Uber outpaces rental cars, taxis for business travelers

Uber outpaces rental cars, taxis for business travelers

U.S. business travelers used Uber more often than either rental cars or taxis in the fourth quarter, according to Certify, which makes expense-management software.

“We’re seeing a tipping point now,” said Bob Neveu, CEO of Certify, which tracks over $1 billion in expense accounts per quarter.

In the third quarter, Uber outpaced rental cars and taxis in San Francisco and Boston, but that trend had spread nationwide by the end of the year.

Cracking that market is a major road to future expansion.

Business travel is a $310 billion market in the U.S. and $1.2 trillion worldwide, according to the Global Business Travel Association.

Corporations now are adding Uber, Lyft, Airbnb and other new options to their lists of approved vendors, Neveu said.

Once those options are approved by employers, many travelers who opt for Uber, Airbnb and other services in their personal lives start using them for business.

Uber had 41 percent of trips, compared with 39 percent for car rentals and 20 percent for taxis.

[...] a traveler generally rents a car for several days.

While the report didn’t track dollar amounts, renting a car is a much bigger expense than taking an Uber ride.

In the third quarter, “Lyft was about one-half of 1 percent, almost a rounding error,” Neveu said.

Certify’s software allows business travelers to rate vendors on a scale of 0 to 5 stars.

Car rentals had 4.01 stars, while taxis had 3.68.

[...] it declined to break out how Airbnb’s penetration compared to that of hotels.

Reports by Concur, another company that makes expense-account software, have showed Airbnb starting to register on expense reports as a hotel alternative, albeit one used much less frequently.

Certify found that many travelers were quite frugal, even on the company’s dime.

The most-expensed restaurants were Starbucks, McDonald’s, Panera Bread, Subway and Dunkin’ Donuts.

The most-expensed lunch was a $7.65 meal at McDonald’s, and the most-expensed dinner was $8.08, also at McDonald’s.

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer.

Uber is most-used form of ground transit for business travelers

Uber was used more often by business travelers than either taxis and car rentals in the fourth quarter, according to Certify, which makes software for expense accounts.

[...] the company looked only at total number of expenses reported, not dollar volume.