What are the challenges of buying airline tickets in bulk?
When purchasing executive bulk tickets, it’s likely that you’ll come up against time-consuming processes and complex logistics. From coordinating travel itineraries to accommodating the unique needs of individual travellers, you’ll often face the following challenges.Insufficient ticket availability
Airlines have a restricted number of seats available for each flight. When buying executive bulk airline tickets, finding enough seats to accommodate your group can prove challenging—especially during peak travel seasons or when travelling to popular destinations.While the advance purchase of tickets can help, it can still be difficult to find available seats for all passengers on the same flight, or even the same day.Inflexible booking policiesPurchasing executive bulk tickets often means facing certain limitations on changes, cancellations and refunds. Airlines have specific policies in place for group bookings, which can limit your flexibility when it comes to making adjustments.This lack of flexibility can be inconvenient, especially when dealing with last-minute cancellations or changes.Coordinating travel requirements and preferences
Regardless of whether your passengers are frequent travellers, coordinating travel dates, preferred airlines, seat preferences, and other travel needs for each passenger can be incredibly complex to synchronise when making group airline bookings.Many airlines will also charge additional fees for amendments that are made at a later date.Communicating with a large group of travellers
Keeping everyone in the group informed about flight details, itinerary changes, check-in information and even sending out boarding passes to the right people can be difficult when dealing with a large number of travellers.4 Ways to purchase airline tickets in bulk
Depending on whether you’re organising corporate travel or booking airline tickets for a leisure trip, there are several ways of buying airline tickets in bulk. To streamline the booking process and purchasing experience, let’s explore the best ways to buy airline tickets in bulk according to your needs.For business travel: Use a travel management platform
When buying bulk airline tickets for business travel, emailing airlines or calling reservation desks to buy tickets isn’t practical. As well as being a waste of time, these methods won’t ensure you get the best deals on airfare.Looking to secure the best prices for group air travel? Using a travel management platform like TravelPerk not only helps you save money but streamlines the entire process of purchasing executive bulk airline tickets.As an all-in-one solution, TravelPerk offers a range of features to facilitate seamless business travel. In fact, our Group Bookings service takes care of every step of the process, leaving no margin for oversights.With TravelPerk’s group booking solution, travel managers and travellers benefit from:- Not switching between airline booking portals and accounting systems—everything can be managed from the TravelPerk platform, including integrated travel policy and approval flows
- Negotiated ticket rates based on your business needs, no matter where passengers are travelling
- A consolidated booking and expense management process in one simple interface—plus, air travel costs are automatically added to your expense sheet
- Integrations with existing loyalty programmes
- Flexible and transparent cancellation policies
- 24/7 business travel assistance for travellers, with a target 15-second response rate from the 7* customer care team
- TravelCare, a travel safety and alerts system
- Trip Assistant—a mobile app available on iOS and Android—that stores all trip information in one place, even when passengers are offline
How to book group flight tickets with TravelPerk
- For groups of more than 10 people, travel managers can submit a request via TravelPerk’s concierge box. Our specialist team will then negotiate rates for the group booking based on your needs and requirements.
- For groups of less than 10 people, you can book directly via the TravelPerk platform and benefit from preferential, negotiated rates.
Top Tip: Planning a company offsite or event that involves travel?
TravelPerk can help you organise the event itself. From booking a venue to arranging accommodation, our Meetings and Events team has you covered. Schedule a free demo with our specialist team now.For leisure travel: Use a travel agent
When making travel plans for leisure trips, travel agencies can help streamline the process of picking a date that works for everyone, deciding on a location and booking group airline tickets.Often, travel agents have relationships with various travel partners, including airlines, to help you make plans, find cheap business-class tickets, accommodate each individual’s needs and buy bulk airline tickets that suit your requirements and fit your budget.Buy directly from the airline
Whether you’re travelling for business or leisure, you can also buy bulk flight tickets directly from major airlines such as Delta and British Airways.Before you make a decision on which airline to travel with, get in touch with a few operators to compare prices and policies. While some airlines might provide bulk discounts, they may have stricter group booking policies. Some airlines also offer flat-rate tickets which can be used as frequently as you want within a limited time frame.However, buying group tickets directly from airlines is an extremely time-consuming task, and they might not be as cheap as you were expecting. Plus, you’ll need to double-check that they can fully accommodate the group booking and manually add each passenger’s details.Use a travel meta-search engine such as Skyscanner, Agoda or eDreams
It’s also possible to use travel meta-search engines to find good deals on bulk airline tickets. These engines allow you to enter your desired travel dates, departure and arrival airports and number of passengers, and some enable you to specify that you are looking for bulk airline tickets or group travel options. You can also enable price alerts via these engines to track fluctuations in ticket prices to help you book flights when prices are lower.However, this option is also very manual, doesn’t guarantee that all travellers will travel together or at the same price, and may involve various surcharges. Plus, these platforms are third-party providers and lack the capability to assist with any problems that arise. This means that you would still have to reach out to the airlines directly, resulting in a poor customer experience.What information do I need to gather?
Booking executive bulk airline tickets with a travel management platform couldn’t be easier. But, to speed up the process and minimise oversights, collect the following passenger and travel information beforehand.The number of passengers travelling
Before you start, verify how many passengers will be making the journey, and double-check whether all passengers will be taking both the outbound and return flights to make sure you buy tickets for the right amount of travellers and avoid any unnecessary expenses.Departure and destination information
Booking executive bulk tickets is simple when the entire group departs from and arrives at the same locations. However, in cases where some travellers have different plans, such as not making a round-trip, you’ll need to make a note of this before you purchase tickets.Details of any special requirements
Request passengers to provide information on any special requirements they may have, such as accessibility needs, dietary restrictions or the need for onboard assistance.TravelPerk's group booking solution: The best way to buy group airline tickets
Want to put an end to the complexity of booking executive bulk tickets? Unlock the power of TravelPerk's Group Booking solution and enjoy the perks of negotiated rates, ensure passengers can travel on the same day and flight at the same price per seat, and find peace of mind with a simple, unified cancellation policy.
Whether you’re booking a trip to Hong Kong, New Zealand or New York, take the administrative weight off your shoulders and book your next group business trip with TravelPerk. Request a free demo and learn how to streamline group air travel with one of our travel experts today.?)
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