Travel Expert enhances profitability with one-stop payment solution

How Airwallex’s payment collection solutions help Travel Expert to increase successful transactions and facilitate its business development and global expansion

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Travel Expert logo

Instant

successful transaction

99%

saved in foreign transaction fees

3%

saved in FX rate

Travel Expert is an HKEx-listed travel agency providing a wide-ranging selection of travel products with over 30 years of experience.

Company size

200 employees

Industry

Travel

Location

Hong Kong

Airwallex Products Used

Online Payments
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Founded in 1986, Travel Expert has grown from a local venture to a Hong Kong Stock Exchange-listed travel conglomerate with five distinctive travel brands, all under the Travel Expert umbrella.

As the travel industry is constantly evolving in the digitalised world, Travel Expert needs to transform from a traditional travel agency business to reach customers from across the globe with multiple touchpoints. From accepting payment to trading with international suppliers, Travel Expert needs a fast and secure payment solution to catch up with its rapid growth.

Kelvin Ko

Managing Director, Travel Expert

"We hope to expand overseas in order to enlarge the customer base. Airwallex’s customers-first approach and new features are a good fit for our business needs.”

Challenge 1: Accepting payments from different customer segments quickly and securely

Customers who book holiday packages through Travel Expert usually need to pay in advance to secure their booking. Given the large transaction amounts and for security reasons, customers had to visit one of the Travel Expert branches to make payments. Payment methods were limited too. In the digital age, this payment hurdle may turn away Gen Y and Gen Z customers, harming the company’s profitability and growth potential. Travel Expert urgently needed a cost-effective solution to widen payment acceptance and methods. 

Solutions & Results: Multiple secure online payment options to enable instant successful transactions

By plugging in to Airwallex’s Online Payment, Travel Expert can now offer a fast and secure checkout process on their official website, giving customers confidence and a peace of mind to make instant purchases. Travel Expert’s sales teams can also issue Airwallex’s Payment Links directly to group and corporate clients through messaging tools to seal the deal. 

With Airwallex’s Online Payment and Payment Links, and a wide range of local and international payment methods that come with it including credit card and Alipay HK, Travel Expert managed to improve the rate of successful transactions while reducing the number of invalid orders, accelerating their digital growth. 

Challenge 2: Physical corporate card lacks security and flexibility

Traditionally, corporate cards are notoriously difficult to apply and usually need to be shared among multiple departments. Travel Expert was no exception. Not only is it hard to track departmental expenses, a physical corporate card is also easily prone to fraud, jeopardizing the business’ financial integrity. If lost or stolen, the considerable wait time for re-issuing a corporate card will seriously impact business operations. 

Solutions & Results: Airwallex Borderless Cards ensure timely payments to international suppliers 

With the virtual Airwallex Borderless Card, Travel Expert can settle payments with suppliers around the globe in a timely manner without juggling between departments or the card being lost or stolen. In fact, Travel Expert can easily issue cards on demand in no more than a minute, empowering departments to settle payments with suppliers at their own pace — be it hotels or tour operators across different time zones — by setting spending limits and other restrictions to minimise the risk of fraud and significantly improve productivity.   

Gordon Lam

Senior Marketing and Product Manager, Travel Expert

“While our business is transforming, we’d like to select trustworthy and value-aligned partners to grow with us. As such, we chose Airwallex.”

Challenge 3: Global expansion requires a cost-effect banking solution

Travel Expert builds its impressive portfolio of travel products and offerings by working closely with global suppliers in destinations far and close. Eyeing overseas expansion, Travel Expert needs a cost-efficient payment solution to settle international transactions with these suppliers; otherwise, the hefty transaction fees and expensive currency exchange imposed by traditional banks will heavily eat into their hard-earned profits.

Solutions & Results: Saving 99% transaction fees including up to 3% in FX

Airwallex charges no international transaction fees, and offers market-beating exchange rates that are usually 1-3% better than what traditional banks can offer. With Airwallex, Travel Expert saves up to 3% in currency exchange every time they need to pay overseas hotels and accommodations. By reinvesting these savings into their business development, Travel Expert can expedite their foreign market expansion plan.

See how our customers are finding Airwallex

Airwallex Testimony

"Airwallex has been a game changer for all our banking needs. As a fast-growing startup, we need a scalable yet cost-efficient batch payment solution to pay our employees and vendors both inside and outside Hong Kong. Airwallex helps us save money on every bank transfer with their near-zero transaction fee and market-beating FX rates. We also use Airwallex’s multi-currency Visa cards for business travel expenses and SaaS subscriptions to avoid hidden bank fees that would otherwise have been difficult to spot. Would highly recommend other startups to get started with Airwallex!"

Henson Tsai

Founder, SleekFlow

Airwallex Testimony

"Importing the best wine and sake overseas always involve extra costs on transaction fee & FX fee. With Airwallex, we saved 100% of our overseas remittance cost and we could provide the best price for our customers."

Tomy Wu

Co-Founder, MyiCellar

Airwallex Testimony

"Airwallex is an innovative fintech platform with a first-class customer support team. They transformed the previously painful process of creating corporate cards and managing business accounts into something simple, convenient, and cost-effective. The onboarding was quick and smooth, the security features exceeded our expectations, and most importantly, it is really easy to use. Airwallex saves a lot of my team's time and the simplicity is genius."

Gavin Black

Interim CEO & Chief Financial Officer, PURE Group

Airwallex Testimony

"I’m so thankful that Airwallex exists! In Hong Kong, it's so hard to find financial service providers that are friendly to small businesses. Airwallex allows me to exchange currencies at really great rates, and the interface is very modern and easy to use compared to my bank. We save so much money with Airwallex! In just a few months, we've already saved more than HK$78,000 in unnecessary fees!"

Jennifer Chong

CEO, Linjer

Airwallex Testimony

"Airwallex provides us with flexibility and cost savings on our international fund flows. We are using Airwallex to pay international suppliers and are saving up to 90% on transaction fees and FX verses traditional banks - thanks to their competitive exchange rate and low transaction costs."

Kelvin Kan

Founder, Homemakase

Airwallex Testimony

"Airwallex has been great for our team - it makes payments and transfers so much easier, and has saved us significant amounts of time compared to what we were doing before with HSBC. Airwallex's platform is easy to use and very intuitive. Airwallex virtual card has solved most of our painpoints with sharing corporate card numbers and credit card limits. The best part is being able to save money on all our monthly bank transfers, and we've already saved thousands of dollars by using Airwallex. Airwallex's support has also been highly responsive to troubleshoot any issues in a timely manner."

Sarah Chang

Co-founder & COO, Forkast.News

Airwallex Testimony

"Airwallex offers both physical and virtual corporate cards tailored to the needs of different staff. Their virtual corporate card can even be set up in just 1 minute. Its features make expense management and approval processes notably easier for us."

Justin Chu

General Manager, K Dollar Program

Airwallex Testimony

"With Airwallex, we were able to start accepting local payments quickly. Because the user experience is intuitive and the checkout process faster, we’ve actually had a 50% increase in shoppers using local payment methods."

Rebekah

Business Development Director, Slowood

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