StephMyLife Trip Planner & Budget Builder

Your new travel best friend has arrived, and she’s a gorgeous, formula-packed spreadsheet that will get you travelling, saving money, and planning for your trip with no stress. This is a budget builder, itinerary planner, transport finder, booking organiser, list keeper and packing helper all in one sheet.

I’ve worked with a version of this sheet for years while planning trips for my Travel Planning Clients, and I thought it was time to build it into something that can help you all to travel easier and cheaper. (Psst, you get it free if you are a travel planning client. So if you want to get the Trip Planner, want me to plan your entire trip to your specifications  – then just click here and book a call.

The Trip Planner is designed for all types of trips – from weekends away to 12-month backpacking trips. If you know exactly what you want to do, the sheet will help you get your plans organised, budget created and to-do list sorted. If you don’t, it will guide you through the process of putting together the perfect itinerary. Instructions are below on how to use the plan, if you’re keen to see how it works. You can head to my Instagram highlight here to see it in action.

Along with using my Trip Planner, I recommend reading my ‘10 Simple Ways to Save Money for Travelling‘ post to help you boost your income, reduce your bills, and increase your ‘Potential Savings Amount‘. My Savings Plan will help you do just that!

What is the StephMyLife Trip Planner for?

The Trip Planner & Budget Builder is designed to get your trip admin and budget organised. If you’re going on a 24-hour or 12-month trip, it will help you to map out your trip and set your budget. As you get closer to your departure date, you can update the trip with your booking costs and details. This will help you make sure you’re staying on budget, and means you have all bookings in one place.

The planner is not designed for use when you’re travelling to keep track of costs. You can use my Savings planner for this, which breaks down everyday spending. Instead, it is for the hardest part of planning every trip: figuring out what you can do in your allotted time and budget. The Trip Planner helps you get more for your money, helps you enjoy planning more, and keeps you organised.

The sheet is preloaded with the average cost per day to travel in each country worldwide in three travel styles: Budget, Mid Range and Luxury.  You can use the sheet to create a cost estimate for your trip, or input your own budget if you prefer.

Along with the Budget Builder & Itinerary Builder, there are sections to manage transport/accommodation/activity costs and manage your To-Do list & packing list. You can start a new sheet for every trip you go on, so you just need to buy it once and can use it forever.

What applications can I use with the Trip Planner?

All functions of the Trip Planner features can be used with both Google Sheets, and all necessary functions can be used in Excel, but some of the styling will be lost. The plan is not designed to be used with Apple’s ‘Numbers’ application. While you can still use the plan with Numbers, some of the functionality will be lost.

I recommend using Google Sheets, which is a free, online spreadsheet program that allows you to share your Trip Planner easily with your other half or friends and access it from your phone, iPad or computer.  When you share the plan with someone, you can see each other’s updates to the sheet instantly. This means you don’t need to email it back and forth with updates, and you both can always have the latest version.

Because the program is online, if you lose your phone, upgrade your laptop, or break your iPad, you will still have access to the sheet on any new device. Just go to Google Sheets, log in with your Google account, and your spreadsheet will be there, with all of your edits!

How do I Install the StephMyLife Travel Planner?

Once you purchase the Trip Planner, an email will be automatically sent to you with a download link for your plan. If you don’t immediately see this in your inbox, check your junk/spam/promotions folder to see if it was filtered in here. Search for ‘shop@stephmylifetravel.com‘ to find the email.

Your confirmation email contains a download link for the plan. When you click the link, it immediately triggers a download of the file to the device you are using. Before you click this link, decide if you want to download the plan to that device.

• If you want to download the plan onto your phone, install the Google Sheets app first, as you will need this to load up the plan. Here is a link to the Android app and here is one to the Apple Version.
• Click the link in the email to download the plan.
• When you’re prompted, open the file in the Google Sheets app
• The file will now be ready to use in the app
• If you log into Google Sheets on your computer, you can see the Trip Planner here.
• If you clicked the link on your phone and can’t find the download later, here is how to find your downloaded files on Android and iPhone.

If you want to download the Trip Planner on your computer:

• Click the link in your email, and the file will be downloaded to your downloads folder.
• Go to Google Sheets, and click on the little folder icon on the right-hand side of the screen
• Click this icon and go to ‘Upload’
• Click Browse and go to your downloads folder, and click on the downloaded file
• Once open, the sheet will be saved to your account, and you can access it on any device or share it with anyone you like
• To open in Excel, make sure you have Excel installed and double-click the file.

