Multiple questions about the 50% promo 3month continuous pass

C

Hi there - I’ve got a number of questions about the 3 month pass that’s currently on promotion - I’ve asked customer support a couple of days ago and haven’t had any response and can’t seem to find exact answers to a lot of the below - hope the community can help answer some of these questions! 

Pls feel free to answer individual questions if easier - however I’ll list them all in one place.

Many thanks in advance!

Questions:

 

1. As a family of 2 adults and 2 children under 12 based in U.K. - if we bought a 3 month continuous pass on the promotion ( ie. for the equivalent of 1 full price Adult ticket) - does this mean we can travel on the Eurostar as many times as we like during the 3months? And as long as there are available tickets on the Eurostar website - does that mean tickets are available for the Global pass too (or are there restricted numbers of tickets like frequent flyer tickets on planes)

eg. we could do Lon-Paris, Lon-Amsterdam, Lon Brussels on 3 consecutive weekends?

 

2. Does the reservation fee of 30eur for the Eurostar apply for each leg of the trip eg. 60Eur for Lon Paris return?

and does it also apply to the free child tickets or are they exempt?

 

3. Does the interail pass mean that as long as there are tickets available on the Eurostar regardless of the price - we will be able to book them?

 

4. Does the 3mth interrail pass cover the journey on London buses, tube and overground trains to get to the Eurostar? (and on the return leg) - it says that National rail and Heathrow/Gatwick express is included

 

5. Does the interrail pass for us as a family allow us to travel to Edinburgh? or is that considered domestic travel?

 

6. If we bought the first class option for the family - is it valid for all trains with first class travel in Europe? does this also apply to Gatwick express and heathrow express first class?

 

7. Can we fly out of London and land in Sweden and use the interail to travel on an trains/arlanda express/ while in Stockholm or Sweden and then fly back out to London during the 3 month period?

 

8. Can we use the pass for ski season trains - ie if we take the fri night train out from London to Les Arcs - and return Sunday night every weekend - would we be able to do that for the duration of the pass?

 

9. Does it matter if we fly out of London and land in any European city and then use the pass for local travel? eg fly to Barcelona - use the pass, train to Valencia, fly to Lisbon, train in Portugal and fly back to London.

 

10. Can we buy more than one 3month pass for the family - eg. if we bought 2 passes to use over 6months?

 

11. If my brother and partner, and mother, who reside in HK wanted to use the promotion - will they have to buy a Eurall pass to use the same promotion?

 

12. Separate note - If my cousin who is currently in Stockholm purchased a 3mth interail pass and came to London to stay with us during that time - does it allow her to use the gatwick express/heathrow express but also all of Tube, Overground, national rail and buses/ferries while she is in London and U.K.? ie she wouldn’t need to buy an oyster card/travel card for the tube and could travel to Bath or York etc?

 

thanks Chris

MartinM 1 year ago

Hi Chris,

a lot of questions at once ^^

  1. You have only one in-/outbound journey during those 3 months. Means you can only travel once on Eurostar to mainland Europe and once back. The other times you’d have to buy normal tickets for this trip
  2. It applies for each leg
  3. Don’t know this
  4. No, it doesn’t. Only National Rail trains etc. will be included, but as you live in the UK. It will be only for 1 day on your outbound and 1 day on your inbound trip the case.
  5. No, it doesn’t. You could only use it to travel to Edinburgh during your inbound or outbound day.
  6. In general yes, it is valid for all first classes on trains in Europe. I don’t know about airport trains as I don’t fly inside Europe (as that’s the “reason” of Interrail)
  7. Yes, you could. But about airport train I don’t know, see point 6. 
  8. See point 1. In general it is valid, but for some ski express trains, which are operated by private companies (e.g. the ones from the Netherlands to Austria) it is NOT valid.
  9. It would be possible, but if you think about a sustainable future this doesn’t fit (and as you’ve children, you definitely should).
  10. Yes, you can.
  11. No, they can’t. It is an Interrail promotion and not an Eurail promotion. (Interrail is celebrating it’s 50th birthday, Eurail doesn’t exist that long)
  12. For tube etc. she needs an Oyster card, but for going to Bath, York the Interrail ticket would be sufficient.
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13 replies

