How To Write Your Own Ticket

U.S. BUSINESSES SPENT some $143 billion on travel and entertainment in 1994, a big bill that TravelNet Inc. is out to trim with a new breed of software. The program lets employees act as their own travel agents, booking their own flights, hotels, and car rentals. Equally important, it provides managers with comprehensive information about their company's T&E spending, which they can use to cut more-favorable volume discounts with travel companies.

It works like this: Employees reserve hotel rooms and transportation directly on their office PCs, picking from a series of friendly menus. Behind the scenes, a server computer on the network communicates with SABRE, Apollo, and the other reservation systems that travel agents normally use. To make sure that employees get the best rates, the server can be programmed with data about the contracts a company may have with specific airlines or hotel chains. To help speed things along, previous reservations--perhaps for an itinerary that someone takes periodically--can be retrieved, updated, and resubmitted with a few clicks of the mouse.