How to use the StephMyLife Trip Planner

1. Purchase the ‘StephMyLife Trip Planner’ and go to your emails to get the confirmation email with the download link.
2. Download the ‘StephMyLifeTravel Trip Planner ‘ and save a copy to your computer or to a Google Sheets account on your phone (I recommend using Google Sheets so that you can sync the plan across all of your devices and budget on the go).
3. Open the ‘Start Here’ sheet to read detailed information on how to use the sheet.
4. Open the Trip Details tab next and start adding your trip details like dates, countries, number of people etc. It’s ok if you’re not sure about these yet, you can change these as you plan. Here you will choose what countries you want to visit, and how many days you’re thinking of spending in each one. The preloaded Country Budgets will calculate an estimated price for the trip. You can choose to budget with this amount or select your own budget.
5. Move on to the Sample Itinerary tab to take a look at how the itinerary will look. This is a pre-filled-out itinerary to help you see how to create your own.
6. Open the ‘Itinerary & Budget’ Tab next. At the top, you will see pre-calculated budget details which have been calculated from the details you entered in the ‘Trip Details‘ tab. If anything looks wrong, pop back to that tab and correct it before moving forward. There are notes added to important columns to describe what the values mean. Hover over any cell with a black arrow on the top right corner to read these notes.
7. Next, we have the fun bit – filling out your itinerary!! Start by choosing the first country you would like to visit, then add the stops to visit in that country. You may already know your stops, or at the start, you might just know you want ‘island’ / ‘city’ / ‘nature,’ etc. You can choose the stop type, then enter the place name. The sheet will use the details from the Trip Details tab to load your budget, start and end date and number of days here.
8. Keep adding to your itinerary and watch your trip take shape. Move between Trip Details and Itinerary & Budget, tweaking dates, number of days in each place, etc, to get the perfect route and stay within budget. Due to the automatic calculations, adjusting days/dates and locations will automatically update your budget so you can see a full reflection of adding and removing any stops or countries.
9. Once your itinerary is done, head to the ‘Flights & Transport’, ‘Accommodation’, and ‘Activities’ tabs. These will be preloaded with your itinerary, showing you what transport and hotels to book and on which dates. For activities, you can start adding tickets, visas, and tour bookings to the sheet to manage costs and keep bookings in one place. The sheet has sections for adding helpful info like booking codes, check-in / out times, and pickup locations – so when you’re on the trip, you have everything in one place.
10. As you add your bookings, you can see how your actual spending is going compared to what your budget is. By the time you go on the trip, you know how much money you have leftover each day for food/drinks/shopping/random purchases. The sheet helps you stay under budget for things that are easy to save money on, like hotels and transport, giving you more money to enjoy your trip.

You’ll notice that the Trip Planner does not set a cost for meals/shopping / miscellaneous purchases on the trip. This is because it’s designed to ensure you don’t have to stress too much about these figures on your trip. You know the approximate average cost per day you have left to spend in each country, so you can stay within this amount. That is a much more enjoyable way to travel than worrying about hitting the same goal every day. Every trip has busy, expensive days and cheap, chilled days. So I wanted the sheet to account for this.

After years of travel and planning trips, this is the way I have found to help me stay under budget while having a great trip and not stressing about money.

I have included a to-do list which you can fill out to keep track of what you have left to plan. There is also a Packing List so you don’t forget anything! And if you are wondering the best places to book your hotels/transport/activities. The ‘Helpful Links‘ tab has my go-to websites for booking my trips. I have some recommended loyalty schemes in there too!

I recommend using the budgeting spreadsheet with Google Sheets on your work laptop, home laptop, and phone so that you can always have access to it and can keep on track with your finances on the go.

How do I share the StephMyLife Trip Planner with my friends/ partner if I’m not travelling solo?

If you are using Excel, you will have to email the sheet back and forth to your partner. (Boo!)

If you are using Google Sheets, then you can share the plan online with a friend or partner. This means you can both update the sheet on your own devices and instantly see each other’s updates. This is extremely helpful because not only can you share the sheet, but you can also access it across all of your devices. You can update the sheet on your laptop when you’re at home, and also add things to the budget on your phone when you’re on the go.

To share the plan, first open the Trip Planner on Google Sheets on your phone or computer.

