Shop Around This technology can help you comparison shop for low fares.

By now, you know that no single travel Web site always offersthe lowest prices. So each time you book a trip online, you feelyou have to check several sites to assure yourself you're notoverpaying.

Save time by using sites or software that employ"Web-scraping" technology to simultaneously searchmultiple sites and then present prices in easy-to-read charts,making comparison shopping a snap.

Sidestep.com:SideStep is a free program that you download. Its search engineautomatically launches when you shop for air, hotel or car rentalfares, scouring multiple travel booking sites (including low-farecarriers that don't always appear on sites, like Expedia orOrbitz) for the lowest prices. While you can't book your tripdirectly with SideStep, it will provide a link to the page whereyour deal of choice is located.

Itasoftware.com: Cambridge, Massachusetts-basedITA Software helps travel suppliers develop online booking sites,but it also offers consumers a broad and flexible airfare searchengine on its home page (see the "Looking for Airfares"box.) You can check one-way, multisegment, or even internationalfares for flights originating overseas. It also searches fares forairports within a 300-mile radius of your origin or destination, orflights within 24 hours of the flight times you specify.

Travelaxe.com:Like SideStep, this isn't an actual booking site, but a smallprogram you download that searches multiple hotel-booking sites forthe best rates in more than 58 countries. The end result is anexhaustive array of rates with the lowest ones highlighted. Tolimit the search results in a huge hotel market like New York City,you can enable filters that specify the distance from the citycenter, price or star rating. Once you've found the best rate,TravelAxe provides a link to the site, where you can make areservation.

Chris McGinnis, travel correspondent for CNN Headline News,is author of The Unofficial Business Travelers' PocketGuide.