With more than one-third of the global population being put under certain restrictions due to the global pandemic, there have been speculations about the travel industry facing a serious decline. However, a recent survey conducted by FabHotels, among more than 500 industry leaders managing travel within their organizations, states that business travel is likely to bounce back sooner than most people expect.
According to the survey titled ‘State of business travel post-Covid-19’ taken by over 500 respondents, 80 per cent respondents expect the business travel to resume to pre-Covid levels in their organization with 6 months post lockdown.
India’s hotel market is more than $10 billion in size. The global pandemic is expected to leave corporate businesses with less money to spend on travel, lodging, and entertainment. The survey by one of the leading hospitality chains, which was conducted among its leading corporate partners found that 58 per cent of corporates expect a reduction of 15 per cent or more in the travel budget. 19 per cent expect a reduction of less than 15 per cent, while 24 per cent corporates expect travel budgets to remain the same post the lockdown is lifted.
While one-third of respondents said they would not move employees to lower-tier hotels to save expenses, the other two-thirds said they are expected to make this transition to reduce their travel budgets.
This survey covered companies across sectors ranging from IT to Pharmaceuticals, and IT to FMCG. Nearly half of the respondents in this survey had employee strength of more than 500 permanent employees. More than 10 per cent of employees travel more than once a month at 45 per cent surveyed organizations. Not surprisingly, hygiene and sanitization at the hotels are going to become extremely critical in the decision-making process of corporates. A very high 93 per cent of respondents said they are likely to switch from unbranded to branded hotels post lockdown for better hygiene and sanitization requirements for their employees. 88.4 per cent respondents said they are likely to revaluate their budget hotel partnerships post lockdown.
Commenting on the survey results, spokesperson of FabHotels, Mr. Vaibhav Aggarwal, Founder & CEO stated in the official release: “FabHotels has been at forefront of understanding and fulfilling requirements of business travelers pan-India. Our partnerships with some of the largest enterprises are a testimony to that. We feel delighted that even in this grim environment, our enterprise partners are upbeat about a swift recovery in business travel at their organizations. Post lockdown, we once again intend to serve our customers in the best manner possible by providing industry-leading hygiene and sanitisation standards.”