M
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Hi Chris,

a lot of questions at once ^^

  1. You have only one in-/outbound journey during those 3 months. Means you can only travel once on Eurostar to mainland Europe and once back. The other times you’d have to buy normal tickets for this trip
  2. It applies for each leg
  3. Don’t know this
  4. No, it doesn’t. Only National Rail trains etc. will be included, but as you live in the UK. It will be only for 1 day on your outbound and 1 day on your inbound trip the case.
  5. No, it doesn’t. You could only use it to travel to Edinburgh during your inbound or outbound day.
  6. In general yes, it is valid for all first classes on trains in Europe. I don’t know about airport trains as I don’t fly inside Europe (as that’s the “reason” of Interrail)
  7. Yes, you could. But about airport train I don’t know, see point 6. 
  8. See point 1. In general it is valid, but for some ski express trains, which are operated by private companies (e.g. the ones from the Netherlands to Austria) it is NOT valid.
  9. It would be possible, but if you think about a sustainable future this doesn’t fit (and as you’ve children, you definitely should).
  10. Yes, you can.
  11. No, they can’t. It is an Interrail promotion and not an Eurail promotion. (Interrail is celebrating it’s 50th birthday, Eurail doesn’t exist that long)
  12. For tube etc. she needs an Oyster card, but for going to Bath, York the Interrail ticket would be sufficient.
C

Thanks so much for the answers Martin - much appreciated!

On point 1 - which is probably the most important point for me to understand - I was of the understanding that you can only have one outbound and inbound travel from your country of residence on any given travel days - however I thought that with a continuous pass you would be able to use any days within the 3 months as your travel days so that you could go in and out of UK (in our case) as many times as you like during the 3 months. One of the things we wanted to do with this pass if it were possible would be to go on the Eurostar on multiple weekends to different cities and explore Europe that way - seems like this isn’t actually possible?

So if I understand correctly - we would only be able to travel out with the pass on Eurostar Lon-Paris for example - use the pass for 3 months in Europe and only come back once into the UK?

(which effectively means it’s only useful if the whole family took 3 months off travelling during holidays and term time!)

  1. Thanks
  2. no worries - moot point if 1 if we can only go in and out from UK once during the 3 months
  3. thanks
  4. thanks
  5. thanks
  6. thanks
  7. thanks - same as point 1 - ie. we can’t use it for multiple weekend journeys originating from UK?
  8. absolutely! was trying to understand our options! : )
  9. thanks
  10. thanks
  11. thanks

Huge thanks Martin for all your responses. 

Seems like we won’t be able to use the promotion the way we had hoped to with multiple trips in and out of UK if the interpretation of point 1 is as you indicate.

M
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Nope, the continuous pass also allows only for one in-/outbound trip like the flexi pass… Otherwise the Interrail pass would be way cheaper than many local season tickets (e.g. Bahncard 100 in Germany, Generalabo in Switzerland etc.) and many railway companies would (have to) leave it due to decreasing revenue.

As said you could book Eurostar tickets in advance, then it might be not much more expensive in some cases? If cheapest tickets start from around 40 euro if I remember right?

Or take a short ferry ride across the Channel, although that is way more time-consuming and also costs a bit extra and like plane not the most sustainable way, but still probably a bit better option?

A
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You can come back to your home country as many times as you like during the 3 months, but the travel to and in the UK will only be free on 2 days. The other times you will have to purchase the ticket for the travel with Eurostar from the UK and for any connecting tran in the UK.

But, as someone else said, even with the Interrail pass you need a reservation for €30 per person in 2nd class on the Eurostar and the cheapest tickets for the Eurostar start at about €40 if you book well in advance. 

The outbound/inbound travel days don't have to be the first and last trips you make, they can be made any time during the validity of the pass.

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
C

thanks Martin - yes that was what I was hoping the 50yr promo would be - a great way to have such a flexible pass for 3 months!

Sadly - not the case and will have to revert to more traditional holiday periods.

Thanks again for your help.

cheers, Chris 

C

thanks Anna - I think the initial attraction for us was the hope that we could book seats on the Eurostar anytime we wanted to as long as there was availability on the train without having to plan far out in advance for the cheap seats. With a family the ability to have the flexibility on travel at short notice without too much planning would have been a real benefit for us - being able to take a weekend break (like we used to pre-children) relatively spontaneously without breaking the bank would have been fun!

