NORWALK, Conn. - Priceline has announced a significant enhancement to its AI-powered travel assistant, Penny, as part of its Winter 2024 Product Release. The upgrade introduces over 30 new features to its Trip Intelligence suite, aiming to simplify and expedite the travel planning process for consumers.
The company's improvements are a response to a common consumer challenge: the extensive time spent on researching and booking travel. Priceline's study indicates that the average consumer dedicates approximately 16 hours to trip planning. With the new AI tools, Priceline estimates that users can save nearly ten minutes per trip, a considerable reduction compared to traditional customer support interactions.
Penny, previously focused on hotel bookings, now extends its services to flights, car rentals, and vacation packages. The AI assistant offers personalized travel suggestions and can handle tasks such as modifying itineraries and connecting with live help agents. Additionally, Priceline's iOS app now features GenAI itineraries, providing users with customized activity and dining recommendations for their trips.
Other notable enhancements include a digital wallet for organizing deals, a price watch function for flights, cabin comparisons during flight searches, and the ability to skip rental car check-in lines with select partners. Priceline also teased upcoming features, such as multi-passenger cancellation and rebooking capabilities and a new partnership with PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) for personalized cash-back offers.
Priceline's CEO, Brett Keller, emphasized the company's commitment to revolutionizing travel through technology, highlighting the positive reception of their AI tools since their initial integration.
To mark the launch of the new features, Priceline is offering a 10% discount on Express Deals through Penny until February 27th. The new features are live, and customers can explore them on Priceline's website.
This expansion of Priceline's AI capabilities is part of the company's broader strategy to leverage data and technology to enhance customer satisfaction and streamline the travel booking experience. The information is based on a press release statement from Priceline.
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