1. Ask six things before you write anything
| Ask | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Dates and nights | Fixed, or flexible by a few days. Flexibility often decides the hotel. |
| Who is travelling | Adults, and children with their ages. Ages decide extra beds and child rates. |
| Where from | The city they start in and how they arrive: flight, train or their own car. |
| Pace | Sights every day, or a slow trip with free afternoons. Older travellers and small children change everything. |
| Hotels | The category they expect, and any hotel they already have in mind. |
| Must-dos | The one or two things the trip is for. A honeymoon, a birthday, a temple visit. |
Six questions in one message, answered in one reply, are faster than six rounds of WhatsApp. Many agents keep the questions as a saved message, or send a short form.
2. Route the trip before you fill the days
- Draw the line first. Arrival city, each overnight town, departure city. Check every drive between them.
- Long drives early. Day 1 is often lost to arrival; the longest drive goes on Day 2 or 3, when the family is fresh.
- Two nights where you can. Every hotel change costs half a day of packing and checking in.
- Sleep near the exit. The last night should be close to the departure airport or station, so a late morning cannot cost the flight.
3. Write each day
A date, a title, morning, afternoon and evening with start times and travel times, and the overnight hotel with meals. Say what is paid on the spot and what depends on weather. The day-wise itinerary format has worked days for a hill station, a beach, Dubai and a pilgrimage.
4. Add what the days do not say
The hotels table, the inclusions and exclusions, what to carry and the weather, and the contacts: yours, and the driver's, sent before the trip. Copy the inclusions and exclusions from the quotation word for word, so the two documents never disagree.
5. Check it like the customer will
- Do the dates and weekdays match the calendar, and the number of nights match the hotels?
- Is every hotel named the same way on the itinerary and the quotation?
- Is there a travel time on every drive, and a return time on every outing?
- Is there a price anywhere on the itinerary? Take it off; it belongs on the quotation.
6. Send it as a PDF, in your own name
A PDF keeps its layout on a phone, prints cleanly and looks like it came from a business. Put your logo and agency name on every page, because the itinerary will be forwarded to people who have never heard of you. Send it from your own WhatsApp with a line in your own words; the customer is replying to you, not to a document.
7. Never write the same trip twice
Most agencies sell the same ten trips in slightly different shapes. Save each one as a template the first time it comes out well. The next Rajasthan enquiry starts from the Rajasthan template: change the dates, the hotels and the one day that is different, and send. The format and free files are in the itinerary format guide.
Making itineraries in Triplli
In Triplli the enquiry is a ticket with the dates and travellers on it. Import a template and the days drop in with their sightseeing, transfers and photos from your library; drag days to reorder and the dates follow. Hotels and cars come from your own catalogue with the rates you last paid, for the estimate on the same ticket. The itinerary PDF goes out in your logo and colour with no money on it, and you send it from your own WhatsApp. Triplli never messages the customer. See the itinerary builder.
