Organizations can use groups to manage control over travel spending for meetings. If your organization uses meeting provider Cvent, as the site administrator you can set up groups to have rules for meeting travel in the Partner Dashboard. As a result, meeting participants can book travel with travel policies, preferences, and messages that are either consistent with their regular business travel, or specific for a meeting type. 

If your organization is a travel management company (TMC) servicing multiple company clients on a single site, you can define groups of users for each company client with different policies, preferences, and message requirements. You can even share group of users across company clients who have similar policies, preferences, and message requirements. 

Setting Up a Dynamic Group Name

To link the meeting provider with the site, you set up a dynamic group name that matches the meeting type defined in the meeting provider. The dynamic group names are entered into the Cvent tool, and the meeting planner can select a dynamic group name to invite participants when creating a specific meeting. Participants see options for travel to the meeting that are consistent with rules you have already configured in the Partner Dashboard.

Assuming that you have already defined groups of users (see Groups Tab for Managing Groups for details) or are using the Everyone group, decide which method you want to use for travel rules (policies, preferences, and messages):

• If users invited to meetings can use the same travel rules for meeting travel as for normal business travel, you can add a dynamic group name and then specify your groups (or the Everyone group) as a parameter for it, so that the dynamic group name links to one or more of your predefined groups. 

• If users invited to meetings should be governed by different travel rules for meeting travel, you can add one or more dynamic group names, specify parameters for them to include members, and then modify the travel rules for each dynamic group. 

Note: The dynamic group name must match exactly the name for the meeting type in the meeting provider tool.

To add a dynamic group name, follow the instructions for adding a new group in Groups Tab for Managing Groups, keeping in mind the following:

• Be sure to select the Service Rules and Display Options Rules checkboxes so that the dynamic group name will appear when assigning those rules, as described in Groups Tab for Managing Groups. For details about Service Rules and Display Options Rules, see Rules Tab for Managing Rules.

• When selecting the group parameters, be sure to:

  • Choose User from the first dropdown menu under "And..." to add the first parameter, and then choose Dynamic Group Name from the second dropdown menu.

  • Choose Equals from the third dropdown menu, and enter the text in the box that matches exactly the text in the meetings tool that identifies the meeting type. Dynamic group names may not contain spaces or special characters (other than "_" or "-" which are allowed).

• If you administer a site for multiple clients, you can choose one of the following methods:

  • Define a different dynamic group name for each client that would have its own travel rules. 

  • Define a set of dynamic group names to share across clients that would have its own travel rules. Note that different forms of payment, such as client-held corporate credit cards, may make this option inappropriate. 

  • Define a single dynamic group name for all clients, which uses the same travel rules for all clients.

The meeting planner will be able to select the meeting type using the meeting provider's tool when creating a meeting, and the invited participants will see travel options that are consistent the rules already defined for them for normal business travel (as described in Rules Tab for Managing Rules).

Setting Rules for the Group

To assign travel rules for the meeting groups, follow the instructions in Rules Tab for Managing Rules, keeping in mind the following:

• The dynamic group names appear in the top rows of the list of groups for assigning rules. For example, on the Service Rules page and the Display Option Rules page, the dynamic group names would appear in rows at the top of the page above the other groups.

• See Service Rules for details on adding a set of travel rules to the group, and see Display Option Rules for details on adding display option rules to the group.

• If you defined dynamic group names for each meeting traveler group, be sure to add the service rules and display option rules for each dynamic group name.

Adding Meeting Participants

If you need to add users specifically for meeting travel, you can add them manually by following the instructions in Adding a User Profile, which also describes other methods of on-boarding users including agency profile uploads and Human Resources (HR) feeds. If you plan on enabling open enrollment for visitors, see Open Enrollment.

To enable guest users so that guests can create user accounts when registering for a meeting, see Setting Up a Guest Traveler. 

If you inviting guests to participate in a meeting, keep in mind the following if you manage multiple clients on your site:

• Disable access to the Address Book on a shared site. See General Settings for details.

• Disable delegation on a shared site. See General Settings for details.

• Activation and password-reset emails should be generic. See Email Settings for details.

• Remember that messages that appear on the Home page appear to all users. See Home Page Options for details.

Glossary of Terms

Dynamic group name(s): The dynamic group names are entered into the Cvent tool to be made available to the meeting planner for selection when creating a specific event. Participants in the event will be presented with options for travel to the event consistent with rules pre-configured in the Partner Dashboard.

Meeting mode: User has access to the site to book meeting-only travel plans, following the meeting-specific parameters established by the meeting planner.

Meeting planning team: Those who plan and configure meetings within Cvent.

Meeting provider: Vendor of the meeting tool. The site currently supports Cvent.

Meeting provider contact: Person at Cvent who will enable integration with the site.

Meeting types: Event categories that are not specific to a one time occurrence of a meeting, but to a more generic, recurring event. They can include but are not limited to conventions, user group meetings, or visits to the home office by groups of employees. They can be grouped into a “palette” by either the meeting type, or type of travel that is allowed, such as first class, business class, etc.

Participant groups / types: A collection of travelers defined within the meeting (Cvent) tool. 

Post back: Itinerary details sent back to the meeting provider used to generate departure and arrival manifest.