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TripIt was highly recommended to me by some of my friends.
It keeps tabs on your travels and alerts you if it doesn’t think you’ll make a connection.
The pro-version even pulls up alternative flights.
I went all in on the pro-version.
After using it for some time, I’m definitely not continuing for the following reasons:
1. Â It selectively imports plans
One of the options on TripIt is to have it automatically import your plans from your email. Â I have this set up and found 1/3 plans have successfully imported into the system, even when I try manually running a scan on the website.
It also has created plans that don’t really exist, and weirdly tries to import my boarding passes sometimes and bugs out.
2. Â It combines my travels with my friends
Some of my friends shared their plans with me and have similar (but not exactly the same) plans. Â TripIt nests my plans within their plans, creating this weird system where I keep freaking out that I missed my flight because I am looking at my friends’ plans instead of my own.
3. Â It doesn’t update my plans once they are in the system, even if I import an email notifying me of a change.
When I get upgraded, or when I change my flight, TripIt doesn’t take this as relevant information to attach to my trip.
This is one thing AwardWallet is really good at proactively.  I usually notice that my upgrade cleared through an email from AwardWallet before I ever see the email from US Airways.  And when I change my plans, AwardWallet automatically updates.  It isn’t as pretty as TripIt, but it’s more effective.
The huge reason I don’t use TripIt anymore is for the reasons above, I can’t actually trust it.  I’ve used memory as a huge part of my organization method for travel, and all TripIt has done is caused me to question (correct) understands of the plans I had.
If I’m taking all this time to reorganize my TripIt constantly, I may as well manually put the plans into my calendar myself and skip the middle guy.
It isn’t consistent enough to rely on completely, and it seems pointless if you can’t rely on it completely.
Anyone have good luck with using TripIt?
I use KAYAK because I like it’s UI better than TripIt, but TripIt integrates with my work travel expensing. So I sorta use both.
Award Wallet looks interesting. I don’t care if it has crummy UI if it means that it will automatically update when a flight changes or gets canceled. Kayak does…but only sometimes. And really, it just sends you an e-mail. I’d rather it updated in my itinerary too (or a note).
I see that Award Wallet auto updates when an “upgrade is cleared” (must be nice), but any idea if it auto updates when a flight changes?
It has always updated everything as long as the itinerary number is consistent. It’s a little annoying when flight times adjust by a minute, but I’d rather that then the alternative.
Don’t you see that Jeanne is getting paid to refer this crappy service?
I don’t — I disclose all advertising and affiliate relationships when there is one.
Have you tried Kayak? Way better at importing than TripIt.
I’ll check it out!
Agree!
I have TripIt pro through work and while I still use it, it is almost never useful.
The biggest issue I have is that it is not smart enough to correctly recognize my destination’s IATA code is the i shared with another location – worldwide.
I often travel to Trenton, NJ via Amtrak for work. Trenton (TRE) has the same IATA code as Tiree England (also TRE). For whatever reason, when I schedule travel to Trenton, TripIt insists I’m going to England VIA TRAIN!!!
This screws up my entire itinerary unless I manually change things which IMO defeats the purpose of TripIt. I made them aware of the issue and they responded that there was no way to fix it since the two destinations shared the same IATA code. Unbelievable
I hope you didn’t actually pay for tripit pro since it comes free with the Barclays Arrival card. I agree you have to do some managing to get the trips all lined up but I still like using it. Also if you pay for any Southwest flights, it monitors the flight and lets you know if there is a lower fare. This allows you to get a credit with SW. It has worked for me at least twice that I remember.
I use TripIt (not pro) and I love how it has all of my travel info at once. I traipse around the world and it has never ever gotten one piece of my travel wrong. I usually forward my details to TripIt but even without doing so, it has always imported my travel info correctly. It has also never gotten my travel info confused with my TripIt friend’s info. I also like that it’s compatible with my standard hotel bookings and even car service bookings. I also love how it will also add it to a TripIt calendar (though this sometimes takes a few hours to update) that I can easily integrate with my Google calendar.
I was an early adopter of TripIt – I even got Pro access a few times through various programs that gave it away.
Adding trips was a hassle and the family or co-workers that would have referenced it frankly never needed the specifics. A shared calendar is easier.
The pro features I wanted to work were gate announcements and reroute assistance. In each case I found myself doing better by doing the research on my own.
Tripit to me feels like there are enough bugs remaining after 8 years that they’re never going to be prime time enough to use.
I’m using tripit pro, but I never would give it permission to access my email. I manually forward reservations to it.
It doesn’t handle upgrades, but it does handle changes in your itineraries, only for some reason they only process itinerary changes within a small window (maybe 24 hours?) before the flights.
If I change plans, I just forward the new e-ticket info to plans@tripit.com and login to handle the conflict.
-David
I agree for the same and some other reasons too. I also stopped using it.
Agree awardwallet is good at scraping sites to put together itineraries, and it’s automatic, but it can’t get scrape all websites. Like @David, I also forward my reservations to TripIt. I like being a little bit involved in the process of constructing my itinerary as it’s helpful to remember and plan.