HRS introduces workforce travel tool

Accommodation and payment technology company HRS has launched a new tool to help project managers improve the way they manage crew travel.

HRS’s Workforce Travel platform is targeted at companies sending crews on location for long periods of time, such as those in the construction, energy, media and mining industries.

The platform uses AI and automation for procurement, booking, digitised invoice reconciliation and payments for this type of travel. It offers travel managers the ability to receive detailed reports from project managers, or whoever is in charge of crew travel.

Vincent Campana, chief revenue officer for HRS’s business ventures unit, said: “When you get into workforce, these are crews that are away for extended periods of time and it’s not an easy booking.

“They are at times in secondary and tertiary markets. You’re moving multiple crews at different times and there are contractors. They’re all coming in at different times, and then you have the complexity of when someone doesn’t arrive on time because of a delay, or you have to swap them out.”

The tool automates much of what traditionally has been a manual process for users. Travel managers in many cases have little visibility into or jurisdiction over crew travel management or spending, explained Campana, but the platform will offer them more detail into spending due to folio automation.

The platform uses a corporate’s own or HRS’s negotiated accommodation rates and provides the best options for each group within a project, recommending the top five hotels. Managers can alter preferred options based on project requirements, including offering specific recommendations based on the status of the individual traveller.

Automation enables the booking, management and payments for each team, according to HRS. While the technology monitors bookings across projects to prevent double bookings of teams and/or individuals.

A user can also replicate projects if needed; for example, when a crew heads to a city for a film shoot and needs to return a few months later. The user can recreate that crew list from an archive, and if there are any changes, they can swap out the crew in full or individual names, added Campana.

HRS began piloting the programme in the fourth quarter of 2023 with a large rail provider and has since expanded it to different verticals.