YOUR HOME AWAY 
Every year, Americans make more than 400 million long-distance business trips.
This accounts for more than 16% of all long-distance travel.
Whether you are going on your first business trip or your 500th business trip, planning your trip ahead of time is crucial.
Let’s take a look at what you need to know in order to plan the ultimate business trip.
When planning a business trip, it’s important to make your arrangements for travel and accommodations ahead of time. The longer you wait to make these reservations for things such as airline tickets, car rentals, train reservations, and hotel rooms, the more expensive these will be. If you wait too long, also, you run the risk of no more reservations being available.
When you’re making these plans, you’ll also want to think about local or religious holidays in the place that you are traveling to. Whether you are traveling nationally or internationally, restaurants and businesses might be closed due to these holidays.
Are you wondering where to stay on a business trip? Extended-stay rooms can be perfect for business travel. Check out this article about what to pack to help make your extended-stay room feel like home.
One of the most important things to make your business travel as efficient as possible is to have a well-organized itinerary. This will include all of your ground transportation information, hotel information, flight information, meeting times and places, and more. By having an itinerary, you can make sure that you are able to do everything you need to do on your business trip.
This also allows you to schedule entertainment and sightseeing if that is something that you wish to do in your free time.
Ideally, your business trip will be pleasantly uneventful. On the off chance that something unexpected happens, however, you’ll be glad if you gave someone else a copy of your itinerary ahead of time. You can share your itinerary with an employee or your assistant as well as a family member or friend.
What this does is it means that if something does go wrong then you’ll be able to receive help much more quickly. If people know when to expect a call from you or for you to return home, they can alert the proper authorities if something seems off. They’ll also know where you were planning to be at any given time in a way that will help to locate you and get you the help that you need.
You’ll need identification no matter where you are traveling to. Obviously, domestic travel requires less documentation on international travel. Either way, though, you won’t want to get stuck without the proper identification no matter where you are.
You might consider getting an international driver’s license if you are frequently traveling overseas. This is something that you can obtain from the US Department of State.
You’ll also want to make sure ahead of time that your passport is not going to expire anytime soon. If it is time to renew your passport, you can get the information you need from the U.S. Postal Service.
Another important point on our business trip checklist is that you’ll need to make sure that you have the right currency for the location you are traveling to. You can stop at a bank ahead of time to get the currency that you need in order to pay for small expenses before you’re able to get to a bank exchange window or a hotel exchange window.
You also want to check with your bank as to whether or not your debit card will work in another foreign location in order to get the proper currency.
What to pack on a business trip? It can be difficult to know what you will need ahead of time, but one of the most important tips is to really try to only bring what you need.
It can be tempting to bring everything but the kitchen sink when you are traveling abroad. This is particularly true if you are going to be gone for several weeks at a time. Chances are, though, that you will regret having to lug around all of your earthly possessions and will ultimately only use a few of the things that you bring.
Most things that you could end up wanting abroad you could purchase if you absolutely needed to.
Things that cannot be left behind are things like your cell phone, your laptop, clothes, shaving gear, cosmetic bag, business documents, and briefcase. You’ll also want to be sure to bring your glasses or contact lenses as well as any medication or lens prescriptions you might have.
You’ll also want to bring a credit card with you, ideally one that has an open balance. If you are going to be traveling to a rural area, make sure that you have cash. It might also be a good idea to have traveler’s checks.
Taking a business trip can be stressful, particularly if it is something you’re not used to doing. Staying at an extended-stay hotel can help you to feel like you are at a home away from home. This can help to make your trip be much more enjoyable and go much more smoothly.
If you are traveling to North Carolina or Virginia and are looking for an extended-stay hotel, contact us today to request a reservation or to ask any questions you might have!