ONDA offers five extra PTO days for mandatory travel — plus a new employee portal with discounted hotel rates. For a travel tech company, these perks finally let staff practice what they build.
ONDA has something called "travel encouragement leave." Anyone who's been here over a year gets an extra 5 days of PTO on top of their regular vacation days. The catch? You're supposed to actually travel somewhere. Pretty fitting benefit for a travel tech company — we basically force you to take trips.
Anyone with kids knows that standard PTO never feels like enough. When your kids get sick, you drop everything. Add extended family events to the mix, and suddenly there's no time left for actual vacation.
I burn through most of my days off dealing with kid emergencies. But thanks to this travel leave policy, I finally took a family trip in late May. First long-distance journey with my 19-month-old twins. Their first time on a plane. And the first time since they were born that we visited my parents in Gimhae, Gyeongsangnam-do.
After the trip, the company also gives you a travel stipend based on tenure. If my wife doesn't read this, I'm stashing that money for emergencies (kidding... mostly).
Part of my job is briefing journalists about the company. When they ask about unique benefits, I could talk about our education budget, book stipends, remote work, flexible hours — but I always come back to travel leave. It's the most ONDA thing about us.
And recently, we added another perk worth bragging about: an internal accommodation booking portal, exclusively for ONDA employees, with special staff discounts (applause, please!).
Here's the thing — friends and family constantly say, "You work at a travel company, right? Book our hotel this time. You can get it cheaper."
Until now, the honest answer was: no, I can't. Being an ONDA employee didn't unlock any magical booking discounts. Maybe other colleagues found some secret backdoor I didn't know about, but I've been booking trips through regular OTAs or pension websites ONDA built for clients — paying full price like everyone else.
But now? Finally! An employee-exclusive portal! With actual staff pricing! Where the company subsidizes part of your stay!
Fun fact: ONDA sells a solution called BookingOn that lets companies set up exactly this kind of private travel benefit portal. If your company wants to offer travel perks to employees — or if you want to sell exclusive accommodation deals to your members — reach out anytime: