Does TripIt live up to its promise?

As a frequent business and leisure traveler I make both my own reservations, and use a travel agent, according to my needs. I have a group of family members, friends and a core group of business clients who need to be apprised of my travel plans.

In case of problems when I travel, I’ve found it essential to carry a detailed itinerary of each trip with me. I list the details in my personal calendar.

Assembling comprehensive itineraries by hand, for personal use and distribution can be a time-consuming pain in the neck.

Earlier this year I began using TripIt, a free Web-based application, to assemble my travel itineraries. While the site was helpful, at first it didn’t fulfill enough of my needs to fully accept it as my central tool for trip planning.

Since then, with improvements at TripIt, and changes in my use of technology, it has become that core tool I desired.

The ability to create detailed itineraries, without having to make your reservations via TripIt is certainly the nucleus of the TripIt product. While the tool and process are not without some faults, it performs that central mission as well or better than any other I’ve tested. TripIt’s attributes don’t end there, and many of its other tools are extremely useful for both the business and leisure traveler.

I make extensive use of technology in my daily life, to ease repetitive tasks and increase my efficiency, to have time to pursue more fulfilling endeavors and be with friends and family.

For years I used TravelTracker on my various Palm devices. It allowed me to create trip itineraries and integrated them into my daily calendar. But it had no direct way to send the itineraries to others.

While you can manually add any itinerary item, part of the beauty of TripIt is its automatic entry of reservations into your itinerary, from confirmation emails from more than 150 airlines, 100 general and individual travel reservation businesses, 10 cruise lines, 20 ticket agencies and event venues, 120 hotels and chains, 20 railroad reservation systems, 40 rental car companies, 5 restaurant reservation systems, and 15 major travel agencies. Reservation types include: flights, lodging, car rentals, rail, cruises, tours, theater, concerts, other transportation, restaurants, meetings, etc.

Each of these itinerary entries can include almost every conceivable detail about them.

As many readers know, I’ve recently changed my cellphone to the iPhone. This has made a substantial improvement for me, in the utility of TripIt, as there are a number of iPhone applications which synchronize with TripIt. In fact, TripIt’s integration with iPhone applications and Outlook have set TripIt as my core travel utility.

Like TravelTracker on my old Palm, Silverware Software has TravelTracker for the iPhone. The iPhone version fully synchronizes with TripIt. It allows the user to modify TripIt itineraries from your iPhone. In addition, for those primarily concerned with air travel, TripIt fully synchronizes it’s flight data with Flight Update Pro. TripIt also has its own free application for the iPhone which brings in your itineraries. In each of these programs, once the data is in your iPhone, you don’t need to be online to access it.

TripIt Mobile works with the iPhone, Palm Treo, RIM Blackberry, or any mobile device with a web browser. The problem here is you have to be online to view your data, unlike the iPhone apps, which store the data for anytime viewing on the iPhone.

TripIt syncs directly with Outlook 2007, in Windows, using Outlook’s Internet Calendar option. Unfortunately, Outlook Internet  calendars don’t directly sync with the iPhone, but it’s easy to copy and paste the entries into the standard Outlook calendar for inclusion on the iPhone.

For sharing, TripIt allows you to set up a network of people with whom you wish to share your travel itineraries. You can even permit some fellow travelers to enter and edit itinerary data. You can also use TripIt to email your itinerary to anyone you choose.

TripIt has a paid ($69/year) “Pro” version too. The Pro version can send you text message alerts about flight problems and changes, keep track of your frequent flier and other loyalty accounts, add additional network options and other valuable additions.

Is TripIt perfect? In a word, no. I have three main complaints. There are times when its email system doesn’t work, and you’re not notified of the problem. When you first enter a new itinerary item, all fields aren’t necessarily available. You can’t enter airline seat assignments, for example, without editing a previously entered flight reservation. You’ve got to explicitly enter the departure and arrival times, of each itinerary item or the order of itinerary items will be out of whack.

While not perfect, I think TripIt lives up to its promise and seems to be improved regularly.

Tagged as: Flight Update Pro, iPhone, Outlook 2007, Palm Treo, RIM Blackberry, travel itineraries, TravelTracker, tripit, TripIt Pro