Travel for work has always been one of the first places disruption shows up. Not because it's fragile. But because it's connected to everything—people, operations, supply chains, costs and growth. When something shifts globally, travel feels it immediately. Over the past months, geopolitical events have made that connection impossible to ignore.
Routes changed overnight and prices moved fast as fuel prices soared and demand shifted quickly. Perk’s proprietary intelligence reflects it clearly. International bookings to the Middle East dropped by more than half compared to last year. At the same time, demand for travel to China surged, pushing seat prices to China up by 68% and contributing to a 12% increase in global flight prices.
Yet, despite this volatility, the demand for work travel hasn’t disappeared. It has adapted. Globally, booking volumes have increased 9% from this time last year when comparing the same cohort of companies. Intra-European travel is up 11% while domestic travel continues to grow in Europe (15%) and the US (16%).
And the impact doesn’t stop at travel logistics. It quickly shows up in cost, planning and financial control.
The strategic importance of duty of care and its cost
In moments like these, companies need to act quickly. They cancel trips. Reroute employees. Make decisions that prioritize safety and duty of care.
This shift is visible in the data. In March voluntary international cancellations jumped by 28% globally, while cancellations for trips to the Middle East more than doubled, indicating companies were weighing their options to ensure their employees were out of risk.
But that’s where the catch is, especially for finance leaders: Duty of care often means absorbing unexpected costs without the visibility or control to manage them.
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Traditional travel insurance often has blind spots, especially during major global disruptions. Exclusions for major conflicts may mean businesses absorb the high cost of exercising duty of care. The gap doesn’t just create financial exposure, it also creates operational pressure. Travel management, admin and finance teams get pulled into chasing refunds, reworking bookings and policing costs in real time - classic examples of shadow work.
Recovering control and protecting the bottom line
This is exactly when the value of an intelligent travel and spend management solution comes to life. Not as a booking tool, but as a system designed to facilitate operating under pressure.
But, technology without great customer care is not enough. Especially in times of disruption, people want to be reassured that someone is taking care of them.
When you need it the most, that combination helps to manage disruption without losing control of cost, time, or visibility. It does it in three different ways:
Real-time help to regain control
When major events hit, speed and control are key. Travel management partners are known for jumping into action. They handle the immediate, time-critical changes needed to keep your people safe and get them home. While it’s easy to manage travel in-house when conditions are stable, external shocks expose the limits of manual processes.
And because these shocks end up demanding immediate attention across multiple parts of your business at the same time, having support from specialists is invaluable for regaining that control.
At Perk, we have a dedicated Customer Care Disruptions team, combining expertise from weather forecasting, operations, and disruption management that can anticipate challenges and keep travelers moving even during major events. When the news broke in late February that the Middle East airspace shut down, our customers received proactive care from our specialists within 30 minutes.
Leveraging our AI automations, we rapidly contacted thousands of customers and intelligently prioritized impacted trip IDs, ensuring our specialists focused immediately on those who needed care the most. We also opened dedicated support channels to ensure faster access to our agents for specific affected clients.
Shifting from reactive firefighting to strategic thinking
It's easy to get pulled into case-by-case solutions. One booking, one cancellation, one message at a time. But this quickly becomes impossible for small teams to manage, leading to immense pressure on your administrative and travel teams.
We help our customers shift from reactive support to proactive guidance. Our customer care team don’t just respond; they help customers understand how disruption impacts their current and future bookings, and what actions are available. This simple step saves time and provides visibility and structure for next steps.
Instead of reacting in the moment, your teams can step back, assess options and move forward with structure.
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Protecting the bottom line by adding flexibility
High-value travel management platforms help eliminate the financial risk of an unpredictable world by building flexibility into the booking itself. Because when conditions change, the cost isn’t the decision, it’s everything that follows.
Without flexibility, you're not just absorbing the fare — you're absorbing the work of rebooking, the approval chasing, and the policy exceptions that follow.
At Perk, we’ve built flexibility into the system. With options like FlexiTravel, you can change plans, up to 2 hours before traveling, without absorbing the full cost of that change, when unforeseen events take place. And importantly, without creating more work.
The means enhanced duty of care, with less cost leakage, less shadow work and more time for real work.
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Putting your travelers safety first. Learn how today.
Methodology Notes:
The data included is based on Perk's proprietary travel booking data. The data was extracted on 2nd April and covered March 2026 bookings made between 2nd March and 31st March. Year-on-year comparisons are done by using the March 2025 equivalent period (03 March to 31st March, 2025).
The data extracted compares the same cohort of long-term Perk customers, who have been with Perk the entire period from March 2025 to March 2026.
All calculations on price of flights are done in USD. The data used for Middle East includes: Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey and UAE.
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