• On your computer, click the button in the top right corner of the screen that says ‘Share’. Enter the email address you want to share it with, and choose the type of access you would like to give the person (choose ‘Editor’ to allow them to make edits. If you just want to show someone the plan but don’t want them to change it, choose ‘Viewer’)
• To share on your phone, open the Trip Planner and click the icon of a person with a plus sign next to it. Enter the email address of the person and choose the type of access just like above, and send the invitation.

You can share the sheet across as many devices and with as many people as you like. Just be sure to only give editing access to those who you want to edit the sheet and who know how to use it. Otherwise, they may accidentally delete an important calculation.

Why does my link say it has expired?

Each link comes with a limited number of downloads for security reasons, so you may have clicked this link and downloaded the plan a lot of times. If you clicked the link on your laptop, check your ‘downloads’ folder to find the file. If you clicked it on your phone or iPad, here is how to find your downloaded files on Android and iPhone.

If you can’t find the download anywhere, reply to your confirmation email letting me know, and I can refresh your link anytime.

Where is my confirmation email?

A confirmation email containing your download link is sent automatically after each purchase. If you pay by PayPal, it will be sent to your PayPal email; otherwise, it will be sent to the email you enter at checkout.

If the email is not in your inbox, check your junk or spam email, as sometimes mail gets filtered there. Search for ‘shop@stephmylifetravel.com’ to find the email.  If you cannot find the email anywhere, send me an email at ‘steph@stephmylifetravel.com‘ and I’ll fix that for you. Usually the reason is that the email address was spelt incorrectly – which is easy for me to fix.

Upgrading your existing Trip Planner

I regularly update my plans with new features. When I do so, I will pop a notice on my stories if it’s a minor change, or I’ll send an email if it’s a big, exciting new feature.

The link in your confirmation email will automatically update when I update the plan. So you can go back into this email, click the link and download a fresh version of your Trip Planner with all the latest features.

If you have any trouble upgrading, email me at steph@stephmylifetravel.com!

How do I Buy the Trip Planner as a gift?

We don’t have a gift option, but you can instead enter your friend’s email in at checkout and send the plan to them instead.

• Select the Trip Planner and click ‘add to cart’.
• When you enter the details on the checkout page, pop your friend’s email in the order form. They will be sent the confirmation email instead.
• You cannot pay by PayPal if you want the email to go to someone else, as the plan gets sent to your PayPal account automatically. You can pay by Apple Pay or a card instead to buy the plan as a gift.
• You can alternatively buy it for your friend, but get it delivered to your email. Then copy the download link and send it to them in a virtual card

What if I Need Technical Help?

I get it, spreadsheets can be tricky sometimes! But don’t worry, I love spreadsheets and helping you guys with yours, so I am here to help. You can email me anytime at steph@stephmylifetravel.com to ask for help. I also have a Spreadsheet Support form you can fill out to ask for assistance with your sheet or to request features that you think would make it even better! If your feature is added, I’ll email you to let you know.

The most common reason people need help is that they have accidentally deleted a formula. So I recommend two key things:

• When you download the plan, immediately make a copy that you have as your ‘Master Plan’. This is an untouched version of the sheet. So, if you delete any formulas, you just copy the cell that’s broken from the master to the working sheet.
• Be besties with the Esc key! With spreadsheets, if you accidentally make a change and click escape, it will undo the change. If you hit Enter, it will apply the change. So as you click about the sheet digging through the cells, if any formulas pop up, just click the Esc key on the top left of your keyboard.
• CTRL+Z (or Cmd+Z on an Apple Mac)  keyboard shortcut will undo any action you have just done. So if you want to undo a mistake or change, just hit those two keys together.  You can click it over and over again to go back through and undo multiple things if you need.
• The Trip Planner is designed to be as flexible as possible. Want to edit your start date? No problem, change one cell on the Trip Details tab, and the whole sheet will update to reflect this. Want to adjust the number of days in Italy? Head to the Trip Details tab, and your budget and all tabs will update. If you start typing dates and budgets into the Itinerary planner (basically anywhere you see a pale gray cell), then this will remove the automatic flexibility. You can keep using the sheet, but now you will have to manually enter all future dates, which is a pain. So lean into the flexibility instead of typing dates and details in grey cells.

I hope that was helpful! Please do reach out if you need anything. And if you like the Trip Planner, consider leaving me a review on this page. I’d really appreciate it!