Sabre recently commissioned a study on the ROI for GetThere. The study was conducted by Forrester Consulting one of the Forrester Group of Companies. So we are clear this is compensated work which Sabre controlled. The study purported to show that GetThere had:
# An ROI of 285%, with an almost immediate breakeven point (payback period) after deployment
# Travel savings due to a decrease in overall transaction costs per travel booking
# Travel savings due to stricter enforcement of travel policies and the greater availability of flights on the Sabre GDS
# Labor savings due to the increased productivity of internal travel staff
Total Economic Impact Study - GetThere on Sabre
However I believe the study is fundamentally flawed. The methodology does not take into consideration significant factors that should be considered in the adoption of a tool such as GetThere.
Various studies have examined the relationship between work compensated vs work uncompensated. Most workers particularly Americans now admit to working during their holidays and leisure time staying connected to the office and the corporation turning a 9-5 job into a 7x24 hour job.
And this is the rub of my point. The cost - both real hard dollars and uncompensated time was ignored.
Factor 1: At no time in the study did Forrester consider either the number of hours that had passed from the professional travel booker to the unprofessional amateur executive thereby either depriving the company of the use of productive time (IE doing his job) or doing it outside of his job in uncompensated time.
Factor 2: A further element was not discussed in that the efficiency of the trips booked and the true cost comparison with what a professional agent might be able to get vs the unprofessional executive might miss resulting in potential savings being missed.
Factor 3: Another flaw is the error rate - the number of mistakes made by the average traveller vs those made by a professional travel consultant is not accounted for. Further if the mistake is made by the professional service provider often they have to eat the cost of the mistake. In the self service environment this cost is born by the corporation. It is estimated that more than 2% of all travel is booked erroneously. (Wrong days, wrong locations, inefficient locations resulting in missed appointments etc etc).
Actually not to split hairs but the Sabre sponsored study is flawed in that its calculation of cost savings is slightly off. The study showed a higher number of hours 2080 which didn't account for holidays and days off. Typical corporations allow 10 days of vacation a year plus holidays (9) and then often sick or ancillary days off (4). This accounts for a total of 1896 hours worked much closer to the real number than Forrester's study would indicate. A little? well its a 10% discrepancy.
If the real cost of the executive's time was factored in I believe - and have always done so - that the true cost of misdirected time (Factor 1) was that on average double the time would be taken by the executive at a truly loaded cost of $250 dollars per hour. (Note depending on the corporation this loaded may actually be significantly higher). This would reduce the ROI to negative. In my opinion the time taken to make a reservation using a tool vs the speed with which a professional travel consultant would use to make a reservation would be a significant factor. So for the sake of a simplistic comparison I have drawn together the compensating factors which I believe should be added back into the analysis as a true cost.
The calculation on labor savings in the example given is that the cost of 2 people would now be 4 person's worth of time - times (my reduced) number of hours of 1896 times the loaded cost of $250 per hour. making a total of $1,896,000. This compares to the net savings (Page 20 Table 16 and 17) of the study of (pre-risk adjusted) $1,874,086.
Note that I have not calculated in the other factors 2 and 3 nor the amount of time that is potentially spent by other workers (admins etc) in assisting in the process. There is no factor allowed for executive annoyance. Nor am I claiming that this is a fully scientific study since no time and motion study has been undertaken. However since the study ignores the fact of the cost of the Executive's labour - I believe the total study to be flawed and at the very least the study should have pointed this factor out.
Bottom line - I believe the study needs to be considered in full context. By leaving out the issue of the Executive's time - the study is fatally flawed and the extravagant claims made by Sabre should be toned down significantly.
Consider this next time you are sitting in front of your screen and frustrated with making that booking.....
Cheers
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