Category: Business Travelers

Top Five Tips for Business Traveling

If you travel on a regular basis for business, you most likely have your own techniques when it comes to getting the best deals, packing the right clothes and getting through airport security quickly and easily. Still, there are some little-known tips and tricks that may come in handy when you travel for business, whether you’re traveling domestically or abroad. Here are five of the best little-known travel tips for business traveling.1. Get up and move on long trips.

It’s commonly known as “Economy Class Syndrome”, but it happens to travelers in business and first class as well. Its technical name is deep vein thrombosis, a blood clot that develops in the legs and can travel to the lungs or the brain. Doctors believe that a combination of conditions contribute to the syndrome, including sitting in cramped conditions for 10 or more hours, low cabin pressure, low humidity and dehydration. You are especially at risk if you smoke, have high blood pressure, or have a history of cardiovascular problems.

Get up and walk up and down the aisle at least every two hours, and be sure to remain hydrated. Remember, coffee, tea and alcoholic beverages actually contribute to dehydration. Drink water and fruit juices instead. The best way to give you an extra advantage is to book an aisle seat with extra leg room.2. Keep your eye on airline fees.

Save your company a bit of extra money by being aware of hidden airline fees. Shop around for the best rates and package deals if you need to rent a car or are traveling to multiple destinations. While boarding an airplane, keep your bags below 50 pounds.3. Take full advantage of what your hotel offers.

When you are away from home you do not have your usual connections, your hotel can help you. Perhaps you need a printer at 2 am, or reservations for a business dinner at an appropriate restaurants. At home, you would know exactly where to go, but when you are traveling, you need answers from a reliable source. A business class hotel can provide these answers and more.

Most business travelers know whether their hotel offers high spend internet and wifi connections, but hotels that deal with business travelers often take those services to a far higher level. The front desk clerk or concierge will often go above and beyond to be sure that you have everything you need for your stay, from a replacing a cell phone charger to arranging pickup and delivery of important papers. 4. Make the most of layovers.

Your best case scenario may not include any layovers, but that’s not always possible. If you find yourself in a foreign airport with time to kill, make the most of it. Many airports around the world feature special lounges and amenities for frequent and business class flyers. You can take advantage of a hot shower, a massage or a nap; plug in to recharge your laptop and cell phone batteries; put your feet up in a massage recliner. Working out may not be an option, but a brisk walk between terminals can serve the same purpose – and get your blood flowing and your brain working again.

Not traveling business or first class? Many airports offer “pay per visit” access to the business/first class lounge that will still allow you access to all the amenities offered to business and first class travelers. 5. Pack smart for safety and comfort.

Spend as much time thinking about your safety as you do about packing the right tie or blouse. Keep a “go bag” ready to go with your current prescriptions, over the counter medications that you use frequently, your health insurance information and an abbreviated medical history. Pack your own amenities kit for the plane trip, too. Bring travel socks, eye shades, an inflatable pillow and mints, as well as travel size moisturizer, toothbrush, toothpaste and mouthwash.

Five Additional Quick Business Travel Tips:

1. If you travel to the same city frequently or for extended periods, look into corporate housing instead of hotel stays. The savings could add up in just a few trips.

2. When using a pay phone at the airport, avoid isolated or poorly lighted locations, and face outward while you’re on the phone.

3. Check to see if your credit card or personal insurance covers you while driving a rented car and save the expense of rental insurance.

4. Ask at airport check-in if there are exit row or bulkhead seats available. They’re usually the last ones assigned and there’s a good chance you’ll get a better seat without the cost of requesting a specific seat.

5. Be sure to keep a photocopy of your passport and ID back at the hotel. It will make things immensely easier in case of loss or theft.

Business Travel Tips: Top 5 Business Traveler Nightmares ? and How to Prevent Them

Business travel is on the rebound. As the economy continues to grow, companies are unleashing their employees to travel to seek opportunities and work with clients and customers all over the world. Increased numbers of business travelers bring problems as well. Travel delays and other obstacles simply increase with volume, and the more you travel, the more you suffer from them.

But preparation can at least equip every business traveler with the tools to master the business travel environment and reduce or eliminate the obstacles to a successful business trip.

