Centralized Payment of Hotel Bookings: HRS Integrates Payment Solutions From AirPlus

Cologne / Singapore, 3^rd October 2013 – Hotel Reservation Service (HRS), in cooperation with the international credit card provider AirPlus, announced that it will now offer its ‘Global Payment’ service to 35,000 corporate customers around the world as an alternative to direct payments at hotels.

The AirPlus payment solution is now integrated in the HRS’ ‘Global Payment’ service, and offers a central payment solution for hotel bookings by HRS around the world. In addition, HRS will also offer a ‘Paperless Travel’ solution, where companies may identify further saving potentials on their hotel expenses and optimize their acquisition strategy thanks to the high data quality and detailed information. Processes inside finance departments will become more efficient, travellers will profit from a simplified travel expense report and not have to pay in advance, and companies may omit travel advances for hotel stays.

As a result of the partnership with AirPlus, HRS’ enhanced product portfolio is now offering a complete service for hotel bookings, from hotel purchase to booking process and payment. “We want to offer our customers equally comfortable solutions for their hotel expenses, like they already experience with air travel expenses”, explains Tobias Ragge, CEO of HRS. “By integrating the AirPlus payment solution into Global Payment, corporate customers are now offered more transparency, and the automated processes will save time and costs.” Due to the strong global presence and direct contact to hotels, HRS and AirPlus may offer these solutions around the globe.

Global Payment: Paying with a virtual credit card

If a customer opts for the ‘Global Payment’ solution, a virtual MasterCard number will be generated and sent to each hotel booking made through the individual HRS corporate customer portal. This solution is based on A.I.D.A. (AirPlus Integrated Data and Acceptance) and may rely on the global online acceptance of the MasterCard network. The virtual credit card will ensure better control of the travel guidelines and give corporate travel management teams several new possibilities of active control in the company. Travel managers may then identify certain benefits such as breakfast, Wi-Fi or parking facilities, which will be covered by the company. At the same time, the virtual credit card acts as a payment guarantee for the hotel in case of a late arrival, for example.

All hotel expenses are then centrally billed to the integrated AirPlus company account after checkout. Up to 9 additional data entry fields such as the cost centre, personnel number or project number may be integrated into the billing document for the companies. This increase in data quality will allow easier allocation and analysis of costs incurred.

“With A.I.D.A. we offer a tried and tested as well as a central solution to HRS customers, who want to use a simple and efficient payment system”, explains Michael Fuerer, Director of Sales with AirPlus Germany. The implementation of the ‘Global Payment’ solution is free for HRS corporate customers.

Paperless Travel: Invoice processing by HRS

The focus of the further cooperation with AirPlus is the combination of booking, payment and billing data in the HRS product ‘Paperless Travel‘. With this solution, HRS supports its corporate customers in the billing process: invoices including their examination are made via the hotel portal. By centrally providing the invoice data in a digitized form separate services are listed separately and the VAT values are shown on the individual item level. The processing in the ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and invoice systems is significantly simplified.

‘‘Paperless Travel provides a valuable contribution to the further optimization of the travel expense management”, says Tobias Ragge, who is delighted and convinced that the new product will be very well received in the market. By combining the data, the partners see great potentials of foster the shared products in order to increase added value for corporate customers.