Customers of Booking.com¡¯s business travel platform now have access to off-channel booking data capture capabilities from Traxo, the two companies have announced.

The partnership will open up Traxo¡¯s email-based data parsing and reporting services to the nearly 600,000 small and midsize (SME) companies globally who are registered to use the online travel agency¡¯s light-touch business travel management tools.

The partnership adds to Booking¡¯s growing functionality for SME companies to gain visibility into business travel activities and deliver select managed travel services.

Booking took a minority stake in Serko in 2019 to deliver the Booking.com for Business platform, which is powered by Serko¡¯s Zeno tool. CWT just last month joined the list of providers to add no-fee agent services to the mix.?

With Traxo, which until now has targeted enterprise companies, Booking customers can now throw a net under transactions not made through the Booking.com for Business platform and improve visibility.?

¡°Our clients value comprehensive visibility into their travel programme. Via this partnership¡­ [they] will gain enhanced duty of care oversight, and travel data distribution tools, regardless of where bookings are made,¡± said Joshua Wood, director of Booking.com for Business, in a statement.

Traxo provides an email integration that detects travel-related information on incoming messaging. It parses that data behind the scenes and delivers it to the customer, in this case, via Booking¡¯s Zeno-powered business travel dashboard.?

¡°Basically, it boils down to two things,¡± Traxo CEO Andres Fabris told BTN about the value the partnership will deliver to Booking¡¯s customers. ¡°Full data visibility into any booking made - not limited to Booking.com. Then add portability to the data. We display it back to the owner through the Booking.com for Business dashboard and also send that downstream to a variety of endpoints.¡±

Booking has prioritised three areas to help serve its customers: duty of care, expense and value added tax (VAT) reclaim, said Fabris. But the companies are looking to add value by extending that list to a number of other business travel entities that would benefit the SME segment.?