Travelling with tech tiresome
Asmartphone is a traveller’s best friend but despite being around for 10 years, airports, airlines and hotels haven’t fully embraced them.
It’s still expensive to get hotel wi-fi, find somewhere to charge devices and difficult to use your own headphones on planes.
I hope someday to be able to travel while seamlessly connected to the internet but I don’t think hotels are going to help.
A hotel in Sydney I recently stayed at charged A$18 (NZ$19.50) for 200MB, though if you’re feeling flush you could fork out for A$85 for 1GB. That last figure is what I pay for a month’s unlimited broadband at home.
Those charges may have been OK in the 1990s but it’s puzzling why prices are still so high. I know Australia is behind New Zealand with its ultra-fast broadband rollout but most travellers don’t need fast speeds, just fair prices.
It’s far cheaper to roam using
Airlines need to embrace the single headphone plug.
your New Zealand mobile provider. However, it pays to get it set up before leaving and it pays to use your provider’s app to keep track of data (once again, get this loaded before you leave).
It also pays to pack a portable battery to recharge your phone as it can be hard to find somewhere to plug in other than the few charging desks at an airport. It would be great to have USB ports under every seat at the airport and in planes.
Trying to plug in a laptop is even harder. Power points are usually far from chairs so you have to sit on the ground and often it can be in a thoroughfare.
Airlines also haven’t embraced tech enough. Most have a good app for keeping track of flights and air miles but they could be used for more, such as keeping you up to date when your flight is delayed. While some do this, the information is usually slow to arrive.
I also think its time airlines embrace the single 3.5mm headphone plug. One theory behind the weird two-prong jack on airplanes is that it was designed to stop people stealing the free headphones.
But now headphones are so affordable, it’d be great to be able to use your own without having to remember to bring an adaptor.
Using tech when travelling is unfortunately still a hassle and the only way to avoid getting caught out is to be organised and plan ahead.