ISO 31030 – Complete guide for employers

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ISO 31030:2021 is a travel risk management standard that gives guidance for employers on managing risks related to business travel. It's the first international travel risk management standard that helps employers in developing, implementing, evaluating, and reviewing travel risk management policies. The goal of it is to protect both business travelers and your company from travel risks. The standard originates from the ISO 31000 that outlines the core principles and guidelines for risk management for employers.

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Key takeaways

• ISO 31030:2021 is the first international standard for travel risk management. It covers five critical areas including policy development, threat identification, risk assessment, operational trip management, and emergency response.
• For employers, following the ISO 31030 guidance helps demonstrate genuine care for employee safety, reduce insurance premiums, lower incident costs, and avoid legal expenses by proactively managing travel risks.
• The standard works best when integrated with the company's existing HR system, travel booking platform, and security infrastructure. With integration in place, automatic risk assessments, real-time traveler monitoring, and coordinated emergency response can be initiated.

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The ISO 31030 standard was first introduced in September 2021. Led by Kevin Myers, the creation of the travel risk management standard is a perfect example of industry experts coming together and developing something urgently needed for the whole industry.

While the ISO 31030:2021 standard was introduced relatively recently, duty of care in business travel has been a topic for many years before. A global survey of business travelers in the UK has recently revealed that 79% of employees engage in risky behaviors during their trips (such as drinking tap water, eating at questionable venues, riding scooters and more). Considering employer's obligation to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of employees while working, introducing risk mitigation strategies is a must.

Before ISO 31030, there was no good benchmark for employers to measure their practices against. With the implementation of this standard, organizations finally have guidance on what their duty of care in business travel should cover. Meanwhile, introduction of the standard revealed the sad reality about the current state of travel risk management in companies. According to ISO 31030 expert Bex Deadman,

there are big gaps in practices of travel risk management versus what ISO 31030 suggests.

The goal of this article is to explain what the standard covers and why it is important for the safety of your travelers. Additionally, we want to introduce you with WorkFlex SOS solution capabilities that help you in managing travel risks and reaching compliance with ISO 31030 guidance.

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💡 Learn more:

• Employer Duty of Care for International Business Travelers

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What is ISO 31030:2021 Travel Risk Management guidance?

ISO 31030:2021 is a document that provides guidance on managing business travel-related risks for both employers and employees. It's relevant to employers of any size and industry, whether it's a small charitable organization or a corporation with more than 10,000 employees. It provides a framework to the development, implementation and review of:

• policy,
• program implementation,
• threat and hazard identification,
• opportunities and strengths,
• risk assessment,
• prevention and risk mitigation strategies.

Core components: What ISO 31030 covers

To be in line with ISO 31030 guidance, employers have to establish a framework that addresses five critical areas of travel risk management:

1. Policy development and program implementation

According to the ISO 31030 guidance, a company must have a travel risk management policy that integrates with broader organizational risk strategies. That means:

• Establishing clear governance structures,
• Defining roles and responsibilities in travel risk management,
• Ensuring top management is committed to allocating adequate resources to implement the policy

The framework also includes exceptions for cases when the employer can deviate from the established policy. Additionally, it requires regular review of the travel risk management practices.

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2. Identification of travel risks and threats

There are multiple categories of travel risks and threats that employers should consider when implementing a system for travel risk detection:

• Physical risks: Crime, terrorism, political instability, and social unrest
• Health hazards: Disease outbreaks, medical emergencies, and local healthcare quality
• Cyber and information security: Data protection, network security, and intellectual property risks
• Operational threats: Transportation incidents, natural disasters, and infrastructure failures

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3. Risk assessment and treatment strategies

The standard requires implementation of travel risk assessment processes that evaluate how likely the threats are for each business trip and what are the potential consequences of risks materializing. Then, the employer must develop appropriate risk treatment options, including risk avoidance, risk mitigation measures, risk sharing through insurance, and acceptance strategies based on organizational risk appetite and duty of care obligations.

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4. Operational management of the trip

The travel risk management policy must account for a set of procedures in trip planning and monitoring, for example:

• Pre-travel authorization procedures
• Accommodation selection criteria
• Transportation assessments
• Traveler monitoring system
• And others

That relates to both routine travel to low-risk destinations and enhanced security measures for high-risk locations.

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5. Communication and emergency response protocols

Finally, employers must ensure that the travel policy has incident management capabilities - for example:

• 24/7 emergency support acces,
• Crisis escalation procedures,
• Crisis response team availability.

The ISO 31030 standard highlights the importance of sharing information in a timely manner in case of a crisis. That means notifying relevant stakeholders within the organisation and outside of it, as well as review of the incident after it's happened to make sure similar situations will be better managed if they are ever repeated.

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Why your company needs to follow ISO 31030

1. Legal liability and duty of care compliance

Employers have duty of care obligation towards employees. If duty of care is not properly managed, it can result in severe consequences that extend far beyond financial penalties, including lawsuits, regulatory penalties, and reputational damage that can take years to rebuild. In the United Kingdom, the general duties which employers have towards employees and the consequences of not meeting them are outlined in the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

The greatest danger lies in the human cost - incidents resulting from inadequate safety measures, poor legal compliance, or lack of support can cause great harm to your employees and their families. In worst-case scenarios, the consequences may be fatal, and no amount of financial compensation or reputation management can undo such a tragedy.

ISO 31030 compliance provides a systematic travel risk management framework that significantly reduces legal liability exposure while demonstrating genuine care for employee safety and wellbeing.

