Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | B | Business Travel News

Acceptance, staff, replacement trump other card concerns.

Article Excerpt
As new tools and enhanced reporting options abound in the corporate card market, it is still the basics that travelers and their managers value most: card acceptance, a polite and professional staff and quick replacement of lost or stolen cards.

Yet, corporate T&E cards have yielded high overall satisfaction from those using them. Eighty-four percent of 140 travel manager respondents said they are satisfied of extremely satisfied with their card programs, while only a nominal percentage said they are extremely dissatisfied. Meanwhile, 76 percent of travelers said they would recommend their payment system to another traveler, and, in most cases, card performance exceeded travelers' expectations.

When BTN released its last Service Quality survey in 1997, travel managers ranked corporate card acceptance as their highest service priority. While little has changed in their attitude--buyers still place it at the very top of their list--much has changed in the realm of charge card acceptance, as vendors aggressively have been adding merchants to their acceptance networks in recent years.

Since 1997, MasterCard International has more than doubled the number of merchants that accept its card to 30 million, while Visa U.S.A. has added 12 million merchants to its portfolio, bringing the number up to 25 million. Diners Club--with 3.5 million merchants in 1997--has added more than 5 million to its roster.

Although Diners Club historically has had the lowest acceptance, one buyer told BTN she prefers Diners over the others since the card provider only focused on such T&E vendors as air, car, lodging, meals...