Business travel management is multifaceted. You have to pick the most suitable facilities for the job, make sure traveling employees are comfortable enough to work effectively, all while staying within the parameters of your travel policy.   While that is enough to tire anyone out, one thing that employers cannot skimp out on is employee safety. Every time an employee goes for a business trip, their safety is their employer’s responsibility. And travel often comes with a degree of risk; accidents, muggings, and political insecurity can break out at any time. That’s where duty of care and travel risk management come in. So, what’s the difference between them?   Well, duty of care refers to the employer’s moral and legal obligation to keep employees safe. Whether they are in the office or out traveling on company business, their health, safety, and security is the company’s responsibility. Travel risk management, on the other hand, refers to whatever strategy or policy the company uses to fulfill its obligation to the employees. It is, in short, the plan that the company will roll out to ensure employee safety during business trips.   The thing with duty of care is that most countries don’t have any laws or regulations to quantify what duty of care entails accurately. But the question is, how can the company control factors that are entirely out of its control? Is it responsible for every incident or accident that happens to its employees?   Andrea Tsakanikas, an experienced travel manager and President of CrewFacilities.com, explains that there are no set answers to such questions, and they are mostly determined by case law. Each company is unique, so you would have to define your duty of care before you set up a travel risk management plan. What do you feel you owe your employees in regards to safe travel? Involve the employees and stakeholders to get varied opinions and to make sure they feel included.   Once you’ve defined your duty of care, it’s time to draw up a travel risk management plan. This usually starts with a risk assessment of your major travel markets. Find out and evaluate the risks involved in the markets and think of ways to reduce them. It is a continuous process that varies by the current political climate, time of year, and other factors.   After that, you’ll have to talk to your employees about how they can handle and respond to the risks, should they come up. You can then customize your travel policy to help reduce risk. Finally, make sure you insure against unavoidable risks like natural disasters.   Companies are becoming increasingly aware of their duty of care, and as this survey found, businesses are putting more thought into traveler safety and travel risk management. With enough research and education, you can roll out an effective travel management plan that will ensure traveler safety. At CrewFacilities.com, we regard ourselves as partners to our clients in ensuring that they execute their duty of care responsibilities to a level that is without reproach. You therefore have no need to worry once you hire us as your travel management company.