Traveling Abroad? How to Avoid Surprise Phone Charges and Save Money on Roaming
There's the simple route: Turn on roaming and let your home carrier charge a daily fee for talk, text and data overseas. That adds up quickly. Verizon's Travel Pass went from $10 to $12 a day last year. And that's for each phone in your family plan. Or there's the money-saving approach: Download a prepaid eSIM for a week's worth of data that costs a fraction of the price.
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Travel + Leisure
an hour ago
- Travel + Leisure
Why Travel Experts Say You Should Never Throw Away Your Boarding Pass
You prepared for your trip, printed your boarding pass, and made it to your destination. At this point, it might be tempting to toss your ticket or delete the saved screenshot of your boarding pass—but you may want to hang on to it a bit longer. Keeping your boarding pass can offer a few unexpected benefits even after your journey ends. It's a small habit that can potentially save you time, money, and stress down the line. A Record of Your Journey Airlines occasionally lose track of flight records—especially when it comes to mileage credit. If you ever need to prove that you were on a flight, your boarding pass serves as solid evidence. It's especially wise to hang on to a printed version, as mobile boarding passes can sometimes disappear once a flight lands. Having that tangible proof can also come in handy for lounge access or verifying eligibility for upgrades. For Frequent Flyer Mile Discrepancies We all hope mileage programs work flawlessly, but technical glitches happen. If your frequent flyer miles don't post correctly, your boarding pass can help customer service resolve the issue quickly. 'If you're part of an airline's loyalty program, your boarding pass might be necessary to claim missing points or miles. Sometimes, airlines have technical issues, and your miles may not be automatically credited,' the blog UniMoniTravel states. 'Having your boarding pass allows you to provide the necessary proof to claim your rewards.' In Case of Travel Disruptions Delays, cancelations, and lost luggage are unfortunate realities of air travel. If you need to file a claim with travel insurance or take advantage of credit card protections, your boarding pass can provide essential information that helps validate your case. Keeping it on hand makes navigating these issues easier. To Protect Your Personal Information If you're using a paper boarding pass, be careful of how you dispose of it. The bar code contains a lot of sensitive data, including your frequent flyer number, which may be linked to your email address, phone number, or other personal details. Hold on to your pass until you're sure it's no longer needed and shred it or destroy it securely when you're ready.
Travel Weekly
2 hours ago
- Travel Weekly
Avoiding crowds and booking last minute
Jamie Biesiada Avoid crowds and the highest prices during peak travel seasons by traveling during shoulder season. It's been a message the industry has been focused on for years, especially during the post-Covid travel boom and after reports of some of the hottest summers on record in choice destinations. A new survey from Travelsavers and the Network of Entrepreneurs Selling Travel (NEST) found evidence that travelers are taking the message to heart. Travelsavers and NEST agencies were surveyed in April and May, and 32% of respondents reported their shoulder season bookings were up compared to the same time period last year. More specifically, 12% said shoulder season bookings were up 10% or more from the year prior, while 20% said they were up between 1% and 9%. Another 35% said shoulder season bookings were comparable with last year, while 27% said shoulder season bookings were down (16% said they were down 1%-9%, while 11% said they were down 10% or more). Six percent said they don't have a shoulder season because sales are consistent throughout the year. Last-minute bookings up The survey also found evidence that some Travelsavers and NEST affiliates are experiencing a popular trend this year: last-minute bookings. In total, 20% of the survey's respondents said they are experiencing more last-minute bookings than usual. Another 40% reported seeing a normal amount of last-minute bookings, while 40% are not seeing last-minute bookings this year. Take Travel Weekly's survey Travel Weekly is currently conducting its own survey, and one of the areas it delves into is booking windows this year compared to last year. It's still in the earlier stages of being fielded, but indications point to much shorter booking windows this year. If you haven't taken the poll yet, please take a few minutes to let us know how your travel business is doing this year. It's still open to all travel advisors and agency owners/managers and takes less than 10 minutes to complete.