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The framework's approach to risk identification, assessment, and treatment creates a defensible position in case incidents occur. Meanwhile proactive risk management prevents many potential problems from materialising. This dual benefit of better protection and reduced liability makes ISO 31030 implementation essential for organizations that take their employees and duty of care responsibilities seriously.

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2. Financial benefits and insurance cost reductions

There are tangible financial benefits to implementing the travel risk management standard:

• Smaller insurance premiums due to effective risk control mechanisms having been implemented in the organisation
• Less incidents and smaller associated costs because risks are mitigated proactively, before they happen
• Lower expenses tied to disrupted business trips through better planning and risk mitigation measure implementation
• Avoided legal costs because of improved compliance and risk management

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3. Boost to employer's reputation

Implementing an effective business travel safety program helps to raise the credibility of your organisation, both in the eyes of investors and business partners, as well as employees. It is a signal to banks, investors, clients, and other stakeholders who want to partner with your organization that you're treating business continuity and duty of care questions seriously.

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4. Business continuity and operational resilience

If a crisis happens, disruption to business operations is nearly inevitable. We experienced this firsthand during the Covid-19 pandemic – while many organizations had crisis response plans "on paper", they did not perform as expected when faced with real emergencies. ISO 31030 guidance is designed to address the right travel risk management dimensions to ensure that if crisis hit, your organisation is ready to act on it with minimal damage to business continuity.

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5. Employee confidence and retention

At the end of the day, ISO 31030 is all about keeping your employees safe. Having a well-designed and operational framework in place helps boost employee confidence in your company's protection measures. This results in:

• Employee retention rates through demonstrated care for employee wellbeing and safety
• Talent attraction advantages in competitive markets
• Increased productivity from reduced travel-related stress and uncertainty
• Enhanced employee engagement through clear safety protocols and support systems

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Integrating Travel Risk Management with your existing systems

To ensure that travel risk management and ISO 31030 guidance becomes a living process rather than just a paper standard, you must integrate it with your organization's existing systems. This includes your HRIS, travel booking system, as well as security and data protection practices. Additionally, it must be clearly communicated to the business travelers to make sure they're aware of what's their role in travel risk mitigation.

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1. Alignment with HR policies

Travel risk management policy should align with HR policies that outline duty of care obligations toward employees. For example, HR systems should flag travelers with special needs or medical conditions that could impact travel risk assessments.

➡️ WorkFlex SOS integrates with HRIS platforms like Personio, Workday, and HiBob, ensuring employee data remains current and is automatically included in travel risk assessments. Destination-specific country guides are tailored based on individual employee profiles and travel patterns.

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2. Travel booking platform integration

Travel booking systems like Perk or Egencia provide the key data on business trip destinations and timelines. By syncing the travel risk management tools with booking systems, you make sure that automated risk assessment is triggered for the business trip, and destination monitoring will be started to inform the traveler about potential risks.

When integrated with travel booking systems, travel risk management becomes seamless rather than one additional tool and process to take care of. Integration enables real-time traveler location visibility, automatic risk categorization based on destinations, and streamlined pre-travel authorization workflows.

➡️ WorkFlex SOS integrates with travel booking platforms including Perk, Egencia, Navan, and more ensuring business trip data transfers automatically and travel risk assessments begin instantly.

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3. Connectivity to security systems

Business travel safety programs require integration with existing security infrastructure, including threat intelligence platforms and incident management tools. This enables automatic traveler notifications during security incidents, real-time destination threat monitoring, and quick escalation to security teams and stakeholders. Integration should include government travel advisory systems and commercial threat intelligence feeds.

➡️ WorkFlex SOS delivers real-time alerts based on employee location to both employees and HR administrators, keeping you informed of threats your employees face so you can respond appropriately.

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4. GDPR and data protection compliance

ISO 31030 standard does require access to significant amounts of personal data, particularly for traveler monitoring. Thus, it demands careful data management in line with GDPR and data protection compliance.

Systems must implement consent mechanisms for traveler monitoring, secure storage of medical information, and clear data retention policies. Employers must balance transparency requirements with operational security needs, especially regarding sensitive emergency contact information.

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Future-proofing your travel risk management

The world has never felt more unstable than it does today. New risks emerge daily, and you cannot anticipate which country will become the next hotspot – even seemingly safe destinations can suddenly face emergencies, such as experienced with flooding in Valencia, Spain (2024), wildfires in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus (2025), and more.

ISO 31030 compliance provides a foundation for employers to keep employees safe while staying ahead of evolving threats. This requires proactive planning and continuous evaluation of current practices.

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Emerging travel risks and threats

Modern business travel safety faces numerous challenges, including cyber warfare targeting travelers, climate change driving extreme weather events, and geopolitical instability creating volatile security environments. Employers must prepare for diverse threats including hybrid attacks that combine physical and digital elements, supply chain disruptions affecting transportation networks, health risks from emerging infectious diseases, and antimicrobial resistance.

Social engineering attacks increasingly target business travelers through compromised hotel Wi-Fi networks, while deepfake technology creates new identity verification challenges. Travel risk assessment processes must account for these ever-evolving interconnected threats.

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Technology trends and innovations

Artificial intelligence and machine learning are revolutionizing corporate travel security through predictive risk analytics, automated threat detection, and personalized traveler safety recommendations.

Real-time language translation, augmented reality navigation, and IoT-enabled safety devices provide travelers with enhanced situational awareness and emergency response capabilities. These technologies enable more granular risk monitoring and faster incident response times.