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Can't make seat reservations London - Paris ''prices temporarily unavailable''

anaaaaaaaa

hi, would like to know how to book seat reservations. (I have a Eurail global pass for 2 months)

I tried to book seat reservations for high speed trains (I have already saved the journeys into my trip on the app), and on the eurail app it says I have to book seats separately on websites, from london (st pancreas) to paris for next week and for another trip at the start of august. But on eurail.com, I am able to find the train timings but it shows “Prices temporarily unavailable, check back in a few hours to see prices and book this seat reservation”. 

I would like some advice regarding these 2 trips and the compulsory booking of seats. Is there any way I can go to train stations in London and ask their staff? Or book the seat reservations through the train stations instead?

 

Thank you!

Best answer by seewulf

AnnaB wrote:
anaaaaaaaa wrote:

If I am unable to reserve any seats, what else can I do?

 

@Al_G What is your recommendations for plan B, C and D to get from UK to mainland Europe?

Plan B,C,D,E 

Train to Harwich and discounted ferry to Hoek van Holland 

Flixbus to Lille,Paris,Brussels 

Train to the south coast 
Ferry (carefull not all allow foot passengers) 
Travel on with trains 

Flight from London to elsewhere

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Railly clever
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  • AnnaB
  • Railly clever
  • 5940 replies
  • July 16, 2022

I'll answer in some different replies. 

 

Eurostar

There will be no seats available at the station.

There is a limited number of pass holder seats on the Eurostar and on popular departures and during high season those sell out weeks, and sometimes months in advance.

The best place to see the availability of passholder seats on the Eurostar is 

https://www.b-europe.com/EN/Booking/Pass#TravelWish

If you have a mobile pass you need to generate a Pass Cover Number in order to make the reservation at b-europe. You do that here in the PCN generator:

https://community.eurail.com/news-and-announcements-39/pass-cover-number-generator-is-live-5653

 

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
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Railly clever
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  • AnnaB
  • Railly clever
  • 5940 replies
  • July 16, 2022

An advice from the experienced travellers is to not active the pass and travel days in advance. Please read more below. Don't hesitate to ask more questions after you have read the information below. 

 

Here is some useful information from the experienced travellers in the Community regarding both planning, reservations and activation of pass and travel days. 

 

Planning

The rail planner is normally not up to date, as it only is updated once a month, so to be sure of the time table you better check the timetable and availability on the websites of the national railways. The bigger national railways, like DB (Germany) SBB (Switzerland) and ÖBB (Austria) cover several countries. 

 

Reservations 

The advice from the experienced travellers in the community is to use other ways to make reservations than the Interrail/Eurail website.  You can look at the guide in the link:

https://community.eurail.com/train-connections-reservations-47/how-to-get-reservations-105

If you, after having looked at the guide, have questions about how to make specific reservation, please give your travel details (departure date, time and route) preferably in a new topic, and you will get advice.

Please note that Interrail/Eurail charges an extra fee of 2 EUR per person and ticket in addition to the fee for the seat reservation.

 

Activation of pass

During the activation process, when you choose the start day of the validity of the pass, the first day of the validity period is automatically made a travel day, even if you don't enter a journey, the advice is therefore not to activate the pass before the first travel day as you only can deactivate the pass before 00.00 on the day the validity starts. If your travel plans change in the last moment you will loose travel days if you have activated the pass in advance.

It can be wise to make a test and activate the pass with a start date well in the future and then deactivate the pass immediately, just to see that everything works.

 

 Activation of travel day

The advice from the experienced travellers in the community is also never to activate a travel day, that is connect a journey to your pass, until just before boarding the train, otherwise you might loose a travel day if your travel plans change in a late stage  You can't delete a travel day in the past. A travel day can only be deleted until 23.59 CET the day before the travel day.

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
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Full steam ahead
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  • Al_G
  • Full steam ahead
  • 1812 replies
  • July 16, 2022

Between now and the end of the month there are 2 trains with 2nd class availability London - Paris, both on Monday 18th in the evening. Lille trains aren’t much better and even the first week in August has little availability left.

anaaaaaaaa
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  • Author
  • Rail rookie
  • 1 reply
  • July 16, 2022

Thank you for your replies! I have tried looking at b-europe but so far all it says “no connections matching your requests” and I am unable to see any trains or timings available. Does this mean no trains are available?

I have been using the pass for trips within London and they have been successful so far. I am only having issues and some confusion regarding high speed trains traveling out of London and into Europe.

If I am unable to reserve any seats, what else can I do?

Thank you!

A
Railly clever
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  • AnnaB
  • Railly clever
  • 5940 replies
  • July 16, 2022
anaaaaaaaa wrote:

Thank you for your replies! I have tried looking at b-europe but so far all it says “no connections matching your requests” and I am unable to see any trains or timings available. Does this mean no trains are available?

Keep clicking on "later trains ". Eventually you will get a result.

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
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Railly clever
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  • AnnaB
  • Railly clever
  • 5940 replies
  • July 16, 2022
anaaaaaaaa wrote:

If I am unable to reserve any seats, what else can I do?

 

@Al_G What is your recommendations for plan B, C and D to get from UK to mainland Europe?

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
seewulf
Railmaster
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  • seewulf
  • Railmaster
  • 2402 replies
  • Answer
  • July 16, 2022
AnnaB wrote:
anaaaaaaaa wrote:

If I am unable to reserve any seats, what else can I do?

 

@Al_G What is your recommendations for plan B, C and D to get from UK to mainland Europe?

Plan B,C,D,E 

Train to Harwich and discounted ferry to Hoek van Holland 

Flixbus to Lille,Paris,Brussels 

Train to the south coast 
Ferry (carefull not all allow foot passengers) 
Travel on with trains 

Flight from London to elsewhere

I´ am not working for Eurail or Interrail i just share my knowledge here. Please ask in the Community and not via private message as this is the fastest way to get an answer. I prefer English/German/ Czech for my answers. In case of Reservationquestions please share some details like Route, Date, Trainnumber as otherwise we can just provide general advices or answers
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