Saw the pricing for bangalore, India. Goodness me. its $290 for 2 persons. this is for meet and assist without fast immigration. just to give perspective, its about $20 for you to get to city from airport for 2 persons (40kms trip). I can say your Bangalore price is really very high. $100 in india can get you done a lot of things.
Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
181–190 of 207 posts
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#182Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Global Entry [0], if you are a US citizen or permanent resident." Ok. But how are they (Solve) going to do it ? Or is the US entry side of things not part of their product offering ?
You're correct in that we can't offer immigrations/customs help in US airports (with the exception of JFK and MIA). However, we can help in about 400 airports around the world. We can expedite clients through departures on international flights. A lot of our clients flying domestic, however, still find value in the service especially families and the elderly.
Interestingly I tried both those airports as they're the ones I most frequently arrive at when flying in to the US. I'm not a US citizen, and the lines for immigration at both of those airports take me a couple of hours usually, so I'd have happily stumped up for this service. The quote you offer for both says they do NOT include expedited immigration/customs however. So is your site broken already or what?
Edit: I see from other comments in the thread that you do this at JDK/MIA by having one of your agents stand in the queue ahead of your customers and then letting them cut in when they arrive. The British in me finds this abhorrent, and there's no way I'd do it.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#183quick review. im arriving in vegas in a couple hours so i thought id check it out.
after signing up, i'm asked to enter my flight details, which goes reasonably well until you ask for the record locator number, which is required. I have no clue what a record locator number is or where to find it, so that's as far as I got into the booking process. I literally can't continue right now, and at this point, the potentially helpful intercom is gone.
the price for Vegas would have been §305, which sounds incredibly expensive. I don't really get why the pricing is different for different airports, other than the fact that you want to fleece people for as much as possible. At least feels that way.
In order to fully take advantage of your service, I'd need to book it for both airports. That puts the price in the $500 range, which effectively doubles the price of the ticket for economy class flights. For business class flights, we are still talking about roughly 25% of the ticket, or 125% total.
Thats incredibly expensive and I dont really get the value proposition. If I travel for fun, I go through customs which takes an hour at the worst and then I walk out the hall, press a button on my app and an uber picks me up. I dont see how you can possibly speed that up. Even if you could cut out the whole customs process entirely, which I doubt is possible (picking up the luggage is the time intensive part), it would not be worth it.
If I travel for business, whatever I do at the airport amounts to a billable hour so I dont REALLY care either.
For reference, I make $20-$30k a month all things considered. I feel its expensive. Based on the value offered, I wouldnt book it. Maybe I lack a really annoying flight experience.
Now, you could argue that I'm not your target customer, which is fair. I get that there are people who make more money. But. My girlfriend happens to be wealthy. She takes advantage of services like yours. But she would never visit some random website to book that off of. When she travels, she gets picked up at home and then a whole bunch of things happen that go beyond what you offer and its being taken care of by her credit card company. At the airport, she's handed off to the priority check-in line of her favourite expensive airline and then its off to the business lounge where some concierge takes care of anything that could potentially bother her.
I'm sure that this may be more expensive than your service, but she doesnt care. Its just a line item on the credit card bill that shes not even going to look at. If you want to compete with that, go super high-end and somehow make it really easy to book. btw, she wouldn't know her locator number thingie, either.
If you want to just do the thing you do, I believe it needs to be cheaper. Or at least make the pricing consistent so that I dont feel like I'm getting fucked for flying into vegas.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a huge pain in many of the airports that I have travelled. In fact, you'll even get ripped off at some. For example Rome. We paid 50 euros for a supposedly Schengen wide 1GB plan but as soon as we left Italy that SIM was useless. So yeah, I'd definitely pay someone if they can just hand me a SIM at a nominal price as soon as I walk out of immigration/baggage claim Singapore has done this in a great way. As so…
Why do you even need to buy SIMs? Are international plans that pricey in the U.S.? Here in Europe they are quite affordable, my Czech 'connect for good for abroad' is $0.35 per MB which is enough in most situations.
