www.Traveljini.com -- Doesn't go far enough

Aarati Krishnan

ARE you one of those highly-strung people who shudder at thought of planning a holiday?

The list of chores that precede a holiday seem endless -- deciding on the location, planning the itinerary, tying up hotel bookings, train tickets, coordinating, confirming and re-confirming each booking to make sure nothing goes wrong.

Now help is at hand for the nervous traveller, in the form of a host of Internet travel sites. Traveljini.com, is one, though not necessarily the best, of them.

The first part of planning a holiday is collecting information on tourist destinations, the best season to travel, the weather, likely cost and availability of accommodation and food and the best way to get to your destination. Earlier, the only source of this information was hearsay -- from friends, relatives or colleagues. Now you can use sites such as Traveljini to systematically sift through destinations and choose the one that best fits your temperament and budget.

Information: At Traveljini, you can use the search facility to choose from a list of locations within India or outside India. Or you can zoom in on your ideal holiday spot from various ``channels'' listed by Traveljini -- such as Adventure Trails, Popular Circuits, Wildlife Sanctuaries, Honeymoon Ideas, and so on.

The site also suggests weekend getaways from the major metros and offers special package deals for those with specific requirements. There is also general information for tourists touring India. This includes such sections as travel tips, must carry, health tips, weather, maps and so on.

Once you click on the destination of your choice, the site offers you further information on the places to visit, weather, accommodation, hotel tariffs and so on, along with a brief description of the place.

The content has its limitations. The information on tourist destinations is probably too descriptive, rhapsodising at length about each spot, its history, balmy weather and so on.

What a busy browser would probably like to see is more factual and tightly presented information that is of quick and easy reference to the users. For those short on patience and browsing time, a brief list of hotels, tariffs, modes of travel within the tourist spot and places to visit would probably serve the purpose better. Though such information too is available on the site, the descriptions undoubtedly take up more space than the basic facts.

Another caveat for those interested in touring outside India -- the site has a limited repertoire for outbound tourists. Though the site promises to the `make the world your oyster', the international travel section features just two destinations at present -- Singapore and Maldives.

Online services: After choosing your destination, you can start planning your itinerary online. Money-changing, visa support, flight bookings, hotel bookings, and readymade packages are some of the services offered by the site. The flight booking section has one feature which would be very useful for non-tourists as well.

It allows one to check the seat availability on flights of your choice, online, through a search facility. The Smart Fare Finder helps you find the flight which offers the lowest fare on a given route. In the hotel bookings section, the visitor can scroll through the various hotels, contact numbers of hotels, a brief review and description of each, tariffs and so on.

Special services: The site also offers quite a few special services. The reverse auctions allow you to hunt for bargain holidays. You can use the ``destinationjini'' to direct specific queries to the site; the site promises prompt feedback through e- mail. You can use the Online Puja facility to have a puja performed at a temple of your choice.

Traveljini promises to send you a receipt and Prasadam from the temple. For those who do not find the readymade packages on offer suitable, the `Customjini' is a good idea. This facility allows you to key in your expectations from a holiday. Based on your budget and time availability, the site promises to use an in-house expert to design a tailormade travel package for you within 48 hours.

The Currency Converter allows tourists to compute exchange rates for foreign currencies. Special sections are also devoted to conferences and corporate travel.

For those interested in travel per se, the site offers other sections which may make interesting reading -- travel news, maps, tourist spot reviews and the fortnightly magazine Mag-a-jini. The last offers articles on travel, mainly travelogues and reviews of books on travel.

Site ideas: The site needs to segregate factual information on various destinations from the descriptive pieces. This way, visitors who want to soak in the ``atmosphere'' of a tourist spot can do so at leisure, while others can stick to facts alone. Moreover, while Traveljini offers a lot of information on flights and flight fares, the site entirely ignores train travel.

Since the majority of the Indian travelling population relies on the Railways, this might be seen as a major missing link on the site. The site needs to expand its repertoire of destinations too, especially with respect to foreign travel, since it has a section devoted to this.