Here Are My Top 5 Business Travel Nightmares — And How To Prevent Or Deal With Them:

1. You’re in danger of missing your flight: you’re stuck in the security line because you didn’t know about some recent rule changes. Today, 3-1-1 is the mantra of the business traveler. If you want to carry on – remember containers of liquid holding no more than 3 ounces, all in 1 (and only 1) quart size zip lock bag. But these rules change all the time. Keep up to date on the government carry-on restrictions. It takes a few minutes at home on your computer before you head to the airport. The best resource to use is www.tsa.gov. Another alternative would be your airline’s website – if you check in on-line, then it’s just an additional click of the mouse.

2. Your flight’s been cancelled, you’re in danger of missing that critical client meeting and you’re 30th in line at the customer service desk. As a standard practice, your travel agent’s, preferred airline’s or website’s customer service number should be in your cell phone speed dial. At the first hint of a delay, contact one of them directly and ask for the flight status. They have access to information that you don’t and can start working on alternatives for you. If your flight is cancelled, there are only going to be so many seats available on alternative flights, and your objective is to get one of those coveted seats before anyone else does. One early phone call can get you there.

3. You are receiving the cold shoulder because you used the 6 words that every ticket or gate agent despises. “Do you know who I am” are the six most lethal words any passenger can use. A gate or ticket agent, unlike your colleagues or your clients or customers, doesn’t care who or how important you are. What’s important to them is your name and flight information, which they have in front of them. So leave your “status” at home. Kindness, deference, respect and a little empathy go much farther as a business traveler than self-importance when dealing with airline personnel. They are the gatekeepers with a lot of discretion, and treating them properly can make them much more interested in helping you when one of the inevitable flight problems arises.

4. You just realized you can’t rent a car (or possibly even get home) because you’ve dropped your only form of identification in the airport that’s 2000 miles away. Remember that you can’t rent a car without a driver’s license and can’t board a plane without your ID. Thus, you must keep your ticket and your ID in a secure place with easy access at all times on the road. Get something to put around your neck or, if that’s not stylish enough, try a separate case, such as the A-Way Ticket Tote. A little expenditure for something that will keep your ID in the same place all the time will be a big help in preventing a disaster or at least keep you from worrying about it.

5. You and your colleagues have been discussing a confidential strategy the entire flight only to find that your competition has been listening from the row behind you. Business colleagues typically discuss their business when they travel together, and if they are going on a trip for a specific purpose, their discussion will probably center on that purpose. But on an airplane you have no idea who is listening nearby. Just be sure that you are guarded enough that you would not be embarrassed or your business harmed if your words were published in the newspaper. Be discrete; you really never do know who is listening to you.

Making Use of the Business Travel Directory

Looking back to the days I worked as an international business consultant. I traveled between 200 and 300 days per year. In the beginning this is quite fun; going to airports, shuffle from plane to plane, meeting a lot of interesting new people, seeing foreign places and so forth. After a while it is not so fun anymore; you get used to it. After a few years as a heavy business traveler you sleep when travel but sooner or later you just get tiered of all this traveling and you decide that enough is enough. I quit as a business traveler.

Now I just travel for leisure and fun, with very few exceptions.

A business traveler might face a lot of difficulties during travel from one place to another around the world. The difference in the culture, food, mode of travel and location play an important part during the travel. The saying “information is wealth” will suit a business traveler more than any other person in real life.

The business traveler needs to get the right information from the right source if he wants to be successful in his business trip. The Business travel directory is one such resource which can be sought when a business traveler needs information on anything. There are many directories available online and a traveler may look to it when needed.

A business travel to international destination is not an easy task if you don’t get the right information needed for your travel. Airline, Car rental, hotels, maps, directions, and other information are needed by a business traveler. After you land in a destination you can’t look for a hotel during a peak season in that destination.

Then you are the one who is going to pay a lump sum for a meager hotel accommodation. Maps are needed to locate the place that you are going to visit. It would give you the confidence if you know in which direction you are going to go. A business directory is one that gives that confidence.

Restaurants near your choice of stay are also important. A good business directory for travel should be able to give you this information also. There are many websites that serve as a travel directory for the business traveler. Some of them might require you to become a member of that site if you need to use it.

Free memberships are also provided. Hard copies of business directory for travel are available in the leading bookstores in most of the business destinations around the world.