A travel policy is a set of rules for specific groups of travelers that are enforced at the point of booking. The policy helps travelers find itinerary options that work for them and comply with your company's budget.
In SVB T&E, there is no limit on how many travel polices you can implement. You can have one policy for everyone, policies for each department or job level, or no policy at all.
Adding a Travel Policy
First, navigate to the Travel Portal of SVB T&E, by clicking Go To Travel on the Personal Sidebar.
If you do not see the "Go To Travel" link, you may not have Travel Enabled for your user profile. See How to Enable Travel for Users to turn access to Travel on.
Once in Travel, Click 'Travel Policy' under 'MANAGE' on the left menu panel.
You will be able to see all your existing policies here. To make any adjustments on current policies, simply click on them. To create a new policy, click the 'Add New Travel Policy' button.
Type the name of the new travel policy. You can check the box to designate this policy as your company's default policy for all travelers not assigned to another policy. We recommend you have one policy that you default as a catch-all for any new users.
Once you new travel policy is added, click into it to configure rules, pre-trip approvals, and notifications. Make sure to click "Save Changes" when you're done with each section!
Select which corporate cards that members of the policy can use. Cards can be authorized for air bookings, hotel bookings or both. Load your corporate cards in 'Company Settings' under 'MANAGE' on the left menu panel.
Under Air Policy, Hotel Policy and Car Policy, fill in the requirements you'd like to enforce in your Travel Policy. Any field left blank will not count toward your Travel Policy. For best practices, see Explaining Travel Policies.
Scroll down to the 'Booking Management' section to set up how you'll enforce your policy.
Flag policy violations: Show travelers which options are out of policy and why as they're booking travel. Anytime a traveler selects an out-of-policy options, they will be reminded and asked for an explanation at booking.
Require Approval: You can require approval for all bookings under the policy, no bookings under the policy or for only bookings that violate the policy. Approvers can receive approval requests via email. Approvers must approve the request within 24 hours of the booking or the travel will be cancelled because the fare cannot be held for more than 24 hours.
Auto Approve for Authorized Approvers: Automatically approve bookings made by an authorized approver.
Send Notifications for: Send an email notification for opted-in users for all bookings, no bookings, or only out-of-policy bookings. These emails are an FYI, they give updates like "John Doe booked X travel booking". Whenever approval is required, approval requests will be sent to approvers.
Assign the booking approvers and notification recipients by clicking "Add New Email Notifications". An approver is a user that will receive email notifications when a booking takes place. Then choose which types of email notifications they'll receive.
Notifications: notification of any travel booked by members of this travel policy.
Approval Requests: Emails outlining travel bookings that must be approved before being placed.
Approval Reminders: Secondary reminder emails that are sent 12 hours after the first approval request if the booking isn't already approved or rejected.
Note: Only Administrators can give approval unless they've been given approval rights with 'Approve Purchases" set to "Yes" in their Profile.
Trip confirmations are automatically sent to the traveler and booker, but you can add additional recipients in the 'Confirmation & Invoice Emails' section.
Click "Add New Email" and enter the recipient's email address. Choose whether they should receive confirmations, invoices or both. Receipts for pre-paid bookings are automatically pushed to the Expense side of SVB T&E and attached to the credit card transaction.
Finally, select all the users you'd like to add to this travel policy.
Your policy is set up! Travelers in this policy will now only be able to book travel within the limits and approval rules of this specific policy.