Behind the scenes of booking 'complex' travel for Paralympians
Arranging travel for corporate clients in specialist sectors, such as the British Wheelchair Basketball team, demands trust and an innate ability to trouble shoot, says Adam Knights, EMEA managing director of ATPI travel management company
When the men’s British Wheelchair Basketball Team competed in the recently concluded Paralympics in Paris, travel and event management company ATPI was among those cheering them on to their silver medal. Since 2019, the specialist has helped both male and female BWB athletes to numerous overseas fixtures from the Osaka Cup and World Championships in Dubai to training camps in the Netherlands, Germany and Spain.
Adam Knights, ATPI’s managing director for EMEA, met the former chief executive of British Wheelchair Basketball through a sports networking group the company was sponsoring. “It allows administrators to get together and network themselves and then preferred partners to soft sell to those organisations and get themselves recognised,” Knights explains.
ATPI also works with Premiership football clubs and the Clipper Round The World race and supports the Canadian and French Olympic committees. Ten of its travel experts have been troubleshooting in Paris this year. In addition, it handles oil rig, shipping and construction companies.
“What ATPI specialises in particularly is complex travel. That equates very nicely to sport and in particular to paralympic sport,” says Knights. But he stresses, for British Wheelchair Basketball, where disabled and able-bodied athletes compete together, the complexity is more about cohesion than accessibility.
“They want to be treated inclusively as a team, to be able to travel through airports as a team; that’s absolutely critical. We try to make sure their wheelchairs can be used throughout, rather than the wheelchairs of the airline or airport.”
Always on call
ATPI seeks dedicated contacts at airlines, airports and hotels and secures teams separate check-in areas. The TMC, available 24/7, must also be adaptable, Knights adds: “If someone gets injured or ill, we need to make those changes very quickly which some airlines don’t always accommodate if you’ve booked in a traditional leisure way.”
There are some equipment challenges unique to BWB. “When heading to one tournament, the airline had agreed the gaming wheelchairs would fit into the hold but a few days before departure it changed to a smaller aircraft,” recalls Knights. “Luckily the game chairs the team use are slightly smaller than a regular-sized wheelchair and they just about fitted through the door.”
Indirect re-routings are another issue: “We always need to ensure the team has slightly longer connecting times to clear arrivals in that country and offload and re-load their chairs. As such, we can’t automatically assume all alternative offered flights are going to be suitable.”
Airline support
Knights praises Japan for its slick organisation, adding: “When the British Wheelchair team travel there, all bases are well-covered by the teams at Japan Airlines.” The postponement of the World Championships from 2022 to 2023 also necessitated good airline support. “As we were taking all the men’s and women’s teams from different regions of the UK to Dubai, it was not an easy task to get the best available flights without going over budget, but with the support of Emirates, we managed it,” says Knights.
“Virgin Atlantic and Air Canada have also been particularly accommodating, inviting a member of our team to Heathrow to go through the check-in and security processes. Virgin also makes sure all its aircraft toilets are wheelchair accessible.”
The TMC has landed further group clients from BWB’s referrals. Its other sports experience has led to rare forays beyond corporate work. Knight explains: “In the higher [finance] level sports, for instance motor racing in F1, people realise that your high touch service on the team side is suddenly very, very valuable to them on the leisure side.”
For agents seeking similar work, he advises: “Not all these organisations [particularly in amateur sports] have huge funding, so they’re always trying to make sure they maximise their bang for their buck.
“The first question we ask is: ‘Do you understand what a TMC does? Because if it’s just about ticket price you won’t be happy to pay our fee on top, which is what we charge you for these services…’”
Often, ATPI is engaged by a team to handle bookings, then given more responsibility as it builds up trust. Knights comments: “The administrators don’t have to be worrying the beds are the wrong size, because we’ve checked that, or, particularly in football, that the minibars have been cleared out of the room!”
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