Travel Weekly
2 hours ago
- Travel Weekly
A cooling corporate climate? Survey sees biz travel slowing
Citing the impact of tariffs, economic uncertainty and geopolitics, many corporate travel stakeholders are anticipating that business travel's rocky recovery is about to get worse. New data from the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) suggests the industry is anticipating a slowdown. The group's July outlook poll, which surveyed 950 corporate travel managers, suppliers, travel management companies and other stakeholders across 45 countries in mid-June, showed that optimism within the sector had plummeted from 67% in late 2024 to just 28% by this summer. The deteriorating outlook was especially pronounced among suppliers: While 37% expected revenue drops in April, that figure had jumped to 48% in the latest survey. Hotel suppliers are especially pessimistic, with 58% anticipating revenue decreases averaging 17%. Jan Freitag, senior vice president of lodging insights for STR and the national director of hospitality analytics for CoStar Group, pointed to recent STR hotel data supporting these concerns. Jan Freitag "If you look at the weekday U.S. occupancy percent change for the last four months, that has been negative," he said. "So, in March, April, May and June, weekday occupancy has declined compared to 2024. And that weekday occupancy softness is, to me, already a sign that all is not well in the business segment." Related story: CWT projects travel costs to moderate in 2026 The uncertainty stems largely from what Freitag described as the "tariff on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again" environment, which he said has infused uncertainty into the global macroeconomic picture, causing some companies to take a "wait-and-see approach" as it relates to corporate transient travel decisions. He also noted that for the first six months of this year, group occupancy had declined. Despite the headwinds, the GBTA's comprehensive Business Travel Index still projects global business travel spend will grow 7%, to $1.57 trillion, in 2025, though this represents a deceleration from previous forecasts. Companies shift gears TMCs are reporting similarly sluggish spending patterns. At the GBTA's annual convention last week in Denver, Gabe Rizzi, president of the TMC Altour, said business is essentially flat year over year to date, which is well below the company's double-digit growth plan. Business with government contractors and some manufacturing sectors are down double digits, he added, and government IT sectors are off approximately 25%. In light of the anemic corporate travel environment, Rizzi said the company is focusing sharply on new client recruitment, including working toward leveraging partnerships announced in April with Kayak for Business and Blockskye. "Corporate travel is like a canary in the coal mine," Rizzi said. "Whenever there is uncertainty in the geopolitical sphere, everyone takes a wait-and-see approach." American Express reported that travel and entertainment spending by its commercial customers grew just 1% year over year in the second quarter, down from 2% growth in the first quarter. The company attributed the slowdown to "softer airline and lodging spend." Airlines, however, represented a bright spot amid the overall pessimism, with only 39% expecting revenue declines this year, according to the GBTA survey. During Q2 earnings calls this month, Delta said corporate sales were up low single digits year over year in June, while United Airlines reported even stronger momentum. United CEO Scott Kirby said that while business demand "is not all the way back," demand "has certainly inflected in a positive direction." Still, this optimism does not extend across all industries. Sectors with significant exposure to tariffs, such as car manufacturing, are likely to be "disproportionately impacted," Freitag said, and may decrease their corporate travel spend. Suzanne Neufang Suzanne Neufang, the GBTA's CEO, echoed that sentiment. "Manufacturing, it goes without saying, I think is the most at risk because of the disruption that's happening," she said. "But we don't quite know which way it's going to go right now." Visa worries Beyond the tariff impact, U.S. government policy has been cited as a factor causing companies to increasingly modify their meetings strategies. The GBTA poll shows rising numbers of organizations have canceled their U.S.-based meetings, relocated events outside the U.S. or shifted to virtual formats since April, with 20% of organizations reporting that they've canceled sending employees to U.S.-based events, up from 10% earlier this spring. "And it wasn't just non-U.S. companies responding that way," Neufang said "It was also companies who are based in the U.S. who are changing their meeting locations, and that could be for visa reasons, because certain employee bases are still having a tough time getting visas to travel into the U.S., from a fast turnaround perspective." The survey also found that one in five travel buyers globally said employees have declined U.S.-based business trips due to concerns related to U.S. government actions, and more than one-third of global respondents reported that they personally know someone whose travel has been affected by U.S. policy changes, up from 23% in April. _______________________________ Robert Silk contributed to this report.