 

A
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thanks Anna - I think the initial attraction for us was the hope that we could book seats on the Eurostar anytime we wanted to as long as there was availability on the train without having to plan far out in advance for the cheap seats. With a family the ability to have the flexibility on travel at short notice without too much planning would have been a real benefit for us - being able to take a weekend break (like we used to pre-children) relatively spontaneously without breaking the bank would have been fun!

 

I agree with you. It would have been great if it had worked in that way. It is difficult to have the pre-children flexiblity once you have a larger family. You’ll have to wait until the children grow bigger. I will go on a 2 week Interrailing trip with our soon to be 18 year old daughter this summer. The only tickets we have booked in advance are for the night trains between Stockholm and Berlin. We will visit Germany, Switzerland and the Czech Republic, all which are countries without mandatory reservation on most trains.

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
L

For questions 3 and 8:

Seat61.com is a very good resource on rail ticketing in Europe and many other countries. It says:

Interrail & Eurail passes now allow you to use Eurostar between London, Ebbsfleet or Ashford and Calais, Lille, Paris, Brussels, Disneyland, Rotterdam & Amsterdam for a special passholder fare.

These passholder fares have limited availability as explained below and are not always available on the busiest trains or dates, so you may want to check availability before buying a pass.

The direct Eurostar between London & Lyon/Avignon/Marseille & Eurostar ski trains between London & the French Alps are not covered.

[https://www.seat61.com/interrail-and-eurail-passes-on-eurostar.htm]

For question 9:

That is possible, but note that you can travel between the non-UK European places for free (or almost free if reservation is required) using your pass. So flying from Valencia to Lisbon is probably not a good idea even if it wasn’t unsustainable.

For question 10:

Yes, but it depends on when you want to travel. Be aware that you have to activate the second pass before the 11-months deadline from your date of purchase. If I have understood it correctly, that means that the validity of your second pass needs to start, the latest, then on the 9th of April 2023 or so. It might be that you can activate it then, but choose a later validity date. Does anyone know details of this?

M

Hi sorry to hijack this post but I have a similar query. I live in Ireland so as that’s my country of residence could I use the UK as a base to get train to multiple cities/countries? I want to buy the 2 month pass but will need to come home some weekends and generally there is always cheap flights from the UK back to Dublin. 
 

Can I travel around the UK & the rest of Europe as many times and even go back to other cities more than once because my country of origin is Ireland? Many thanks! 

R
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I live in Ireland so as that’s my country of residence could I use the UK as a base to get train to multiple cities/countries?

Yes you can. But every Eurostar reservation is at least 30€...

Please ask questions in the community and not via a private message. That's the quickest way to get a response. I don't work for Eurail/Interrail.
tetra rex

Hi!
I also bought the discount ticket foe 2 months. I remember it saying it should be activated/the travels should be started within 11 months of purchase. But I can’t find any information about this any longer on the website, and can’t get past the chatbot to contact the customer service about it.

I was just wondering how strict is it, like day of the month when purchased, or how? Or just buying the ticket on the app on that day, or…. I am planning to use my ticket as late in the spring as possible, bought it 10th of May.

Any help appreciated 🙏

A
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@tetra rex 

You should have the information about the last activation date for your pass on the invoice that you got with your confirmation email. Otherwise the information should be in the order overview in your Interrail account.

But if you bought the pass on the 10th of May you need to activate the pass no later than the 10th of April 2023.

Please note that I don't work for Interrail/Eurail and that I don't reply to personal messages.
G

Hi sorry to hijack this post but I have a similar query. I live in Ireland so as that’s my country of residence could I use the UK as a base to get train to multiple cities/countries? I want to buy the 2 month pass but will need to come home some weekends and generally there is always cheap flights from the UK back to Dublin. 
 

Can I travel around the UK & the rest of Europe as many times and even go back to other cities more than once because my country of origin is Ireland? Many thanks! 

Hi Madeline,

I just came across the thread "Can I cancel my 50%-Sale-Global-Pass?" where youve posted regarding a screenshot. Is there anyway you could send the screenshot over as I am in need of a refund for 2 unused passes which I bought over the 50% promo period but couldnt use due to unexpected medical issues. I unfortunately didnt take a screenshot at the time of purchase, if you could send the screenshot it would be a godsend!! it would help massively especially due to my current financial situation!! My email is goxn@yahoo.com thanks Daniel

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