Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I purchased this bag for an upcoming business trip to Italy. I normally carry a small cross-body Dooney & Bourke, but I wanted something less likely to attract attention and a little more practical than my normal bag for this trip. I'll try to provide the type of information I like to read in a review for this bag to help you decide if this is the right bag for you. Favorite Features: The locking zipper on the main compartment and the cut resistant strap got me right away and were the main reason I ordered this bag. There is a very handy open pocket on the back of the bag that I think is going to be super useful to me (more on that in a moment). The passport pocket, card pockets, and pen loop inside the locking compartment are just the type of handy features I like in a bag, as is the interior mesh zipper pocket with an open pocket behind it. Concerns: Since I haven't traveled with the bag yet, I'll just list these as concerns for now and hopefully I'll remember to come back and see how it worked out. First - I take my bags/purses/totes seriously - my husband calls me the 'bag lady' because I love nothing more than a well-designed bag of any sort. My 'go-to' brands are Tumi, TravelPro, and Dooney & Bourke so I'm comparing features on this less expensive bag to those brands. 1) zipper quality - the zippers on this bag seem a little light-weight. I am particularly concerned about the 'lockdown hardware' clasp that secures the shoulder strap to the bag on one side, and I see a reviewer showing a case where that did break. I am bringing a small carabiner along with me in case I need to make an emergency repair as the bag will be useless without the shoulder strap. Since I wear my cross-body in front of me the lockdown hardware seems kind of useless (I usually just wear my bag through meals and the like if I'm concerned about theft). The clasp that locks on the main compartment is also a bit flimsy feeling, but at least the bag will still work okay without the lockdown (a paper clip can take care of that in a pinch). What it holds: Locking main compartment - passport, 4 credit cards, driver's license and medical ID, pen, USB charging cable, keys/key ring, mini-carabiner, small pill case, earplanes in case, a bunch of loose Ricola cough drops and over the counter meds in single packs, cash in interior mesh zip pocket, small change purse, full pocket pack of Kleenex. note - push larger items all the way down to the bottom to maximize capacity. Zipped front compartment - hand sanitizer, lip gloss, 20 business cards, could still stick a boarding pass or earbuds in there are well. Open back pocket - iPhone 6s OR - put the phone in your jeans pocket and a 16 oz water bottle fits, as would one of the flat folding umbrellas. Now you see why I'm worried about the clasp holding together! However, the capacity of this thing is really good, and I'm honesty going to get a smaller coin purse or forego that entirely and pack a 1/2 empty Kleenex pack just to cut down on how full I stuff the bag. If I take out the change purse, my Kindle Oasis, with cover, will fit in the bag along with the other items and I can still fit a water bottle in the open pocket. The water bottle will go further down into the pocket than shown in the photo I attached. Even full (sans water bottle), this bag will easily slip down into my 'personal item' on the airplane, although I plan to wear it so I can slip my phone into it and play white noise through headphones while I try to sleep. Fit: I am 6' tall a few pounds (like 35) overweight - the bag fits me cross-body with no issues, in fact I have an extra foot of so of strap available if I needed to make it larger. UPDATE May 2018: This bag worked just as I hoped it would. I would definitely recommend it and would buy it again. I stuffed it full, including loading the water bottle in while walking around Pompeii, and it came back home as good as new, so I'm rating it pretty high for durability.