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The best apps to keep you on the move
Our increasingly digitised lives are making travel more complex but also more rewarding, enabling meaningful connections and a deeper understanding of unknown people and places, but at the same time leaving us more vulnerable. The rich pool of digital resources available to travellers can also make it a lighter, more agile experience. The following tools could save you money, keep you safe and enhance the travelling experience this year.
Organisation
Travel increasingly involves a number of different providers and companies. Keep track of all aspects of your trip in one place via an organisational app such as Apple’s Wallet (for storing boarding passes, rewards cards, credit and debit cards and more, which can be synced to your calendar).
Create a master itinerary by forwarding confirmation emails
Avoid awkward language barriers by using Google Translate’s instant camera translation function
from airlines, car rental companies, hotels, restaurants and so on to collation apps such as Tripit (tripit. com) and Tripcase (travel.tripcase. com). IQ Planner (iqplanner.com) invites users to upload their itinerary to its “marketplace”, then earn money for views and click-through.
Avoid awkward language barriers by using Google Translate’s instant camera translation function: take a photo of the foreign text (ideal for cyrillic or Greek and Chinese script), choose the language and wait for the results.
Download maps for your chosen destination and then use them offline to navigate when you don’t have access to wi-fi; it also avoids the “Look At Me, I’m a Tourist” inevitability of traipsing around and trying to scrutinise a street map.
Money
There are many ways in which to reduce the risk of paying over the odds on currency exchange, particularly by avoiding last-minute purchases. However, a new wave of fintech start-ups is shaking up the way in which money and people move around.
Revolut (revolut.com) is a digital banking system that comes with a debit card that can be used fee-free in 130 currencies using the “real” (not marked up) exchange rate and hold up to 25 currencies at one time.
Weswap (weswap.com) bills itself as “the people’s currency exchange” – the peer-to-peer exchange site cuts out fees and mark-ups by connecting travellers with currency. Register for a card, load it with sterling then choose your chosen currency – it is swapped at “low” rates (1-3 per cent) and no fees, though watch out for “inactivity fees” if you leave any money lingering at the end of a trip.
Many currency exchange providers won’t buy back foreign coins. Fourex (fourex.co.uk) is an exception; the company’s automated kiosks – currently only in London – accept small change and even obsolete currencies. There are no commission fees, but the rates aren’t always attractive – but it still beats wasting your last coins on pointless airport purchases in a bid to purge yourself of pennies. You can also opt to donate the cash to charity.
Transport
The only guaranteed method for ensuring an upgrade is to pay for one. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean paying full price. There are several apps that invite customers to fill unsold posh seats last-minute, by means of bidding. Seatfrog (seatfrog.com) recently launched in partnership with Virgin Trains, offering same-day upgrades to first class from as little as £5 one-way.
Bidding opens two hours before departure and ends 30 minutes before.
Plusgrade (plusgrade.com) is the airline equivalent, powering bidding systems for nine airlines including Singapore, Etihad, Cathay and Qantas. Virgin Atlantic (virginatlantic.com/gb/ en/my-booking/upgrade.html) operates its own online auction, but only permits moving up to the class above your paid-for seat (so you can’t leapfrog from economy to Upper Class) and not all routes are eligible. Improve your chances by checking sites such as Expertflyer.com to see which seats are available.
If you don’t have the means to upgrade, use search site Seatguru. com to identify the best (and worst) seat numbers on your flight. Flightaware (uk.flightaware.com) is a useful tool for tracking flights, and more importantly delays. Its Misery Map is an amusing means of keeping track of large-scale snare-ups in the US, for example extreme weather upsets.
Frequent flyers are increasingly turning to facial recognition as a means of airport fast-tracking. Currently being trialled at a handful of airports in Europe, the US, Middle East and Australia, the “single token travel” service does away with passports and boarding cards, favouring biometrics (sita.aero/ solutions-and-services/solutions/ sita-smart-path). British Airways is currently trialling a similar system at Los Angeles airport (vision-box.com).
Security queues at US airports can be avoided – for a fee – by authorised US passport-holders. The TSA Pre service (tsa.gov/precheck) costs $85; apply for screening and once authorised you can sail through screening without removing shoes, laptops and liquids for five years.
US immigration – frequently cited as hostile and cumbersome – can also be cleared prior to arrival. Ireland is the only European country that is able to conduct pre-clearance for passengers flying to the US: book a connecting flight on Aer Lingus (aerlingus.com) and clear immigration in Dublin, then walk straight through on arrival.
Citymapper (citymapper.com) is an intuitive mapping app that offers intelligent transport solutions in almost 40 cities around the world. Tap in your desired destination and it will use your current location to find the swiftest routes available. Its newest innovations include a “smartbus” route and shared black taxi app in central London.
Accommodation
Frequent travellers tend to collect loyalty points with one hotel brand. However, Wanup (wanup.com/en) casts the net far wider, with a huge variety of independent and chain partner hotels. Currently available in Europe, it rewards stays with cash incentives, perks and rewards.
Travellers with flexibility should look to spontaneous booking apps Hotel Tonight (hoteltonight.com) and One Night (onenight.com) that offer often deeply-discounted hotel rooms for last minute bookings. One Night opens up booking at 3pm on the same day, while Hotel Tonight improves the offers the more stays you book.
For anyone with a taste for adventure, look for “secret hotel” options on booking sites such as Lastminute.com and Laterooms. com. A description is provided but the hotel isn’t revealed until after booking – a trade-off for discounted rates that can be mitigated simply by putting the description into a search engine before committing to the booking.
Safety
Using wi-fi or public computers abroad can put your personal details at risk. Keep your data safe by firstly performing a full data back-up before leaving and make sure you have strong passwords in place.
Photograph or scan important documents, including your passport and serial numbers of valuables and save them to a cloud-based storage service such as Dropbox.
VPNS (virtual private networks) will keep your device secure, wherever you are online – but avoid free downloads and opt for a paidfor service such as Expressvpn or Ipvanish.
For general and country-specific safety advice, consult the Foreign Office’s Travel Aware checklist at travelaware.campaign.gov.uk. ■