Booking trip for one self

[DomCB]

Hi, In my company, we have designated travel bookers who book trips for their team members.  Our travel policy says that a travel booker cannot book a trip for herself/himself.  However our travel bookers regularly book themselves on a trip by mistake.  Does anyone know if this can be prevented automatically? 

[KevinD]

@DomCB I have some good news for you. There is a solution to what you have asked. 

So, for those people booking for others, what you can do is remove the travel wizard option from their profiles. This will prevent them from seeing Travel when they are logged in, ergo they cannot book travel for themselves. However, because they have been added as the travel arranger for others, they can act for others including booking travel. A user doesn't have to have the travel permission on their own profile to book for others. 

This should solve your issue. Now, this is working off the assumption that the travel bookers themselves will never need their own travel booking, which from your description sounds like they will not. Is that a fair statement? Now, if they do need to have business travel booked and it must be done by others, there is a work around for that, but I'll only pass it on if you need it. 

Let me know if this answer helps. 

[DomCB]

Thank you Kevin, your answer is very clear.

Going back to what you wrote: " Now, if they do need to have business travel booked and it must be done by others, there is a work around for that, but I'll only pass it on if you need it. ". Indeed occasionally, a travel booker will need to travel. In this case, our process if for the travelling travel booker (A) to ask another travel booker (B) to book for the trip for travel booker A (ie "act on behalf of").  Does this make sense and is it the right approach?  Many thanks again

[DomCB]

Also Kevin, if we remove the Travel Wizard function from our Travel bookers, will they still be able to Book for a guest? Thank you

[KevinD]

@DomCB okay, so I thought you might ask that question. The answer is Yes. Even if you remove the Travel Wizard from someone, they can still book travel for someone else. 

As for the workaround I mentioned if a travel arranger needs to travel for business, you can have someone book the travel for them if you want to go that route. The other option is to create a Travel Group for all travel arrangers and then require all trips booked by anyone in that group require Approval. That way they cannot book without someone else seeing their trip and approving it. 

[DomCB · Accepted solution]

Thanks Kevin,

Unfortunately, removing the Travel Wizard from our Travel bookers mean they cannot book for a guest either (which they need to be able to do). There does not seem to be any way around this

[KevinD]

@DomCB Okay, so I was all proud of myself for having found a solution and then you dropped the Guest Booking bomb on me and dashed all my feelings of accomplishment. LOL. 

I'm confirming with others on our Travel Training team, but I believe you are correct and Guest Booking is only available if the user has Travel turned on in their profile. 

[DomCB]

@KevinD , so sorry 🙂 but you have been a great help nonetheless! 

[KevinD]

@DomCB glad I could help out.