what we do

Every company and organisation that travels for business needs some amount of travel category management. You need to procure, monitor and manage the services provided to you by the travel agent, the airlines, hotels, rental car firms and others. If you spend around $30 million or more annually on travel, your scale supports full-time internal travel category managers. If you spend under $100,000 or so, the downside risks and issues are obviously fairly minor. But most travel buyers are stuck in the middle.

Travel is a difficult procurement category. Even though it is probably not your largest or most business-critical area of spend, it presents problems. Firstly, it is a complex maze of inter-connected suppliers, systems, services, incentives and financial flows. Secondly, it is a classically conflicted supply chain, with powerful travel agency intermediaries funded by sales commissions ruling the roost. It is complicated and opaque.

Many buyers don’t have the resources for internal travel expertise, and instead rely upon the supply chain itself, through the travel agent, or “TMC”, to deliver fair and good outcomes. Historically, this has been costly.

Jensis offers a service in truly independent outsourced travel category management. You receive the right amounts of category expertise at the right times. The net financial result is positive.

Whether or not you are satisied with the partial and biased account management services from a TMC is becoming a moot point anyway, since most of those TMC services won’t exist post-Covid.

 who we are

Jensis is the outsourced travel category management service provided by Butler Caroye, the region’s leading independent travel procurement consultancy. Butler Caroye has been helping travel buyers since 1998. We have worked with over 100 corporates, universities and government agencies over the years, on projects ranging from $250,000 to $850 million in travel spend. Please see our clients page, and click here to see the Butler Caroye home website.

Butler Caroye’s founder and manager Tony O’Connor is also the Regional Director of the Global Business Travel Association. The Washington-based GBTA is the world’s largest travel buyers’ organisation. Click here to see the GBTA website.

Butler Caroye is a member of the PTC global travel consulting network, the world’s largest international specialist corporate travel consultancy specialising in global projects. Click here to see the PTC website.

what we are not

We are not a Travel Management Company, or “TMC”. A TMC is a travel agency that specialises in business travel. Just like leisure travel agencies, it receives over 70% of its income from airlines and hotels as sales commissions for selling their travel products. We don’t do bookings. We are a management consultancy specialising in travel procurement. 100% of our income comes from you, the travel buyer. We are totally independent of the supply chain and act ONLY in the interests of travel buyers.

Also, consulting, procurement services and supplier management are all that we do. Unlike account management services from a TMC, they are our primary and only business, and not a secondary service in support of some other profit centre. And TMC account management services are necessarily limited. A TMC cannot objectively monitor and manage that part of the travel supply chain that has by far the biggest impact on prices, service quality and risk … itself.

our proposition

Please take a look at our “3 packages” page. The idea is simple. We will manage your entire travel category for you for a monthly fee. We offer three levels of care, to best match your needs based on your own resources, your procurement strategy, and the size and complexity of your travel spend.

Because we bundle our services, we are able to offer them at a substantially reduced fee compared to bespoke consulting. However, to accommodate your circumstances, specifications, preferences and needs, there is a good amount of flexibility built into the service, especially for the higher-care packages.

The inherent risk in this type of a service is under-delivery due to over-standardisation. You have to get the balance right. We have put a lot of work into building a good model, based on 22 years of category management experience. And we consult with you openly and often to ensure that we are getting things right.

And because we are not a TMC, the hidden costs are removed, your category will be managed with full, dedicated expertise in your interests, and your travel costs will fall.

a note on covid

We think that there are two main things to say as we progress through 2021.

You will probably travel again to compete, to meet and to do business; first domestically and then overseas. It probably won’t be at 2019 levels again soon if ever. There will be positive structural social and commercial shifts resulting in less travel. But for every dollar that you do spend, and for every trip that you do take, things will be more complicated and require more management. These are summarised in the scrolling “5 issues” presentation below.

Secondly, when you do return to the skies, you will be facing a very different supply chain. Not only will many of the suppliers be gone or have their services substantially reduced, but the structure and operation of the supply chain itself will be dented and different. This will present new risks AND opportunities, needing independent expertise to navigate and optimise.

our family of services

Jensis Outsourcing is a service provided by Butler Caroye, the region’s leading independent travel procurement consultancy, since 1998. We also provide Butler Caroye Consulting for tenders, reviews and other bespoke services, Airocheck for fare and fee auditing, MandEP for meetings conferences and events procurement, and Terravium for travel sustainability services. Please click on the logos for more information.

Butler Caroye also provides substantial voluntary time to the buyers’ organisations … GBTA, PASA, Company Dime and Travel Again. Please contact us if you would like to contribute to these buyer forums.