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2010 Articles

27 September 2010

BTN's 2010 Best Practitioners: Walmart's Mary Sharp

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By Jay Boehmer

In February 2010, Universal Air Travel Plan, which for decades had been an air-only centrally billed payment platform for corporations, announced the addition of La Quinta Inns & Suites as the first hotel company in its merchant network. That announcement was the culmination of efforts led by Walmart to pioneer automated central billing of hotel payment, a process that previously had been laden with paper and rife with inefficiency. Those efforts began in late 2008, were tested throughout 2009 and implemented this year, delivering Walmart's goal of using its preferred payment method—already the primary method for corporate air transactions—into the realm of hotel transactions.

A longtime user of UATP for Walmart's ARC-certified Corporate Travel Department to settle airline transactions on behalf of its corporate travelers, the massive Bentonville, Ark.-based retailer previously had relied on a far less efficient process for the settlement of hotel transactions.

"Prior to the automation, we were just manually paying invoices that came from the hotel," Walmart senior manager of corporate travel Mary Sharp said. "We would get the invoice and ensure its accuracy, and it was very time-consuming to do that. This was far more sustainable for us."

Sharp said the new process with La Quinta and UATP "provides a secure loop for us from reservation to payment."

Getting to that point was a group effort, led by Walmart, that required cooperation from UATP, issuers of its UATP payment platform, American Airlines and La Quinta.

"When you look at your computer, you have the Intel sticker," UATP CEO Ralph Kaiser said. "We're like that: We're the ingredient brand. We make things run, but we're not the main driver. This came from Walmart and American coming to us and asking, can you do this for us? We said, of course."

Getting the various supplier constituents on board "was an idea, and we presented to them individually, received their buy-in and had a joint meeting and further discussions from there," according to Sharp. "We're always looking at our business and looking for efficiencies. We did a beta test with a few hotels that were the most popular hotels in our portfolio, the ones we used the most. We worked out any issues and then we were ready to roll it out."

The new payment method fit well into Walmart's unique approach to corporate payment. Kaiser explained.

"Walmart doesn't issue walk-around plastic to a lot of their travelers," he said. "Let's say I'm in Arkansas at Walmart headquarters and I'm going to Chicago. I'll book the air, and I'll book the La Quinta property through the Walmart CTD, and all of that will be invoiced to Walmart on the American Airlines-UATP payment. When the traveler gets to the hotel, the room is paid for."

Now, the players are setting their sights on expansion. Walmart said it would like to extend its innovative program to other preferred hotels.

UATP, meanwhile, is setting its sights on ubiquitous acceptance at hotels, and said it already has gained interest from other clients on its payment platform that want to use the form of payment in their hotel program.

American Airlines sees expansion opportunities, as well. "Walmart approached us to see if we could utilize their UATP account for hotels. We worked with UATP and La Quinta to make it happen. We've been successfully running the program since 2009 and see additional opportunities to expand it," said Karen Buls, American director of small/medium-enterprise products, marketing and sales strategy, in a statement issued in February.

Meanwhile, La Quinta president and CEO Wayne Goldberg also sees this as more than a one company opportunity. "When it got announced, we knew we had something," he said. "I believe there's going to be huge legs, long-term. We have some customers who are very interested. People think it will replace direct bill."