that they can unwind at. Based on their preferences (you should have these by now on that Excel worksheet), you will be able to compile several options that you think they will enjoy.

Create a consolidated itinerary

After you have booked all aspects of their travel, make sure you compile it all into one schedule. There is nothing worse than having five different booking confirmations and having to scramble through a carry-on when things go wrong. The one itinerary is also useful for making sure you have covered everything. Some websites/apps you can use to save time on creating travel itineraries from scratch are:

• Tripit by Concur

• Travefy

Speaking of Apps…

Even if your VIPs don’t want to download travel apps, it’s extremely handy for you to keep them at bay in case you need to quickly look or search for something. The best part is, these travel apps place real-time local alerts, transport options/delays and food and drink options in the palm of your hand, 24/7. Some great apps are:

• Waze: Waze will calculate the best route, and as traffic delays pop up, it will give you better route options.

• Time Buddy: World Time Buddy (WTB) is a convenient world clock, a time-zone converter, and an online meeting scheduler.

• Wi-Fi Finder: This app will help users locate free Wi-Fi wherever they are in the world. To find out more about these apps and see more apps like this, click here

The nature of travel is unpredictable, however if you make every effort to ensure that aspects within your control are executed impeccably, you can sleep a lot easier! If on the other hand you have been struggling with your VIP travel and you just need further assistance, then we can help! Click here to find out more about our VIP offering at QBT.