Case Study: Duty of Care During a Global Pandemic

In times of crisis, it is paramount for public and private entities to ensure the safety and secure passage for travelers away from home. A public university, home to 30,000 students, trusted the CTP team to assist students requiring return from study abroad, most of whom did not book the original trip with CTP.

In response to the COVID-19 global pandemic in early 2020, the CTP team and the University were presented the need to enact business continuity protocols and support travelers affected by rapidly changing travel restrictions and public health guidelines.

Specifically, the University required:

• Emergency consultation and booking from Level 1 and 2 countries impacted by the Coronavirus affecting approximately 500 travelers
• Most affected travelers were unprofiled in this unmandated program setting
• As repatriation of affected students required one-way travel originating overseas into the US, likely within 72 hours or less, CTP established a passcode for traveler authorization and processing. This allowed these bookings, which would normally be flagged for fraudulent activity review under normal circumstances, to proceed
• Distributed the latest carrier information, capacity updates, and rebooking channels to our agent teams to ensure the most robust availability and best routing options presented to each student in light of specific country of departure restrictions
• Agents handled this situation with sensitivity, directing students, as well as parents and loved ones, to local outlets regarding information on quarantine processes or regulations specific to the students country of departure
• Provided students and parents and loved ones escalation contacts both from the University and from the CTP team

 

CTP assisted with 264 bookings for returning study abroad students in just 5 days, and received the following feedback:

• Mother of a student abroad says, “You are a blessing in such a difficult time. I do not know what we would have done to get her home.”
• Study abroad student says, “Your agents were amazingly helpful, gave me great options, and got me ticketed right away!”
• Father of a student abroad says, “God bless you! We have been completely unable to contact the airlines through all of this.”

In responding to this unprecedented global event, the University is reviewing travel policies to increase adoption and visibility for future bookings.

 

From the Travel Manager:

“I’d like to personally thank Patrick, Jeff, and all the dedicated CTP agents and staff who brought our study abroad students home, even when CTP didn’t make their original travel plans… We’ve had several units reach out about moving their college or department travel to CTP. Once we’ve returned to our offices, I’ll be inviting Patrick, Jeff, and Morgan back to campus to review the exceptional customer service CTP provided during this pandemic, what CTP could have done to minimize the chaos if the University had a managed travel program in place, and what we can do to better prepare ourselves in the future.”