2026-11-10 · 9 min read
Travel agency CRM software can mean a contact list or a full back office. Split the work into five jobs, check your host agency first, then see what one vendor's published pricing adds up to for five seats.
Awesome travel destinations for 2026, sorted by trip type: city breaks, islands and coasts, and wild country, with a summary table and the checks to make before you book.
Places to stay in Quebec City, by traveller: Old Québec on a first visit without a car, Saint-Roch or Montcalm on a return trip, Sainte-Foy or Beauport if you drive or bring children.
By the Fortrip editorial team. Pricing last reviewed on 2026-11-10 against Tern's pricing page.
Travel agency CRM software is a system that stores client records and trip history for travel advisors, and in many products it also builds itineraries, takes payments, tracks commissions and runs the back office. Decide which of those jobs you need covered, check what your host agency already provides, and only then compare subscriptions.
The label is used loosely. On vendor sites, travel agency CRM software, sometimes sold as travel agent CRM software, can mean a contact list with reminders, or a platform that reconciles commissions and pays suppliers. Comparing a free contact tool with an all-in-one platform tells you nothing, so this guide separates the work first and prices second.
This is a buyer's framework plus one worked pricing example, not a ranked roundup. Only Tern's own page was opened and read for prices, so no other vendor's figures appear here. Confirm any price on the vendor's page before you buy.
Every product in this space bundles some mix of five jobs. Knowing which ones you currently do by hand tells you what you are shopping for.
Contacts, trip history, preferences, follow-up reminders and intake forms. This is the one job a general sales CRM can cover without bending.
The client-facing document or app: day-by-day plans, confirmations, supplier details. It is separate from the CRM, though many platforms bundle the two. If you build itineraries elsewhere, Fortrip's itinerary validator is one way to sanity-check a draft plan before it goes to a client.
Taking deposits and final payments, and storing card authorizations so you can pay suppliers. Tern lists card authorization on every plan. Processing fees vary by vendor, so compare them separately from the seat price.
Matching what suppliers owe you against what actually arrives. On Tern, commission reconciliation sits on agency plans of 3+ seats, not on individual plans.
Supplier payments, centralized billing and agency-wide reporting. Tern's agency plans of 3+ seats show what this layer looks like. It is what separates a CRM from a full travel agency management system: the CRM remembers your clients, the itinerary builder presents the trip, and the back office moves and reconciles money.
Run these against the last month of work:
Each yes is a job the software should take over. Each no is a feature you can stop paying for.
If you work under a host agency, the organization that sponsors independent advisors and supplies booking and commission support, ask what is already bundled: an itinerary builder, a booking platform, commission tracking. Paying twice for the same job is the most avoidable cost in this category. This guide found no independent source on how much host bundles overlap with standalone tools, so confirm what is included in the host's own membership materials, or ask the host directly.
Two cases hold up. The first is brand control: you want client-facing itineraries that look like your business rather than your host's. The second is a workflow the host's system does not cover, such as a particular intake process or a client portal your clients expect. If neither applies, use what you already have.
Tern is the example worked through here because its terms are published in full on a single page. The figures come from the vendor itself, so treat them as that vendor's stated terms rather than an independent comparison. Other travel-advisor platforms exist, but this guide prints no prices or terms for them, because those figures need to come from each vendor's own pricing page.
Who it suits: solo advisors through multi-seat agencies, since the pricing page lists individual and agency plans.
What is included: every plan includes a CRM, itineraries, scheduling, card authorization, forms and intake, and reports. Agency plans of 3+ seats add commission reconciliation, supplier payment management, agency-wide reporting, team collaboration tools, a shared content library and centralized billing.
The catch: included AI usage limits apply starting July 1, 2026, and Tern Pro is an optional add-on for more AI usage, more AI Notetaker hours and custom reporting. A free trial exists, but the page does not state its length.
When you open another vendor's pricing page, look for the same fields:
The headline subscription is rarely the whole bill. Put these questions to every vendor, and write the answers down next to the seat price.
The last one is live for Tern, whose included AI usage limits apply from July 1, 2026. If you lean on AI-written itineraries or AI note-taking daily, price the add-on into your comparison. If you only need a first-draft itinerary to move into your own system, Fortrip's AI trip planner, which drafts a first-pass itinerary from your trip brief, is one place to start.
Using Tern's published rates, five seats at $35 per seat per month on annual billing comes to $2,100 a year. Five seats at $49 per seat per month on monthly billing comes to $2,940 a year. The gap is $840.
Five seats clears the threshold at which Tern's agency plans add commission reconciliation, supplier payment management and centralized billing.
| Billing cycle | Seat price per month | Five seats per year |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | $49 | $2,940 |
| Quarterly or annual | $35 | $2,100 |
Source: seat prices from Tern's pricing page; yearly totals are five seats multiplied by twelve months at each rate.
Beyond the subscription, add setup, payment processing, add-ons and any metered usage. A plan that looks cheaper per seat can cost more once those are counted.
Pick the cheapest route that covers client records, itineraries and payment collection. Check trip caps first, since they bite hardest on small plans.
Audit the host's bundle first, using the questions above. Then decide whether a separate tool adds anything the host does not provide.
Commission reconciliation and shared billing start to matter at this size. Tern's agency tier is the worked example above; hold any other vendor to the same list of fields.
Itinerary pricing, supplier costing and group handling matter more than lead pipelines. Operator back-office tools are outside this guide, so it does not recommend a specific product here.
A sales-pipeline CRM works if your itineraries are built elsewhere and you mostly need follow-ups and lead tracking. It falls short on commission tracking, supplier payments and itinerary delivery, which are three of the five jobs above.
Send each vendor these questions before you sign:
Tern says a free trial exists but does not state its length. Ask every vendor for the trial length and whether a card is required to start.
Ask advisors in your host or consortium what it was like to switch, and which tool they would not move away from. A peer who has migrated clients will tell you more than a feature grid.
This guide is for advisors and small agencies choosing client, itinerary and payment tools. The following are different buyers with different needs, and are not covered here:
For more on planning tools, browse the travel planning guides on the blog.
It is a system that stores client records and trip history for travel advisors. Many products also build itineraries, take payments, track commissions and run the back office, so decide which of those five jobs you need before comparing plans.
On Tern's published rates, five seats at $35 per seat per month on annual billing come to $2,100 a year. On monthly billing at $49 per seat, the total is $2,940 a year, a gap of $840. Setup, payment processing, add-ons and metered AI usage are extra considerations.
Check the host's bundle first. A separate tool makes sense mainly for brand control over client-facing itineraries, or for a workflow the host's system does not cover, such as a specific intake process or client portal.
It can if your itineraries are built elsewhere and you mostly need follow-ups and lead tracking. It falls short on commission tracking, supplier payments and itinerary delivery.
Ask about trip or client caps, contract term and cancellation, setup and migration, card processing fees on deposits and final payments, and what happens when metered AI usage passes the included allowance.
Sketch a brief. We come back with an itinerary that reads like a recommendation, not a checklist — and tell you what we’d change about it.
Try planning free
