Sabre Hotel RFP simplifies hotel negotiations, drives cost savings with upgraded online interface and new hotel consulting services

SOUTHLAKE, Texas, July 18, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Sabre Corporation has launched new capabilities in its award-winning Sabre Hotel RFP solution, designed to simplify the hotel negotiation and request for proposal (RFP) process for corporate travel managers and travel agents. The upgraded solution offers a streamlined user experience across multiple processes to help increase efficiency and reduce training time for new users. The enhanced solution will be demonstrated at the Sabre booth during the 2014 GBTA Convention in Los Angeles.

In addition, Sabre is offering hotel program consulting services to travel buyers as an alternative to the self-service automation customers already enjoy. Sabre's hotel program consulting services will assist companies with everything from managing implementation to gathering industry rate trends and negotiating corporate hotel programs on the behalf of the company.

"On average, 50 percent of hotel room nights are still booked outside the managed travel program, pointing to a significant opportunity for increased cost savings for corporations. Effective negotiation is key to controlling these costs," said Alex Alt, president, Sabre Hospitality Solutions.  "Hotel RFP helps corporate travel managers and travel management companies maximize the value of their hotel spend whether they want hands-on, personal consulting services or the convenience of our self-service online solution." 

According to the GBTA, corporate travel spend continues to grow, particularly with travel from the US to international locations. As a result, travel buyers are relying on Sabre Hotel RFP to increase their global buying power to achieve better rates. Sabre Hotel RFP users negotiated for nearly $81 million in unique corporate transient room night spend last year, more than 5 percent over 2012. Also, buyers increased the amount of business awarded to hotels by nearly 10 percent – which translates to increased responses and better rates from hotels. 

As part of the development process, Sabre conducted a usability test on the new Hotel RFP interface, resulting in a 96 percent completion rate with users who had little to no training on the product.

The new Sabre Hotel RFP solution includes these additional enhancements:

• A new, easy to populate data capability saves time by giving corporations the ability to select a location and automatically see the hotels within a certain radius of that location.
• An updated Hotel Directory provides greater visibility and flexibility by allowing users to display hotel rates by market and policy level as needed.
• New navigation and structure increases corporate visibility and likelihood of hotel response to RFPs.

Sabre Hotel RFP is an online marketplace that helps corporations effectively solicit bids and negotiate rates and amenities with hotels, as well as audit the actual hotel rates received. Nearly 1,200 travel buyers use Sabre Hotel RFP to drive cost savings and increased return on investment for their corporate hotel program. Integrated with the Sabre travel marketplace, Sabre Hotel RFP allows customers to source more than 130,000 hotels, manage countless hotel bids and pull from an extensive set of reports and exports including a negotiated rate benchmark and the ability to create custom reports.

About Sabre
Sabre® (NASDAQ: SABR) is a leading technology provider to the global travel and tourism industry. Sabre's software, data, mobile and distribution solutions are used by hundreds of airlines and thousands of hotel properties to manage critical operations, such as passenger and guest reservations, revenue management, and flight, network and crew management. Sabre also operates a leading global travel marketplace, processing over $100 billion of estimated travel spend in 2013 by connecting travel suppliers to their most valued customers, the business traveler.  Headquartered in Southlake, Texas, USA, Sabre operates in approximately 60 countries around the world. www.sabre.com

Media Contact:
Heidi Castle
Sabre Inc. 682-605-4290
[email protected]

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SOURCE Sabre Corporation