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When it comes to travel for work and your responsibilities as an HR manager, an airport lounge or hotel lobby becomes an extension of your workplace. The average business traveler takes 6.8 business trips every year. And it’s down to you to make sure that every employee, on every business trip, feels safe and secure.
But it needn’t be stressful to manage. By creating a corporate travel safety policy, you’ll be equipped to make sure every business trip is a success.
By following the steps below and downloading our travel risk management policy checklist, you can create a simple employee travel safety policy to help you to identify risk and provide clear guidance on enjoying a safe working environment, even when away from the office.
What is a corporate travel safety policy?
In simple terms, a corporate travel safety policy is a defined set of guidelines to support your employees’ safety when they’re on business trips. It ensures that every time a worker has to travel, they feel supported and safe, but not micromanaged. It’s about instilling confidence in your team, so they feel ready to travel wherever you may need them.
By creating an employee travel safety policy, you’ll also ensure you’re fulfilling your responsibility to look after workers’ safety and wellbeing. A strong policy will help you to manage unexpected risks, set expectations early and make travel more comfortable for your employees.
Benefits of a strong travel safety policy
Ensures you’re compliant with health and safety legislation and your duty of care
Eliminates shadow work by streamlining travel processes
Manages unexpected risks
Sets employee expectations
Empowers your team to travel with confidence
What is duty of care for business travel?
When an employee travels for work, your duty of care towards their safety is exactly the same as if they were working in the office or at home. US employers are required by the Occupational Safety and Health Act 1970 to ensure employees are safe during business travel. This includes taking reasonable, practical measures to reduce the risk of harm when an employee is traveling for work.
If you’re unsure about your legal and ethical responsibilities to employees who are traveling on business, find out more in Perk’s complete guide to duty of care for business travelers.
How to create an employee travel safety policy
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Assess and record the risk
For every work trip, you are legally obliged to assess all risk factors. This includes general travel risks like lost or stolen documents, and location-specific risks such as civil unrest.
You’ll also need to consider safety risks such as the country’s political situation or the likelihood of extreme weather events, and how the medical system functions if your employee becomes ill. The US government provides up-to-date travel advisories on foreign countries, and it is a useful place to start when considering risks specific to a destination.
All of the above might affect business travel insurance coverage too, so double-check policy details and note any restrictions.
Consider cultural differences
Is an employee traveling to a country where any local laws differ significantly from those where they usually work? Identify these factors and discuss them with your team, allowing time to review, discuss and adjust. It’s also worth considering unfamiliar business etiquette, such as different attitudes to business dress, tipping culture or negotiation styles. This will help your employees to navigate different cultures more easily.
Particular care must be taken if the employee is part of a minority group, which may affect their risk factor when traveling. For example, the US government provides specific travel advice for women traveling alone.
LGBTQIA+ people are also at risk when traveling, as several countries have laws against homosexuality and gender nonconformity. Consider this when you are assessing risk factors for travel. Ensure that employees are comfortable and feel safe to travel, provide extra precautions and guidance where necessary and encourage an open and confidential dialogue throughout their journey.
Remember, every employee is an individual
When assessing business travel risk, it’s crucial to consider each employee as an individual and any personal factors that may affect their experience of traveling for work. This could be a medical condition that will need to be managed during a long-haul flight, consideration for care responsibilities at home or making sure an employee has access to a prayer space whilst they’re away.
Some people may find it harder to be away from the comfort of their home routine, or find traveling particularly tiring. Get ahead of potential travel anxiety by giving teams the chance to air any specific concerns prior to travel, so support systems can be put into place.
Safety-proof the booking process
For their own safety, it’s important that employees can only book a business trip using a company-approved booking tool. This ensures that everyone sticks to defined parameters when choosing airports, transfers or accommodation providers. For example, if an employee is traveling to an area with a risk of extreme weather, you might favor a certain hotel chain due to enhanced safety features on-site.
A corporate travel booking platform is the simplest way to manage this, so employees can use it to book every part of their work trip, from car rental to flights. You can then rest easy that every part of the journey is compliant with your internal travel policies.
Once an employee has made a business travel booking, all trips should be approved by a team lead, who can assess any risk factors and approve final choices.
Set expectations and communicate them
It’s a delicate line to walk between keeping employees safe whilst they’re working away from home, but not wanting them to feel like their autonomy is limited. Set expectations pre-trip, such as how often to check in with you and any expense restraints to be aware of.
For managing multiple employees across several locations, staying connected via a corporate travel tracker, gives you full visibility of every employee’s itinerary and trip progress.
Develop an alcohol use policy
The key here is to be precise about your expectations. If you don’t want to permit any alcohol use during work hours or work events, make this clear. If you would like to permit alcohol expenses in some instances, set some boundaries. This could take the form of a three-drink limit per evening, for example.
Keep travel documents safe
Instead of expecting employees to travel with hefty travel wallets full of paper that can be easily misplaced, ensure that they upload all travel documents, such as passports or travel insurance documents, to your corporate booking platform. Everything from hotel confirmations to dinner bookings will also be stored there.
Define support for emergency needs
There are many reasons why employees might need your assistance whilst they’re away on business, from canceled flights to sickness. Defining emergency procedures ahead of time will allow everyone that little extra peace of mind.
To get ahead of any issues, Perk users are alerted to real-time travel updates on incidents that could impact business travel, such as transit strikes or bad weather. By pairing this with a detailed emergency response plan, employees will know exactly who to contact if the worst happens.
In your emergency response plan, be sure to include:
Details of multiple emergency contacts
Insurance coverage details
Specific procedures for security threats or natural disasters
An outline of how the employee should report any incidents and what you as a travel manager will do to support them
Local embassy details
Travel risk management checklist
Assess general risk when traveling, such as lost documents or booking cancellations.
Assess location-specific risks (civil unrest, risk of extreme weather).
Identify minority risk factors and consider specific risks for women traveling alone or LGBTQIA+ employees.
Review personal employee risk factors, such as medical history.
Evaluate how the medical system functions at the end destination.
Ensure business travel insurance covers the specific destination and activities, noting any restrictions.
Identify local law differences.
Review any significant business etiquette differences.
Provide opportunities for employees to voice concerns prior to travel so support systems can be implemented.
Mandate approved travel booking tools.
Set communication protocols to define how often employees should check in.
Define expense restraints.
Define and communicate alcohol usage policy.
Create an emergency response plan.
Download a .PDF version of the checklist.
Create your employee travel safety policy with Perk
With a little forward planning, you’ll be on your way to a happy and confident team of traveling employees, who feel assured that you’ll be there for them if the worst were to happen.
Help your team feel at ease when traveling for work and make sure you’re meeting duty of care requirements by using Perk’s easy-to-use travel risk management policy checklist, and then request a demo to see how Perk can enhance your travel management processes.
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