We do have Google Fi, which is $20/mo + $0.01/MB. It works in 180+ countries with no need to swap out SIM cards. The main downside is the lack of phone choice...basically only the Google flagship phones (Pixel and Nexus...not the worst choices) because of something to do with the radio hardware they use.
For the casual traveler, it might not make the most sense, but for someone who does a lot of international travel, it's a great option.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is much less of a pain since EU roaming charges ended on 15 June 2017. "Roaming charges end on 15 June 2017. Europeans travelling within the EU countries will Roam Like at Home and pay domestic prices for roaming calls, SMS and data." https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/policies/roami... Happily using my UK SIM and data plan while traveling through several EU countries.
> This is much less of a pain since EU roaming charges ended on 15 June 2017. > Happily using my UK SIM and data plan while traveling through several EU countries. The Brexit should fix that for you.
Israeli sims have free roaming in EU. No reason why the UK can't keep that.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This is much less of a pain since EU roaming charges ended on 15 June 2017. > Happily using my UK SIM and data plan while traveling through several EU countries. The Brexit should fix that for you.
Israeli sims have free roaming in EU. No reason why the UK can't keep that.
Because, when British carriers get a chance to fleece their customers without pesky European regulators spoiling the party you can be damn sure that they'll jump on that opportunity in a heartbeat.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
Man, Japan is way ahead of the rest of the world, when it comes to certain aspects of convenience.
...and way behind in others. Try finding a pre-paid voice & data SIM in Japan (hint: it doesn't exist due to arcane regulations - non-residents can only get data-only SIMs). Most WiFi spots require registration that require you to confirm identity via a verification email (think chicken and egg).
I hope not to drag this conversation too much down the rabbit hole, but do you have any advise about what and where to get when it comes to a data SIM, which works on a GSM phone in Japan? Validity: ca. 1 month.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
Every airport already has this service. It is simply complicated to order it. Like VIP/CIP lounge/fast track/diplomatic channel/anything. That is a complicated, unsexy business though. It will be hard to pull off on a scale, in many airports.
do things that don't scale.
yeah, i just imagine how painfully difficult it will be for them. Every time they will try to make arrangement with a new airport to become their point of service, they will hear a lot of 'young man, get off my butt, you don't know what are you doing' before they will get a deal. The people who are in charge of these things in airports are very entitled, arrogant, and bound with a lot of regulations because it is a border and customs control zone after all.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are there people who take the SIM and leave? I always assume everyone stuck around until data was okay on the phone, since sometimes it needs activation, sometimes it needs settings, etc.
In Japan you can buy it at the convenient stores and the "mini" electronic store (haneda) at the airports. Switching sims, setting up the APNs, and the NO REFUND AFTER OPENED on the sticker make people buy it and jump on the bus or train to downtown tokyo (where you have 45mins ~ 1.5 hours to burn anyways).
Hmm, I see. Maybe that's why the ladies selling the SIMs at Haneda were a bit perplexed when I hung around to make sure that it worked.
Re: Launch HN: Solve (YC S17) – We Save International Travelers Hours of Time
#190How does this work, inbound, to the US ? When I return to the US (San Francisco) on first class or business tickets there is no segregation of lines/service - you queue up in the big line and wait your turn (45-60 minutes later) like everyone else. Other than diplomats, I see no mechanism for expediting immigration/customs inbound to the US and my (short, reckless) research suggested that expedited immigration/custom…
> I see no mechanism for expediting immigration/customs inbound to the US Global Entry [0], if you are a US citizen or permanent resident. It is life changing. Immigration takes under a minute at a kiosk and there is a priority lane at Customs. [0] https://www.cbp.gov/travel/trusted-traveler-programs/global-...
I don't fly internationally all that often, but I do sometimes and just did this week, and I have never had an immigration experience that took longer than the baggage claim did. Is this a problem that only occurs at airports other than O'Hare, or am I just lucky?