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We reserved a ticket and a seat on Eurostar train from London to Brussels on 22 September at 19:34. We would like to take an earlier train that day but it looks like all the earlier have either no tickets or seats. What are the chances of being able to buy a ticket and seat on an earlier Eurostar train by simply showing up early at the st pancras train station and talking to a Eurostar ticket agent?  We would use the Eurail global pass to buy the ticket.

Your terminology is a bit confusing. The Eurail pass is your ticket. Seat reservations come extra, on trains with mandatory reservations. Like Eurostar.

Anyway, I checked.

All passholder seats are sold out for that day (Fridays are always very popular on Eurostar). If you want to travel earlier, you’ll need to buy ordinary tickets (but these will probably be very pricey).

Eurostar is not a very flexible train. You can rebook, but this will cost you 15 EUR per seat reservation (when travelling with Eurail) and it’s subject to availability. As there are none left on a busy Friday, I wouldn’t risk it. 

You can change normal tickets (non Interrail/Eurail reservations) until 7 days before departure, whith paying a potential price difference.

Conclusion: It’s rather difficult to just show up and rebook an earlier train. So best stick to your original plan. Luckily almost all other trains in Europe are much more flexible.


There would be the London - Amsterdam train at 06:16 which stops in Brussels. Book London - Rotterdam on eurail.com or https://www.b-europe.com/EN/Booking/Pass#TravelWish

It's not an issue to stop in Brussels.

But as Brendan advised best stick to your plan.


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