Farewell to rfps?

One company that is moving away from the request for proposal (RFP) process is the professional services organisation EY. The London-based business previously had three full-time staff members working on the hotel RFP process for around six months of the year. However, EY realised moving away from RFPS could free up time for its people to work on more valuable tasks, and would provide an opportunity to boost employee satisfaction through a broader array of travel choices. “We threw out the traditional RFP process and looked at a more dynamic programme, but still with controls in place and some fixed pricing,” says Karen Hutchings, EY’S Global Travel, Meetings & Events Leader. “The idea is to give our travellers more choice so they can in turn be more satisfied and engaged.” EY scrapped its historical RFP programme, which previously consisted of 2,500 preferred hotels and increased the coverage of hotels with EY rates to approximately 36,000. It then implemented city caps. “Our employees can stay in any property with an EY rate below the ceiling in that particular city,” says Hutchings. The city caps were determined by previous years’ data and have been tweaked up and down as appropriate. “San Francisco is a challenge right now, for example, but we can also achieve quick savings by reducing a cap by, say, 10% if we need to,” says Hutchings. “We were very open with hotels about our city caps, and that prompted them to pay attention if they weren’t getting business from us. Conversely, if we see hotels raising their rates towards our cap we have been very clear that we may blacklist them.” EY previously conducted around 4,000 RFPS annually, but that number is now down to around 500, and they’re primarily with independent hotels and properties close to its key locations with very high volumes. “We’ll still negotiate value-added benefits for our employees like room upgrades, but our EY rates must include complimentary gym access, breakfast in some cities and wifi,” says Hutchings. “Also, employees that were very brand loyal could still have an option – in a particular brand albeit at a lower category – if their first choice was above the cap.” A survey completed by nearly 300 members of staff showed 75% were more or equally satisfied with the new hotel programme. “We love it and the team love it. When we launch our RFPS this autumn all we’ll do is send out our new city caps to hotels. We’re challenging the traditional processes.”