If you’re like most people and you believe that government travel advisories, warn

ing and alerts represent the most accurate advice for business travellers then y
ou are terribly mistaken.
Here are the key elements that all business travellers and travel managers need
to know regarding the validity and application of government travel alerts and t
ravel related advice. Knowing and understanding these few simple issues will sav
e your company unnecessary travel delays and disruptions under almost any circum
stance. The main points to always consider in the wake of a renewed or updated a
dvisory, warning or alert is the target audience, specific government resources,
commercial relevance and the avoidance of evacuation scenarios.
The primary demographic for government advisories are first time travellers, bac
kpackers, families and anyone else with little to no prior travelling experience
and preparation or the lowest possible denominator. It is this group that gover
nments aim their advice and analysis towards with the belief that if this group
is adequately informed, then all remaining demographics will be covered. Unfortu
nately this results in an artificially low benchmark for all travellers not with
in this group.These other groups depend upon travel for business productivity, m
anagement and administration and the more likely to have their travel plans alte
red unnessesarily due to many government alerts. This is in part due to corporat
e risk avoidance (in the belief the government travel advisories are adequate) a
nd insurance companies benchmarking many of their travel policy exclusions on th
at of government travel advice (again, in the belief the government are catering
to their needs too). Unless you are a first time traveller, significantly inexp
erienced or lack appropriate business support while travelling, then the majorit
y of government travel advice does not apply to you.
Detailed examination of dedicated resources aimed at travel related advice and c
ontent typically reveals little more than a handful of “specific” resources. That is
, someone or department dedicated solely to the collection, analysis and dissemi
nation of commercially relevant travel advice. Most government resources are “shar
ed” services when it comes to travel intelligence and advice with general non-gove
rnment travel a very small increment of their overall mandate. Smaller countries
have no dedicated resources and simply “share” the advice from coalition partners o
r more populace countries, further diluting the relevance to their citizens. Mos
t continuous travel advisory services, provided by a government, are little more
than a chronology of publicly available media updates. While resources are limi
ted in the first instance, it is the lack of commercial experience that constitu
tes the greatest flaw to government travel advisories.
What little resources there are that are aimed at travel intelligence typically
lack any direct commercial experience. Therefore, all their apparent advice is p
redicated more on the interests of the government (resulting in censorship, omis
sions and politically correct publications) than that of any business sector or
commercial demographic. When you have soldiers, government agents and police off
icers commenting on matters relating to commerce and business travel, you get li
ttle actionable advice due to their inability to put into commercial context the
impact events may have from a purely commercial perspective rather than a trans
national or political viewpoint.
Behind closed doors, most governments admit they do not maintain nor posses the
resources (assumed by most of their citizens) for large scale evacuations from a
ny corner of the globe. Regrettably many travellers have grown to assume that co
mplete failure to take responsibility for their own safety and security while tr
avelling will always be compensated by the government’s ability to swoop in and sa
ve then if they should so choose. This is wrong and very dangerous for those wit
h such a belief. For those governments that would even consider an evacuation of
their nationals (not very many) they will often go to great lengths to advise t
heir citizens to leave or make personal arrangements long before any government
is forced into acting. Landing troops or foreign government elements in someone
else’s country is always the choice of last resort and highly prone to complicatio
ns, even if it were possible.
Anything published by a government will always have the country’s national interes
ts such as economy, trade and diplomatic relationships carefully considered befo
re release. Anything that may threaten such strategic goals is likely to be with
held, including government travel advisories, warnings and alerts. Now that you
understand the importance of being self sufficient and discerning when it comes
to government travel advice you will waste less time placing priority on such up
dates and focus on more commercially relevant inputs. As a result, your company
travel risk management process will be far more resilient and less impacted by t
he stop/start affect created by government updates, warnings and alerts. You may
also now identify gaps that need to be filled by insufficient commercial conten
t from government sources.
Government travel advisories, warnings and alerts focus on the wrong target demo
graphic, lack the appropriate resources, have little commercial relevance and se
ek to avoid last minute acts such as evacuations. Now that you too are aware of
these limitations you should be better positioned to make business decisions in
the wake of crisis, emergency and dynamic events that affect a location and your
business travellers. Business travel risk management is a commercial process an
d can only be achieved with appropriate commercial products and services.