Travel calls an AI can make for you: hotels, airlines, rental cars

What it settles, and where it stops

Start with where it stops, because that's the part you'll care about at the gate. An AI assistant calling on your behalf will not pay a change fee. It will not read out a card number, and it will not agree to a charge of any size. Anything with a price attached comes back to you as a question.

Inside that line there's a good deal it can settle by phone. It can ask a hotel for early check-in, or let them know you're arriving late. It can wait on hold with an airline and rebook you after a cancellation, or chase the refund you were promised. And it can answer when the rental counter rings while you're in the air. After each call you get a written summary of what was agreed and what's still open.

Asking a hotel for early check-in

This is the ideal call to hand off, because you're asking, not buying. Your flight lands at nine, check-in is at three, and the only way to find out whether a room might be ready is to ask the front desk. The assistant rings, gives your name, your dates and your confirmation number, says when you'll arrive, and asks.

Front desks rarely promise. The usual answer is some version of "we'll make a note and do our best", and your summary will say exactly that. It won't say confirmed when nothing was confirmed. If the hotel offers early check-in for a fee, you get the amount and the choice.

The same goes for the other small hotel calls. A late arrival, so they don't give the room away. A crib. A room away from the elevator. The phone charger you left plugged in by the bed.

Rebooking after a canceled flight

The message arrives at 5am. Canceled. The app offers one alternative, tomorrow night, and the phone queue is long and you're trying to get two children into shoes.

Give the assistant your booking code, where you need to be and by when, and what you'd accept: a connection, a nearby airport, a different day. It works through the phone menu, waits out the hold, and asks the agent what's available. If a new flight fits what you said and costs nothing extra, it can take it. If there's a fare difference or a fee, or a choice you didn't cover, it comes to you first. You hear from it when a decision is needed, and not before.

Two caveats. Airlines often want to verify the passenger before they change a ticket, and some will only deal with the passenger. For those, ask to be connected. The assistant does the waiting and rings your mobile once a person answers, so you do the talking and skip the queue. The details are in let an AI wait on hold for you.

When the rental counter rings about an upgrade

You gave the rental company a phone number when you booked. If that was your assistant's number, or if your missed calls forward to it, the assistant answers when the counter rings the day before you land. Usually it's one of three things. They're confirming your pickup time, they're offering a bigger car, or the class you booked isn't available.

The assistant takes all of it down. The offer, the price per day, what it includes, how long the offer stands, who to ask for when you ring back. It doesn't accept the upgrade, because an upgrade is a charge. You read the note at the baggage carousel and decide with the facts in front of you, not with a line of tired people behind you at the counter.

Calls that stay yours

A few travel calls shouldn't be handed off at all, or only as far as the hold music.

• Anything that ends in a payment. The assistant brings you the amount and the terms. You pay.
• Identity checks. Keep passport numbers, card details and security answers out of any instruction. If they need to verify you, be on the call.
• Arguing about compensation. It will ask what the airline is offering and write that down. Deciding whether to accept it is your job.
• Travel insurance claims. It can ask where a claim has got to. It doesn't advise on one.

What you read when you land

You switch your phone back on and the summaries are waiting. The hotel has noted the early arrival but promised nothing. The airline has you on the 2:15 with the same seat type, and here's the new confirmation code. The rental counter offered a bigger car at a daily price, and the offer stands until noon.

Each note starts with an honest status, and a call that didn't get through is reported as exactly that. If you've connected an assistant that can search flights, it can also send you options with a booking link, and you do the booking and paying yourself. Integrations lists what's available.

Before you leave home

Ten minutes of preparation makes all of the above work better. Do it on the sofa, not in the security line.

• Decide which number goes on which booking. Put the assistant's number where you'd like callbacks handled for you, or set up forwarding for missed calls so it covers your mobile.
• Keep your booking codes in one place. Every call starts with one.
• Settle your limits now. The latest arrival you'd accept, the airports you'd use, whether a connection is fine. You think more clearly at home than at a gate.
• Turn your ringer on for connect calls. The assistant can wait forty minutes for you. The airline agent won't wait long.
• Keep your card in your own wallet. Whatever it costs, you're the one who says yes.

Common questions

More on everyday use

• Let an AI wait on hold for you
• How an AI books a restaurant table by phone
• Using AI to schedule and move appointments by phone
• AI call screening: what happens when a stranger calls your line