An international payments processing company with its UK headquarters in York is vying for the Sustainable Travel category in The Press Business Awards.

TSYS, in Fulford Road, York, is working hard to reduce its impact on the environment by encouraging its 370 staff – known as team members – to use sustainable travel methods whenever they can.

TSYS’s associate facility director, Julie Jones, said: ‘‘Cycling is one of the most popular and successful sustainable travel methods we have promoted in recent years, with many different campaigns and offers promoted to our team members.

‘‘This year we launched our own on and off-road cycling clubs.

‘‘The first rides out were co-ordinated to take place during the York Cycle Challenge in July and helped to ensure these were logged as miles for the competition.

‘‘Last year we launched our first cycle-to-work initiative to coincide with the York Cycle Challenge and our second cycle-to-work window was open for a month in April this year with another excellent take-up.

‘‘In total, ten per cent of our workforce has now taken advantage of this scheme over the two years we have run it.’’ The company joined forces this year with City of York Council to help the council to launch its park-and-pedal initiative, assisting with the council's marketing design and contributing to the print costs for the campaign.

‘‘We promoted this scheme to our cycling community as an alternative to joining the queue of heavy traffic on Fulford Road,’’ said Julie.

‘‘We also encourage team members to use the park-and-ride routes and refund all ticket costs for team members who choose this option to lessen the local traffic.

‘‘We provide secure cycle parking within our grounds and have extended this in 2013 because more team members are choosing this option for their daily commute. We also offer a free gym for our team members with shower facilities to ensure they are comfortable after their cycling."

For the past two years, TSYS has promoted the Living Streets Walking Challenge, which aims to encourage team members to walk to work or walk part of their journey. In 2010, the company established a UK Environmental Group to investigate and assess all environment-related suggestions.

‘‘One idea was a staff car-share club where team members use the firm's intranet to ‘‘advertise’’ their car journey details to others.

They log their details and phone extension numbers and other team members can see if they match up and make their own arrangements to car share.

"Our team members are key to our environmental plans.

‘‘It is their suggestions and support for the schemes we introduce that makes our travel sustainable and successful,’’ said Julie.