As more travellers rely on installment payments in 2023, WeTravel has launched a Future Cash Flow Dashboard feature to enable travel businesses that use its platform to in real-time track up-coming installment and past-due payments to analyze their cash flow.
Available to WeTravel Pro clients–an annual, paid subscription, the Future Cash Flow Dashboard provides a comprehensive report of expected month-over-month and annual earnings. Access to the dashboard’s forecasting analytics enables travel businesses to view month-to-date expected payments, expected payments and past-due payments to provide an accurate analysis of projected revenue, enabling better financial control and revenue management.
”Last year, more than 90 percent of our clients used our Payment Plans features–including deposit and installment payments–to enable their travelers to pay portions of their trips, when it financially worked for their individual circumstances. Offering installment payments helps travel businesses to sell more, but it’s difficult for these businesses to manage and track up-coming revenue,” said Ted Clements, WeTravel’s CEO.
“Adding within our existing payment tracking dashboards a feature that enables our clients to track and analyze their future earnings will make it easier to manage their businesses’ cash flow – and better analyze their profits and losses.”
In 2023, more consumers are opting for installments and buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) payment options when purchasing travel. In a recent study, Amadeus found 68 per cent of 5,000 polled travelers confirmed that a BNPL option would encourage them to spend more on their holiday.
In DEC 2022, WeTravel surveyed nearly 200 tour operators and travel organizers in the wellness, student group, travel advisor and destination management companies categories. The survey found that more than 85 per cent of these businesses receive travellers' payments by installment, with four or more–up to eight for more than 15 per cent of respondents–installment payments being most common.
By comparison, in 2019, only 70 per cent of the surveyed businesses offered installment payments to their travelers.
While travel businesses may wish to offer their clients the flexibility to pay for trips, it adds complexity to forecasting a business’s revenue. The feature allows travel businesses to visualize past due trip payments and set up automated emails to follow up with clients who have overdue installments.
“At WeTravel, we create new features with the purpose of empowering our clients to grow. We’re excited to offer our newest feature to help travel businesses save time on tracking and managing up-coming payments, instead moving their attention where it counts – on managing a successful and profitable travel business,” said Clements.
