Every AI feature in Tern draws from one shared monthly usage allowance. This article explains how that allowance works and what drives it, so you can make the most of it.
How AI usage works
Your Tern plan includes a monthly AI usage allowance, plus a set number of Notetaker hours. Every AI action you take, from importing an itinerary to categorizing an email, draws from the same shared allowance.
You can see where you stand any time on the Plan & Usage section in your subscription settings. AI usage shows as a percentage progress bar. Notetaker shows as hours used.
A few things to know:
Your allowance resets every month on your billing cycle date.
Unused allowance does not roll over to the next month.
After July 1st when you hit 100%, AI features pause until your next reset. Later in June you can add Tern Pro at any time for a larger allowance.
What drives AI usage
A request uses more when the AI has to do more. Three things matter most:
How much it creates. Generating new content is the biggest driver. Asking the AI to write a long destination guide, draft full client emails, or create a complete trip from scratch uses more than reading something and pulling out a few details.
How much it reads. Long documents take more to process than short ones. A 14-day itinerary PDF is heavier than a single hotel confirmation.
How much it has to search or figure out. A vague request means the AI does extra work to search, browse, and fill in gaps. A specific request points it straight at the answer.
This is also why a back-and-forth chat adds up: each message re-reads the whole conversation and writes a new response.
Note: chatting with support (Fin) does not count towards your AI usage.
Some actions use more than others
Knowing which actions are heavier helps you understand your usage, not avoid features. Here's roughly how they compare per use.
Lighter on your allowance | Heavier on your allowance |
Parsing a single activity or pasting one supplier URL | Importing a full multi-day itinerary |
Having AI read a confirmation email and add it to a trip | A long, back-and-forth AI Chat conversation |
A specific question | Reviewing upcoming trips for potential errors |
Heavier doesn't mean "avoid." Some of the most valuable things you can do, like having AI review a full trip for errors and inconsistencies, use more because they do more, and they're often the best use of your allowance. The goal is to understand the tradeoff, then choose what's worth it to you.
Getting the most from each request
Start in AI Chat. AI Chat is the most flexible way to work. You can build trips, add and edit activities, create and update contacts, search cruises and cabins, and ask questions, all in one place.
Be specific about what you want. A clear, detailed prompt points the AI straight at the answer, so it does less searching and guessing and gets it right the first time. Include the details that matter, like dates, names, tone, and format.
Ask for what you need, not everything. Because writing and creating content is the biggest driver of usage, asking for the specific section or change you need uses less than having the AI generate or regenerate a full document each time. If you only need one paragraph rewritten, ask for that paragraph.
Import when you already have the document. If a supplier sends you a full itinerary or confirmation, importing it builds the whole trip in one action. Re-describing the same trip in chat takes several messages. Use chat to build from scratch, make changes, and handle anything you can't simply hand over as a file.
Start a fresh chat for a new task. Each message re-reads the whole conversation, so a long chat makes every new message heavier. When you move to an unrelated task, starting a new chat keeps things efficient. Stay in the same chat while you're working on one trip or topic, so you don't have to re-explain the context.
Edit small things directly or in chat. To change one description or detail, you can edit it by hand or ask AI Chat to update that one item, rather than re-running a full import that reprocesses the entire trip.
Use Reporting for big data questions. For totals and aggregations, like how much commission you booked last quarter, Custom Reporting is built for that and doesn't draw from your AI allowance. Custom Reporting is part of Tern Pro.
A few things worth knowing
Email categorization runs in the background. It reads incoming mail and labels booking-related messages automatically. It's light per email, but a busy inbox adds up over a month. You can turn it off in your settings if you don't want it.
Notetaker uses its own hours. Notetaker draws from a separate pool of hours, not your AI allowance, so recording meetings doesn't reduce it.
Generated content can be reused. Destination guides and packing lists draw from your allowance each time you create one. Saving and adapting the ones you make is a quick way to get more value from each.
What base usage covers
Your base plan is built to cover everyday work, and most advisors stay comfortably within it. Everything draws from one shared allowance, so you can mix and match. In a typical month, base usage covers roughly any one of these. These estimates may change as we refine the AI tools and are based on usage data as of June 1, 2026.
25 full itinerary parses
100 activity parses
5 trips created / updated via chat with ~10 activities each
25 contacts created / updated via chat
It also includes 5 hours of Notetaker each month, which draws from a separate pool.
Most advisors never come close to the limit. If you regularly build trips from long documents or work in chat throughout the day, Tern Pro gives you a larger allowance.
Using your full allowance is a good thing
Understanding usage is about making informed choices, not using AI less. The most successful advisors lean on AI heavily, because it saves them real time.
If you regularly reach 75%, 90%, or your full limit, that's usually a sign your plan should grow, not that you should cut back.