Speedy response times are a key requisite of a TMC’s customer service, but not at the expense of accuracy and professionalism. Think of the VIP traveller stranded at an airport calling up expecting someone who already knows the situation, or the rebooking that needs policy sign-off 20 minutes before the last seat goes. Speed without structure doesn’t just frustrate travellers; it erodes the trust that corporate clients are renewing contracts on. Here’s how to manage it better:

1. Centralised communication

Fragmented context is where TMC service falls apart fastest. When a traveller’s rebooking request comes into reservations@ while their account manager is fielding a separate escalation through a client-specific alias, nobody has the full picture, and the traveller ends up calling back before anyone has realised the situation has moved.

Bringing everything into one shared thread changes that. Not a ticket summary or a CRM note, but the actual conversation, with every update visible to everyone who needs it. Teams co-ordinate directly within it, decisions are logged as they’re made, and the traveller gets one coherent response instead of a duplicate call or a request to start over.

2. Clear ownership and assignments

Most service breakdowns don’t happen because nobody cared. They happen because nobody was clearly responsible. A disruption case that crosses into the overnight shift without a proper handoff leaves the incoming consultant starting from scratch at exactly the wrong moment.

Clear ownership means one named person is accountable for every conversation, with transfers tracked as part of the workflow rather than handled via a forwarded email. When a conversation comes in, it’s assigned immediately. If it sits past a defined threshold without action, it escalates automatically and visibly. Either someone owns it, or it’s flagged as at risk.

3. Workflow automation and routing

Inconsistent routing is where SLAs quietly bleed out. Priority accounts sit in a general queue, and agents re-triage work that should never have landed with them in the first place.

Automation fixes the routing layer. You set rules based on what actually matters: urgency, account tier, request type. A VIP rebooking after a cancellation hits the priority queue immediately. A standard cancellation moves through an AI-assisted draft with a quick human review before it goes out. The repetitive work gets handled at speed; the judgment calls stay with the consultants who know how to make them.

4. Real-time visibility and dashboards

The problem with end-of-week reports is that by the time they land, the damage is done. A queue building on Tuesday afternoon doesn’t surface until Friday, by which point three clients have already chased.

Real-time dashboards give leaders a live view of which queues are growing, which conversations are ageing, and where ownership has gone quiet. For support teams, that means catching SLA risks before they breach. For ops leaders, it means spotting misrouted tickets or uneven workload during a disruption spike without waiting for someone to flag them. Stewart Travel Management runs a 39-minute average response time against a 90-minute SLA. That comes from seeing what’s happening in the moment, not in retrospect.

5. SLA tracking and reporting

Tracking SLAs and operationalising them are two different things. In travel, steady-state averages only get you so far. The real test is whether your team holds the line when a weather event causes inbound volume to triple within an hour.

Done properly, SLA management turns deadlines into active guardrails. Each conversation carries a deadline tied to customer tier or enquiry type, with warnings surfacing as those deadlines approach. When a threshold is crossed, escalation triggers immediately, not on Friday’s report.

That gives leaders visibility into which commitments are at risk, which teams are running hot, and whether the root cause is capacity, routing, or ownership. SLAs stop being numbers to report and start shaping how your team works, especially on the days when everything is happening at once.

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