Forecasting and predictive insights are the missing data link for corporate travel buyers: Nearly half of buyers not fully satisfied with TMC data

Forecasting and predictive insights are the key metrics over a third (34.65%) of US-based corporate travel buyers think TMCs are missing when it comes to reporting on the data they need to monitor, manage and forecast for their travel programs.  

This is the latest insight from research conducted with over 200 buyers across North and South America. 

Buyers were asked to select from a multi-choice list the data sets they felt TMCs were missing. Released today by Business Travel Show America, the top five missing categories are: 

• Forecasting and predictive insights – 34.65% 

• Traveler behavior and preferences – 32.67% 

• Compliance / leakage data – 28.71% 

• Supplier performance – 28.22%  

• Real-time traveler tracking data – 23.76%  

Room for TMC data improvement  

In addition, buyers were also asked to what extent their TMC provides the data they need to monitor, manage and forecast their corporate travel program. 

While 16% stated their TMC provides all the data they need and over a third (39%) confirmed TMCs provide most of the data they need, nearly half (42%) of buyers are not fully satisfied with the data provided by their TMC. This suggests there is still work for TMCs to do to ensure the data they are providing is both accurate and fit for travel program management and planning purposes.   

Commenting on the results, Tami Pharr, Senior Corporate Travel Program Manager, Zillow said: “Programs are being asked to manage forward, not report backward - and that's a different data requirement entirely. I've spent real cycles getting TMC data into our own warehouse and dashboards, because the reporting portal a TMC provides and the questions a program actually needs to answer are rarely the same thing. Until that gap closes, buyers will keep building the forecasting layer themselves.” 

Additionally, Pharr said, data quality becomes a more fundamental concern even if the TMC data reporting categories were in order. 

“The data sets buyers say are missing matter, but none of them are worth much until the data you already receive is clean, consistent, and defined the same way every time. AI has changed what I can do with travel data. I recently had an AI assistant condense two years of booking data across two platforms, rank spend by carrier and build my talking points for an airline meeting - work that used to take days. That's exactly why these gaps sting more than they did two years ago: the analysis layer has moved faster than the data layer feeding it." 

This year’s Business Travel Show America hosts the panel session Applying AI to travel program decision-making and will offer corporate travel buyers the opportunity to learn more about AI’s impact on data management and how to make data work harder.   

The show will also feature over 20 exhibitors across the floor focusing on the latest innovations and solutions in data management and analytics, and some are TMCs. Here’s the list: 

• 3Sixty 

• Airline Reporting Corporation 

• Amadeus Cytric 

• Blockskye 

• Cerebri AI 

• Cirium 

• Clarasight 

• Cornerstone 

• Grasp 

• Oversee 

• Planned 

• PredictX 

• Prime Numbers Techology 

• Serko 

• Travelport 

• Tripkicks 

• Unlocked Data 

Business Travel Show America returns to Javits Center from October 14-15, 2026, bringing together corporate travel buyers, procurement professionals and industry suppliers to address the challenges shaping the industry, including cost management, technology adoption and traveler duty of care.