Online collaboration and hybrid work environments have been critical to the continued success of businesses in a post pandemic environment. Despite these changes, travel and expense for corporate travel hasn’t moved with the times. Travelers must use and switch between multiple platforms and apps to log-on, search, book, pay and expense.
Now, what if everything could be simplified and in one place?
Amadeus, in partnership with Microsoft, is taking the first step in their joint vision to redefine corporate travel: Cytric Travel & Expense, the Amadeus online booking and expense management tool, is now embedded in Microsoft 365 – introducing Cytric Easy. Users can plan trips and share travel details with colleagues without ever leaving their day-to-day applications such as Microsoft Outlook or Microsoft Teams.
Booking business travel will be faster and easier than ever before as users can search, compare, or book a hotel, flight, or car rental – without ever leaving Microsoft Teams. It will be the only tool embedded into Teams with the ability to share trip information easily with your colleagues.
The tool will minimize the time spent discussing trips with colleagues, allowing users to share trip components with colleagues and enjoy connecting and collaborating on trip.
There are further plans to add an Outlook calendar invites which will populate relevant data before starting the search process, such as preferred departure location, destination based on meeting location and dates. Flight search results will show recommended options based on flight convenience, price, and users’ preferences (for example, stop-over airports to avoid).
The shortest, cheapest, and greenest options will be highlighted. Teams will send users prompts to visualize unassigned receipts, complete their expense reports, and file them on time. All of this will be done using Microsoft’s Single Sign-On service across your workplace ecosystem to access all travel and expense needs.
This all means less disruption to the user’s workflow, and less hassle logging in and toggling between apps, the traveler just needs to login to Microsoft and they’re ready to go.
“Working with Microsoft this past year, our focus has been to reinvent corporate travel. With Cytric now embedded into Microsoft 365, toggling between applications will become a thing of the past, leading to improved productivity, and easier compliance with travel and expense programs. Most importantly, this collaboration with Microsoft simplifies decades’ old processes that impact departments across finance, procurement, and travel. This is just the first step in our joint vision to transform the travel and expense experience” says Rudy Daniello, Executive Vice President Amadeus Cytric Solutions.
“The integration of Cytric into Microsoft 365 will make the traveler experience more fluid. The ability to book plane tickets or manage travel expenses without leaving everyday collaborative applications will help make the process smoother for users, making travel easier and eliminating some of the usual booking challenges” said Eric Bailey, Global Travel Director for Microsoft.
The ambition of the partnership between Amadeus and Microsoft is to reimagine travel, including the way users meet, collaborate, or claim expenses. The two companies will continue working together to foster collaboration and empower employees with a new hybrid way of working.
