Are you traveling to Europe and concerned about ash clouds or airline strikes?
e-Travel Techologies, a Mississauga, Ontario, firm which has spent the last couple of decades providing risk-oriented travel information to travel management companies and corporations, launched a subscription service for consumers.
For $2 for one destination per month or $3 per destination for three months in a row, the company e-mails its e-Travel Alerts, which cover travel advisories ranging from a financial crisis in Greece to riots in Thailand, so it can equip travelers with risk assessments before and during their travels.
The service covers a comprehensive list of destinations and e-Travel Technologies claims "this is the first time that fully comprehensive travel alerts and personalized 'know before you go' advisories have been offered directly to the public."
e-Travel Technologies says its alerts, which are culled from government agencies, the travel industry, security services and some 60 news websites, are updated every 10 minutes.
e-Travel Technologies appears to be targeting unmanaged business travelers for the service.
Don Churchill, president of e-Travel Technologies, says the alerts are delivered via email to PCs and mobile devices, adding that SMS text messages would be too restrictive.
"We are confident that 99.9% of corporate business travellers receive their emails on their mobiles," Wilson says. "SMS is restricted to 180 characters."
With the abundance of public information, including Google Alerts, available to consumers about global crises, it remains to be seen whether road warriors will pay for the service.
e-Travel Technologies says it is also building a white label version of its notification service for suppliers.