Emirates Airline's Business Rewards which offers SMEs the opportunity to benefit from employee flights has been rolled out into 55 countries: including China.

Each time a registered employee books their Emirates flight through Business Rewards, the business earns Business Rewards Miles while the individual traveller continues to earn their miles from Skywards, Emirates' frequent flyer programme. The company can then redeem accumulated Business Rewards Miles against future flights.

Keith Longstaff, Emirates' divisional senior vice president, commercial operations worldwide, commented that since its launch, more than 2,000 small and medium sized businesses had signed on and benefited from Emirates' Business Rewards.

Longstaff added that despite the challenging economic environment, or perhaps because of it, Business Rewards continues to grow from strength to strength because of the broad range of benefits the program brings to SMEs.

First launched in the UAE in May 2008, Business Rewards was subsequently rolled-out across Emirates' network and is now available in 55 countries across the globe.

In addition to reward miles, Emirates' Business Rewards program also provides an online portal for administrators in SMEs to manage employee travel on Emirates Airline. The company must register with Business Rewards in the country where it is located, but it can accumulate miles for travel undertaken by employees at all their branches into one central account.

(China Hospitality News December 19, 2008)Emirates brings business rewards to SMEs?