How to set a business travel budget

1. Count trips by type

Start from what each department actually did last year, not from a headcount. Your booking reports, card statements or expense claims give you, for each department or cost center:

• how many people traveled at least once;
• how many round trips they took;
• how those trips split between domestic, short-haul international and long-haul international.

Then adjust for what you already know about next year: new hires in a traveling role, a client program starting or ending, an office opening. Keep the split by type, because a long-haul trip can cost several times a domestic one and the mix moves the total more than the count does. The planner treats short haul as under 3,700 km (about 2,300 miles) each way and long haul as 3,700 km or more, the same line the emissions estimator uses; use your own if your reports draw it elsewhere, as long as you use it every year.

2. Set a rate for each type

Fares. Use your own average round-trip fare for each type, including taxes, from the same twelve months of bookings. It's the only figure that reflects your routes, cabins and how far ahead people book. If you have no history for a type, price three or four typical trips at today's fares and say in the budget that the figure is an estimate.

Hotels. Your own average nightly rate is again the best figure. For a public reference, US companies can use GSA's FY2027 lodging rates (Oct 1, 2026 to Sep 30, 2027). Boston / Cambridge, MA, for example, runs from $213 to $365 a night depending on the month, $284.78 averaged across the year.^[1] They're federal reimbursement limits before tax, not market prices; the hotel rate benchmarks explain them and let you look up any city. For trips outside the US, the State Department publishes equivalent rates.^[2]

3. Add hotel nights

Multiply each department's trips by its average nights per trip. Day trips count as zero. A department with a few long site visits and one with many one-night meetings can have the same trip count and very different hotel bills, which is why the planner asks for nights per trip department by department.

4. Add booking fees

Put your travel management company's or booking tool's fees on their own line, apart from fares and room rates, so you can see what the service costs and compare it next year. Work them out from the provider's published or contracted fee schedule and your own volumes: people traveling each month, flight bookings, hotel bookings and changes.

silentVIP's fees are published:

• Essentials: $8 per active traveler per month, $22 per flight booking, $12 per hotel or rail booking and $15 per change or cancellation, with a $600 monthly minimum.
• Managed: $14 per active traveler per month, $30 per flight booking and $15 per hotel or rail booking, with changes included and a $2,000 monthly minimum.
• Not counted by the planner: after-hours calls ($45 each on Essentials, included on Managed) and custom export formats ($750 one-off).

The planner adds these fees using the same calculation as the cost comparison on our pricing page. We take no commissions from airlines or hotels; you pay the fees on our pricing page, and any hotel-program fee paid to us is shown on your invoice (how we're paid).

5. Allow for changes and cancellations

Plans change, and some changes cost money: airline change penalties, fare differences and nonrefundable nights. Add an allowance for them as a percentage of air and hotel cost. The most reliable way to set it is from your own history: last year's change and cancellation charges divided by last year's travel spend.

If you have no history, say so and pick a figure you can defend, then correct it after the first quarter. For counting change fees, the cost comparison on our pricing page assumes that 15% of bookings need a change or cancellation. That's an assumption, not a measured industry rate; replace it with your own share when you know it. On silentVIP, airline and hotel penalties are passed on at cost and shown before you agree, so they belong in this allowance, not in the fee line.

6. Review it every quarter

A travel budget built from averages drifts. Each quarter, compare actual spend with the budget by department and by trip type, and ask three questions: did the number of trips change, did the average fare or nightly rate change, and did the mix shift toward long haul? Reforecast the rest of the year from the answers rather than cutting evenly across departments.

In the silentVIP portal, each department can have a budget per period, compared with actual spend in reports. See Reporting & savings and the sample monthly report on our fictional demo company.

A worked example

Halden & Pike's finance lead enters an average round-trip fare of $450 for domestic trips, $900 for short haul and $2,200 for long haul. For hotels she uses $284.78 a night: the GSA FY2027 maximum lodging rate for Boston / Cambridge, MA, averaged across the year, excluding taxes.^[1] She adds a 5% allowance for changes.

With 30 people traveling in a typical month on the Essentials plan, silentVIP fees come to $12,120 a year, shown on their own line, for $367,963 in all. Fees use the change-rate assumption of 15% of bookings, not a measured rate.

Open this example

Sources

1. GSA, FY2027 per diem rates (rates file). US General Services Administration lodging rates for the continental US, fiscal year 2027, effective Oct 1, 2026 to Sep 30, 2027. Checked Oct 21, 2026, from https://www.gsa.gov/travel/plan-a-trip/per-diem-rates/per-diem-files.
2. US Department of State, Foreign per diem rates. Lodging and meal rates for official travel outside the US, by country and city, set by the State Department. Checked Oct 21, 2026.

silentVIP fees are from our pricing page.