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 Global Business Travel Association (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.

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.