Web Buzz: With the Lola app, personal travel advice and service are a quick text away

Need immediate advice about a flight or hotel? Here’s an instant messaging app that connects you to a helpful online concierge.

Name: Lola app

What it does: Connects travelers with travel agents who can find the best options for you based on your preferences, including favorite airlines, hotel brands, where you like to sit on a plane, preferred hotel class and amenities, hotel budget and more. Your trip chats are organized by departure date and can be archived inside the app.

Available: In the App Store, requires iOS 9.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

Cost: Free

What’s hot: Type in your trip-related question, meet your agent in a chat room, and then put down the phone and go live your life. You’ll get a ping notification when the agent has returned with your requested information. It was was impressively quick with hotel and flight info. Besides having a concierge in your pocket, a reason to pay attention to this app is for the combination use of artificial intelligence and humans. My travel agent Jeremy quickly found a good price for a flight from San Francisco to JFK for three months out and hotel options near my final destination.

What’s not: It wasn’t as quick with advice on restaurants and activities. When I asked about trendy restaurants and a kid-friendly theater show for a Las Vegas trip six days away, the agent said she’d get back to me in a few hours. When I asked about activities for families in the west Yellowstone area, the agent said they’d get back to me at the latest “tomorrow.� It was already early evening my time. This is definitely one to watch. There’s a wait list that can be upward of a month, so have patience.

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