How the top 5 travel management systems rate on sustainability

You may have noticed that travel management companies have started adding sustainability features to their offering. This is being driven by businesses that are facing increased pressure to report on their emissions and comply with the CSRD (Corporate Social Responsibility Directive). But it's not just compliance - businesses are more aware than ever about the financial and reputational benefits of taking climate action too. But whatever the incentive, its great news for the planet, because it means there are now even more ways for businesses to integrate climate tools into their everyday operations.

But as you’ll discover, not all sustainability features are created equal. We looked at the top 5 travel management systems and found that they all cover the basics such as emissions tracking. But where they fall short is offering real-time analysis of business travel emissions (and how to reduce them), or credible options to offset or reduce. In this article, we’ll give you the inside track on the top 5 corporate travel management solutions, and how they rate on sustainability. 

The top 5 travel management sustainability features:

Navan (formerly TripActions)

Navan is a travel management system and expense solution that caters to both small to medium sized businesses (30-200 employees) as well as enterprises (250+ employees). In 2022, they introduced a “Sustainability Suite” to help their customers track their carbon emissions. While these features are good for getting an overall picture of your business travel emissions, they don’t include emissions offsetting or reductions as part of the package. Here’s a look at some of the sustainability features they do offer.

Conclusion

Navan is first and foremost a travel management and expense solution, which is what they're known for, but sustainability is not a central part of their core offering. So if you’re interested in a tool that tracks your emissions, this is a great option, but if you’ve set sustainability targets and need to reduce or offset your emissions, it doesn't go far enough.

Greenperk was launched in 2020 as the sustainable add-on to TravelPerk - the travel management system based out of Barcelona serving small to medium sized companies. As a TravelPerk customer, you can get GreenPerk added to your membership, but there are some costs involved in the offsetting part of this feature.  

Amex GBT Egencia (formerly known as Egencia) is one of the world’s biggest travel management companies. Founded in 2002, it was bought by American Express Global Business Travel (Amex GBT) in 2021. When it comes to sustainability, they’re a little more like Navan than TravelPerk, because they’re more focussed on educating employees on their business travel footprint and tracking those emissions rather than reducing or offsetting.  

SAP Concur provides travel and expense management services to businesses of all sizes, although mostly larger enterprise customers. Predominantly focussed on their core area of expertise which is travel and expense management, they have some sustainability add ons, even though it’s not central part of their business, nor what they have become known for. 

Goodwings is a climate-focussed travel management system for small to medium sized businesses. It features an emissions dashboard that gives users real-time data to make more informed travel decisions in line with their company's sustainability efforts or reduction targets. 

What you can expect from Goodwings:

Now that we've explored what the market has to offer, here's a quick look at what you can expect from a sustainable travel management system like Goodwings.