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Flight Centre Limited partners with the unexpected, Airbnb

In a move that's sure to make you say "wait, what?", the Flight Centre Travel Group has entered a new partnership with Airbnb in order to provide its corporate customers more options on the road.

In a move that’s sure to make you say “wait, what?”, the Flight Centre Travel Group has entered a new partnership with Airbnb in order to provide its corporate customers more options on the road.

Announced this morning, the agreement will give the travel group’s corporate brands – FCm Travel Solutions, Corporate Traveller, Campus Travel and Stage and Screen – access to Airbnb’s third-party booking tool, Airbnb for Business, which has some three million listings worldwide.

Although Flight Centre will be the first travel agency group in Australia to work with the home-sharing website, Airbnb has previously partnered with corporate agencies in the US including Corporate Travel Management Companies (TMC’s) Carlson Waggonlit, BCD and American Express Global Business Travel. Click here for more information.

Initially, listings will be available to Campus Travel and Stage and Screen and then progressively introduced soon after to FCm Travel Solutions and Corporate Traveller.

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Corporate consultants using the home-sharing site to make bookings will be able to see trip details, make changes to reservations and contact Airbnb hosts with questions. Their clients will also have access to the same access.

Although some may see the move as controversial, Flight Centre Travel Group’s General Manager of Corporate Travel, Andrew Flannery, believes the partnership will give Agents access to an “unrivaled pool of accommodation options” and customers the chance to experience “something a little different”.

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“It will also benefit our corporate customers who are travelling to locations where there may currently be an under-supply of suitable hotel rooms.”

Andrew Flannery, Flight Centre Travel Group General Manager of Corporate Travel

Flannery said the group is already talking to clients about the range of opportunities Airbnb can offer and customer trials have returned with a positive rating experience of 4.76 out of 5 stars.

Thrilled to be working with the Flight Centre Travel Group, Airbnb’s Global Director of Business Travel, David Holyoke, said he looks forward to helping Aussie and Kiwi business travellers “feel more at home while on the road”.

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“Airbnb for Business gives business travellers the ability to explore a city like a local, making it easy to travel for work without sacrificing the comforts of home.”

David Holyoke, Airbnb Global Director of Business Travel

According to Airbnb, the home-sharing site has welcomed more than 180 million guest arrivals and approximately 10 percent of all travellers on Airbnb are business travellers.

What do you think of the partnership?