Applying booking practices

Officials should consider the following strategies to maximise value for money when booking airfares, including:

• booking as far in advance as possible
• being flexible with times
• selecting lower-cost fares where plans are certain and less flexibility is required
• considering alternative routes where this reduces the total costs.

When booking via a Travel Management Company (TMC) consultant, officials are encouraged to advise of key business requirements when booking, such as direct routing, meeting times or excess baggage requirements.

How to apply this

• start with the cheapest available option
• adjust only where there is a clear operational reason, and
• provide clear business requirements to the TMC to support booking outcomes.

Where possible, official travel should be booked as soon as the operational requirement is confirmed:

• bookings should be made at least 21 days prior to travel
• costs are likely to increase closer to the departure, particularly for international travel, and
• domestic airfares are likely to increase from 1 week prior to travel and may have limited availability during peak periods.

Entities should consider implementing strategies to encourage earlier travel bookings. This may include taking a more flexible approach to cancellation fees where it delivers better overall value for money than booking shortly before departure.

Where there is a high degree of certainty around travel times, officials must assess all fares and should consider more restricted fare types (which are typically significantly cheaper than more flexible fares).

Where there is uncertainty that a scheduled meeting will not proceed, or around the time that a scheduled meeting may conclude, officials must consider whether the additional cost of flexible fares offers better value than change or cancellation costs.

Officials are encouraged to compare fare classes and types across airlines servicing the required route. Each domestic leg (outbound and inbound) is to be considered separately.

Travel bookers are encouraged to use the Online Booking Tool (OBT) where possible.

How to apply this

• use OBT for domestic bookings and simple international travel, and
• managing bookings online is the most cost-effective and quickest way to make and update travel arrangements.

Where airfare credits exist, these should be used for subsequent travel bookings to help reduce the fare cost where possible.

For some domestic airlines, credits from rebooked or cancelled tickets are automatically applied to future bookings, depending on the value of the credit, ensuring value for money is achieved where those credits can offset future flight purchases.

For all other domestic and international airline credits, entities must actively manage and ensure credits are being applied to bookings to reduce the cost of the trip.