An increasing number of professionals in India are now extending their work trips for leisure, blurring the lines between corporate and leisure travel.
According to a survey by FCM Travel Solutions, 29% of the respondents who took 1-3 business trips extended at least one trip for personal travel, while the number stood at at least four such trips for half of the respondents taking 4-10 work trips a year.
“ Bleisure (business and leisure) is a trend that we have been noticing for some time,” said Rakshit Desai, Managing Director, FCM Travel Solutions, the Indian subsidiary of FCTG, Australia.
“Historically, business travel has been highly structured and regimented. It was also policy driven. Leisure travel, particularly international travel, has been niche with very low penetration. But through the survey, we have found that some of these lines between corporate and leisure travel are increasingly blurring,” Mr. Desai said.
The employers are also responding positively to changing employee behaviour and aspirations by modifying policies, Mr. Desai added.
‘Astounding statistics’
He pointed out that ‘an astounding’ two-thirds of companies in the survey said they had absolutely no problem if employees travelling on work want to combine leisure with it, taking a day off before or after the start of the trip.
“If we [had] looked at this picture three or five years ago, it would [have looked] very different. There has been a significant change in the behaviour of corporate travellers as well as corporates that ask them to travel on their behalf,” he added.
In the survey, 65.5% respondents said they were allowed by their company to combine personal travel booking with a business trip. Only 27.6% said their company did not allow them to combine personal travel with a business trip.
A majority, 75%, agreed that the ability to combine personal travel with business trip is a perk in the job.
More than 800 corporates in the country participated in the survey, FCM Travel said, adding that all CXOs who took survey have taken at least 11 business trips in the past 12 months.
