User Delegation

User Delegation allows one user to access another user's travelers and perform actions on their behalf. This is common in organizations where executive assistants book travel for executives, travel coordinators manage multiple departments, or managers oversee team travel.

The Problem Delegation Solves

In corporate travel, the person booking travel is often not the person traveling. Common scenarios include:

• Executive assistants booking flights for executives
• Travel coordinators managing travel for an entire department
• Office managers booking travel for visiting clients or candidates
• Team leads arranging team travel for offsites or conferences

Without delegation, these users would need shared login credentials (a security risk) or the travelers themselves would need to make every booking (inefficient).

How Delegation Works

Delegation creates a formal relationship between two users within the same company:

Key terminology:

Delegation Model

When User A (delegator) grants delegation to User B (delegate):

1. User B gains access to all of User A's travelers
2. User B can perform actions based on the granted scopes
3. Policy and budget evaluation uses User A's assignments (the delegator's policy and budget apply)
4. User A remains the "owner" of all bookings created by User B

Delegation Scopes

Each delegation grants specific permissions through scopes. This allows granular control over what actions a delegate can perform.

Common Scope Combinations

Key Characteristics

Company-Scoped

Delegations only work within a single company. A user cannot delegate access to someone in a different company. Both users must be active members of the same company for the delegation to function.

Self-Service + Admin Management

Rahal supports two delegation management models:

1. Self-service: Users can grant, update, and revoke their own delegations from the user app
2. Admin-managed: Administrators can create and manage delegations for any users in the dashboard

Policy and Budget Attribution

When a delegate creates a booking:

• The delegator's policy is used for compliance checks
• The delegator's budget is consumed (if budget management is enabled)
• The booking is attributed to the delegator in reports and analytics

This ensures that travel policies are enforced correctly regardless of who makes the booking.

Documentation