Christmas time = travel time
What does Advent and the Christmas season have to do with travel expenses? And what can give us optimism?
What does Advent and the Christmas season have to do with travel expenses?
Probably now the articles and contributions you read are piling up, which dare to take a look back and perhaps even a cautious look forward. As is almost always the case, today we would like to look at current references to see what they have to do with our main topics; travel expense reporting and APP.
The first thing to notice is that, at least in the second half of December, there is definitely more private travel than business travel. And these trips do not go over the controllers’ desk for business trips. For them, the end-of-the-year accounting starts right after the holidays and thus a rather stressful time. With our SaaS travel expense report, we can help at least concerning our part, because in addition to the ongoing audits, our customers also have many options for reporting and controlling which can help.
Along with the topic above there is another aspect that concerns me today. Durin one of our last office breakfast meetings, as well as in my private life, there have been discussions recently in which many people revealed to have a pessimistic view. And it didn't matter whether they were looking at the last 1-2 years or forward to 2023 or beyond.
Is there reason for optimism?
Now I don't want to "strain" the Christmas story too much, even though it stands for exactly that, for optimism. Firstly, not everyone celebrates Christmas, and secondly even the people who do celebrate certainly have very different relationships to Christmas in the meantime.
I also don't want to deny that we are currently living in difficult, uncertain, or challenging times. This can relate to very different areas of Life. In the media, we are mostly informed about war, pandemics, energy and climate crises. Where is optimism supposed to come from?
I recently read a short article in which the journalist openly stated that it is of course good for his guild to be able to report on crises. That helps in the attention industry. And that's exactly why he then listed lots of points that are positive, where good things have happened. I found that very pleasant.
Maybe the Advent season with the Christmas markets, the many candles, the meetings of familiar people is a good time to practise something that can help throughout the year. If we come to rest a little, out of the stress of everyday life, we have the amazing ability to decide for ourselves where to direct our attention.
We decide which films to watch, which articles to read, whether to throw ourselves into the shopping rush or prefer a nice walk through nature.
As written above, many people travel now. They often visit parents or grandparents. This is also a wonderful opportunity. Why don't you ask your parents or grandparents again what it was really like back then? And then compare what problems the post-war generation had to deal with and what positive things came out of it. Or maybe, if they are a bit younger, they tell you about the car-free Sundays during the oil crisis in the 70s.
I do not want to relativise or deny today's challenges. At the same time, I draw optimism from the way generations before me have mastered seemingly intractable issues. Why shouldn't today's generations be able to do that?
Finally, I would like to mention a few facts that prove in our field - business travel, travel expense accounting - that sometimes things look better than you think.
Our sector was directly affected by the Corona crisis due to the restrictions on travel. We have the nice opportunity to see accurate numbers (at least for our clients).
Number of business travellers of our clients
- Increased 157% in 2021 from Q1 to Q4
- The increases in the comparative quarters of 2021 to 2022 are as follows
- Q1 by 119%
- Q2 by 122%
- Q3 by 60%
- The number of business travellers in the first three quarters of 2022 are now already 16% higher than the figures for the whole of 2021
On the one hand, this means that we have not yet reached the figures for business travel in the pre-Corona period. And for another, the figures clearly show the good recovery that has begun. That's good news for our industry at least, and it's cause for optimism.
And now it's up to you. Find some positive aspects in your environment.
For this I wish you a lot of fun and success, enjoy the Advent season, have a happy and healthy New Year and let us achieve small positive changes in many ways in 2023.
We would like this contribution to be understood as a proposal for discussion. We would be very happy to enter into direct discussion with you in an appointment or you can also write us feedback.
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