Drafting itineraries and trip summaries with AI

AI can lay out an itinerary well. It shouldn't invent one. The difference is whether you hand it confirmed facts or ask it to fill gaps.

What an itinerary is

A travel itinerary is a schedule of intended destinations and activities for travellers¹. In airline systems, the booking record that holds one is called a passenger name record. It contains the itinerary for a passenger or a group travelling together, and it's found by a record locator².

Your client sees something friendlier: a day-by-day summary. Getting from booking record to that friendly page is a layout job, and layout is where a language tool earns its keep.

How the tool works with your notes

The tool predicts plausible text from what you give it. If you give it a clean list of confirmed items, it arranges them. If you give it a vague note, it may fill in what seems likely. Chatbots can slip believable falsehoods into their text³. An itinerary is full of spots where a guess looks right. Think of a check-in time, a pickup point or a museum's opening day.

So treat the tool as a typesetter. You supply every fact. It supplies the order, the headings and the plain wording.

A sensible way to prompt

1. Paste only confirmed items. Flight or rail times, hotel names and dates, transfer details, tour starts. Copy them from the booking record or supplier confirmation.
2. Label unknowns. Write "dinner: not booked" instead of leaving it blank, so the tool doesn't fill it.
3. Say what format you want. One heading per day, a short line for each item, times in the local style, nothing added.
4. Forbid extras. "Don't add attractions, restaurants, tips or opening hours."
5. Ask for a list of anything unclear. "After the itinerary, list any gaps or items that look inconsistent."

That last request is useful. A tool may sometimes flag an inconsistency, but don't rely on it. You still check every line against the booking record.

What to check before it goes out

Compare the finished text against the source record, line by line. Don't read it only for sense.

• Dates and days of the week. A date moved by one is easy to miss, especially across midnight flights.
• Times and time zones. Say which place a time refers to.
• Names. Spell each traveller exactly as on their travel documents, which you'll hold in your own system.
• Places. Cities with shared names, and airports and stations with similar names, are easy to mix up.
• Reference numbers. Copy them from the confirmation. Don't retype them from the draft.
• Anything the tool added. Delete it unless you can confirm it from a source.

For a longer routine, see the checking page.

Layout differs between systems

There's no general industry standard for the layout and content of a booking record². Different systems show the same trip differently, and suppliers' confirmations vary again. That's a reason to paste text from each source in a clear order, and to say which confirmation each item came from. The tool can't guess your supplier's format reliably.

Trip summaries versus itineraries

A summary is shorter: who's travelling, where, when, what's booked and what's still open. It suits a quick check-in with a client before the full document. Ask for it separately, with the same confirmed facts, and ask the tool to keep open items in their own short list.

Keep the document honest

Mark the document as a draft until every line is checked, and ask the client to read it too. They'll often spot a misspelt name or a wrong date quickly. Avoid adding advice about entry rules, health or insurance to an itinerary. Point clients to the official government source instead.