Years ago when I went traveling, I left the office behind. Today I take it with me.
Years ago I cleared up all outstanding business obligations and deputized an associate, relative or friend to deal with unforeseen problems in my absence. Rather than call in from wherever I stopped, I’d leave a couple of telephone numbers where I might be reached, but only in the direst emergencies, please.
Today, however, I carry a laptop computer. This year so far, I’ve taken it around New Zealand, to a remote inn in West Virginia and to Bergen, Norway, where I’m writing this. Because today’s technology permits it and a lot of advertising promotes it, I’m encouraged to stay connected.
Early this year I wrote about my New Zealand experience and how good it felt to be in instant e-mail touch with family and friends from so far away. In Norway, however, my laptop is much more important than for that. Yes, I hope to spend many rewarding hours viewing the spectacular fiords, but I also have this column to complete and to transmit electronically along with replies to questions that incoming e-mail will inevitably bring.
The other day in Oslo, after borrowing an appropriate telephone plug from the hotel concierge because I had packed the wrong ones, I was able to go on-line. Twenty-three e-mail messages awaited me — a 36-hour accumulation. Three were sexual solicitations, seven were junk commercials, and many of the others were from e-mail lists to which I subscribe. They told me the airline, hotel and auto-rental specials for next weekend, the latest news about travel technology and a schedule of upcoming rock concerts in New York City.
There was also a message from an editor asking for urgent changes in an article I had submitted a month earlier. It took five hours to complete my response.
On this trip, I’ll be gone 21 days. My paper mail — snail mail, the computer geeks call it — is on hold at my local post office. When my wife and I reach home, at least two bins of it will await us. If I hadn’t brought my laptop, e-mail would have piled up too. AOL says it keeps unread mail alive for 30 days.
For six days, my laptop will be forced out of service. That’s when we’ll be sailing up the Norwegian coast. Even if I can go on-line from the ship, the maritime telephone cost will be prohibitive. So e-mail will have to accumulate, at least until we debark at Kirkenes, far above the Arctic Circle.
Now let me switch gears. As I travel, a lot of changes are taking place in marketing on the World Wide Web. Almost daily, one hears of technological refinements and new business partnerships in the persistent, highly competitive race to get consumers to buy travel on-line.
The airlines, hotels and auto-rental companies love to sell on the Internet. It saves them money, because on-line marketing requires fewer reservations agents and fewer customer service calls than selling by telephone. Also, travel agents get lower commissions for on-line sales — and none if consumers buy directly from suppliers.
After spending several million dollars on technology and advertising, American Airlines recently updated and relaunched its Web site, now reachable at www.aa.com. Citing a media poll, the company advertises it as “The most popular airline site on the web.” This is hardly surprising in view of American’s popular NetSaver program of discounted weekend Internet-only fares and the bonus frequent-flier miles that it awards for on-line purchases.
The revamped site centers on American’s AAdvantage frequent-flier program, which has a reported 31 million members. Special e-mail offers geared to their personal preferences help promote their loyalty.
American also offers an on-line program called Personal Access, reachable via proprietary software that can be downloaded from www.aa.com. Both programs sell electronic tickets and have other similar features. But of the two, Personal Access works much faster. Among its many special features is a simple chart that tells how many frequent-flier miles are needed for each level of airline award. To get such information on www.aa.com, I had to click slowly through five screens beyond the home page. Even after that, there was no comprehensive chart to scan but only a separate one for each type of award.
Using the “Fare Quotes” section of American’s new site, I attempted to find the best price for a round trip between Philadelphia and Phoenix, leaving Saturday, Oct. 31, and returning Thursday, Nov. 5. In reply, I got a list of fare codes and rates for those dates, but no indication of what airlines were offering them, at what times, with what routings or whether seats were available.
When I switched to the reservations section to shop by price, I was offered three flights on American, all with connections and a round-trip fare of $394.53. I was not given the option to see or select any more flights or to change airlines. When I chose to shop by schedule, I was offered 10 flights on three airlines in each direction, starting with non-stops. I had to select a pair before being quoted a fare. I chose a round trip on US Airways and ultimately was quoted $354.80.
There’s no question that the new site is an improvement. Further improvement would be welcome.
United Airlines, meanwhile, has enhanced its United Connection on-line program to allow its Mileage Plus frequent fliers to request upgrades for flights that have been booked there. Bonus miles are offered. An itinerary selector displays a whole range of flights on all airlines on selected routes, but no fares until specific flights have been selected. A “SuperShopper” lets you shop fares two days before to two days after a proposed itinerary.
The proprietary United Connection software, however, notable for speed and ease of use, appears to have been downgraded. It refers users to United’s Web site (www.ual.com) for discounted “e-fares” available on selected domestic and international flights. The proprietary software continues to book hotels and has a much broader database than American Airlines’. For example, it offers two hotels in Rovaniemi, the capital of Finnish Lapland. The closest hotels on www.aa.com are in Helsinki, the Finnish capital.
By contrast, the United Web site doesn’t fare so well with hotels. Not only does it not list Rovaniemi, it also omits Hot Springs, Va., site of The Homestead resort, and White Sulphur Springs, W.Va., home of The Greenbrier. For Boca Raton, Fla., it lists 30 hotels within 50 miles of nearby Ft. Lauderdale Airport, including several in Miami, but not the famed Boca Raton Club and Resort.
When I tried recently to punch my flight preferences into a United “personal page,” I received this message: “Welcome! The personal page has been temporarily deactivated. We apologize for the inconvenience. Thank You.”
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Paul Grimes can be reached by e-mail at paulmark@aol.com
