The vast majority of business travellers always book trips within their organisation’s travel policy, but US employees are the most likely to break these rules, according to a new study.

A global survey of 5,200 business travellers by Expedia’s travel management brand Egencia found that 82% of corporate travellers always booked within travel policy.

But this number dropped to just 62% in the US with the biggest reason being travellers’ inability to book far enough in advance to stay within their organisation’s travel policy.

Business travellers in Australia (68% compliance to travel policy), Norway (72%) and UK (73%) were also more likely to book their travel outside policy.

The most compliant business travellers were found in India, where 97% always booked within policy, followed by France, Germany and Sweden, where the compliance rate was 87% for all three countries, according to the Egencia survey.

Globally, the most common reason for booking out of policy was, again, the inability to book far enough in advance (52%) – ranking well ahead of other reasons, such as there being no advantage for the traveler to book within policy (12%), companies not enforcing policy (9%) and policies not being “clearly defined” at 4%.

Travelers’ number one complaint with corporate travel programmes was price constraints and their impact on the quality of the accommodation they could book (31%), followed by having limited upgrade options (15%).

The inability to add perks such as lounge access or fast-track security at airports also ranked in the top three factors affecting business travellers in the US, UK, Germany and Sweden.

The most important element of a programme for travelers was the ability to control bookings themselves (48%) from the initial booking stage to making any changes. This ranked well ahead of receiving specialised customer support (15%).

Wendy White, Egencia’s vice president of marketing, said:

“The days of mindless cost cutting out of a travel programme are now gone. While travel managers are still expected to deliver savings, the stakes are now much higher.

“Company culture, employer brand, capacity to attract and retain talent – these are key to the growth and success of companies. The modern travel manager knows that and will set the travel programme to play a determining role in shaping the company culture.”