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WHAT'S 'ESSENTIAL' ON THE ROAD NOW
By Joe Brancatelli
May 23, 2012 -- If you travel on business long enough, you begin to notice items you once considered "essential" that you don't even own anymore.

Remember when we all traveled with mini-alarm clocks because hotels never had clocks in the rooms? Remember acoustic couplers and alligator clips so you could turn an old-school phone into a jerry-rigged modem? How about dual-time-zone watches? Pagers? Little black boxes that activated our home answering machines? Or, for that matter, answering machines?

But if you travel on business long enough, you also realize that there's always something new we "must" have with us on the road. Here are five new must-have items for the well-equipped, well-prepared, modern business traveler.

Global Entry Membership
Four years ago, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency invented a little service called Global Entry. It allows U.S. citizens who travel overseas to bypass the customs and immigrations lines when they return. Instead, they are permitted use a fingerprint-driven automated kiosk because they have given the Customs agency lots of background information. It's a nifty program if you travel overseas a lot and a terrific value for the five-year fee of just $100.

But what makes Global Entry a must-have accoutrement for every business traveler is that the TSA has decided membership qualifies you for the PreCheck program. What's PreCheck? That's the TSA's long-overdue and extraordinarily sensible scheme that permits "trusted travelers" to bypass the scrum at security checkpoints. PreCheck-approved flyers use a separate lane and are afforded the dignity of leaving their shoes, belts, and jackets on and their laptops in their cases. I have had my doubts about PreCheck. But credit where credit is due: The TSA hasn't played too many games with the rules and has been rolling PreCheck out fairly rapidly. Anyone chosen for PreCheck—usually based on elite frequent-flyer status at particular airline hub—raves about it.

While you're not always eligible for PreCheck through your airline status, Global Entry membership trumps that disadvantage. To date, it's the best $100 you can spend to minimize the hassles and the humiliation of airport security. Better yet, you might not even have to spend the C-note. If you're an American Express Platinum cardholder, Amex will rebate your fee. Several airlines will also comp Global Entry membership for their most elite flyers. Check with your program for more details.

Spools on a Plane
Armies may travel on their stomachs, but the nation's army of road warriors travel on their technology. And we deal with a veritable snake pit of cables for smartphones, laptops, tablets, book readers, and other electronic devices. Don't channel your inner Samuel L. Jackson on your next flight. Put your snakes, er, cables, on a spool. Virtually any wire you require is now sold on a nice, neat, easy-to-organize spool. They cost only a few bucks each, and you'll be surprised how much better your life is when you don't have to untangle a Gordian knot of cables before you fire up your laptop or recharge your smartphone.

A Chip on Your Card
Among the many things that divide American sensibilities from standard operating procedure in the rest of the world is our respective credit cards. American banks issue plastic currency that has a magnetic stripe on the back. The rest of the world uses what is officially called the EMV payment system and average folks call chip-and-pin technology.

Until recently, U.S. card issuers have insisted that magnetic-stripe cards will work just fine overseas because merchants are required to accept any type of card that bears the proper logo. And that's true enough if you're in a restaurant or a shop where you can jawbone a reluctant merchant. But the world is much more automated than we are here at home: There are increasing number of unattended places and devices overseas that only accept EMV-enabled credit cards: train-ticket machines, automated gasoline stations, and even those cute rent-a-bicycle schemes in European capitals.

American card issuers are catching up with the world, albeit slowly, and whining about the cost of chip-enabled cards all the way. For international travelers, however, the bottom line is unavoidable: You need at least one chip-enabled card in your wallet. In the business-travel arena, Chase Bank seems to be in the lead since it already offers EMV-enabled cards for its Hyatt Hotel and British Airways credit-card partners.

Photos of Your Car Rental
Nothing is more commoditized in travel than car rentals. All of the major agencies offer essentially the same vehicles for approximately the same rate. And all of the rental firms chase the same slim profit margin while handing total strangers the keys to expensive vehicles.

To control costs, rental firms have become sticklers about the condition of their cars. Whenever you return a vehicle, an employee will now do a visual inspection and attempt to blame (and charge) you for any ding, dent, or scratch. Sometimes, blame is affixed retroactively and you don't even know that the agency claimed you damaged the rental until you see a hefty charge on your credit card.

You need to adjust your attitude and your actions to fight the hypercritical and hypocritical actions of car-rental agencies. Before you drive off the lot with any rental, use your smartphone's camera to take pictures of the vehicle. Make sure you get the license plate number in at least one of the shots and ensure that your smartphone's time stamp is accurate. Then retain the photos until after you receive a final bill from the rental firm. If they claim you've damaged their rental, you'll have photographic proof to the contrary.

A Better Handle on Life
The more complicated our lives on the road become, the more information we need to cope. For real-time flight conditions, you'll do no better than the brilliant one-page summary of the State of the Skies offered by FlightStats.com. Its Global Cancellation and Delay Tracker was designed to slake the needs of media wonks, but we all benefit by its general availability. You can find delays by airline or departure or arrival airport, then drill down further to specific flights or times.

And I have given up on our cable "news" networks because they now seem to limit their coverage to celebrity gossip, the outrage of the week (the over-tanned mom, anyone?) or the political meme of the moment. For global news, I've returned to radio, specifically the BBC World Service. It's not without its political, cultural, and institutional biases, of course, but at least it acknowledges there's a world beyond Hollywood or the Beltway. Meanwhile, Tunein does a terrific job of aggregating local news radio and NPR stations. It also has a terrific app so you can stream remotely on your mobile device. And when there's specific breaking news somewhere in the world, I turn to WWiTV.com. It does a credible job offering up live feeds from broadcasters around the world.

The Fine Print…
I've learned never to hit the road without knowing where the local Walmart is located. I've lost count of the number of times a Walmart has done me a service: Emergency clothing in the middle of the night after an airline "mishandled" my bag and other shops are closed; snacks and beverages at reasonable prices instead of the $7-a-bottle water at a resort; a backup portable hard drive oroffice supplies; or even just a toothbrush or a travel-size stick of deodorant.
ABOUT JOE BRANCATELLI Joe Brancatelli is a publication consultant, which means that he helps media companies start, fix and reposition newspapers, magazines and Web sites. He's also the former executive editor of Frequent Flyer and has been a consultant to or columnist for more business-travel and leisure-travel publishing operations than he can remember. He started his career as a business journalist and created JoeSentMe in the dark days after 9/11 while he was stranded in a hotel room in San Francisco. He lives on the Hudson River in the tourist town of Cold Spring.

THE FINE PRINT This column is Copyright © 2012 American City Business Journals. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission. JoeSentMe.com is Copyright © 2012 by Joe Brancatelli. All rights reserved.