The Trump administration’s second version of the US travel ban signed into effect on Monday, March 6, is being viewed as less threatening, according to a new survey conducted by the Association of Corporate Travel Executives. However the order may still be a public relations misstep for the US travel industry and suspicion of the ban process lingers.

The survey found that business travel managers were almost evenly divided on the question, “Will the provisions of the new US travel ban pose travel difficulties for your company?” Nearly half (45 percent) responded “yes,” with six percent of those citing significant difficulties. Another half (50 percent) saw “no difficulties,” with 5 percent saying “the question did not apply.”

“The global business travel industry had been waiting for the new travel ban, so the issue carried less shock and surprise the second time around,” said ACTE executive director Greeley Koch. “Our response rate to this second travel ban survey was much slower, indicating the industry had time to prepare for the announcement. Eighty-four percent of respondents indicated they were familiar with the provisions of the new ban within hours of its signing. This is a dramatic difference from the blindsiding they got a month ago.”


Two-thirds (66 percent) of respondents said the new travel ban had not caused their company to rethink conducting business with the US. But 21 percent said these bans were causing their company to reconsider doing business within the US, with 4 percent of these claiming the reconsideration was significant. Ninety-one percent of responding business travel managers stated their companies had not cancelled meetings in the US for locations abroad; while 9 percent indicated their companies had.

ACTE is convening the first global travel conference of 2017 in New York City, April 23-25, and international bookings are up over last year for a similar event.