Why is 3 weeks not enough time to ship tickets to Europe?

  • 16 June 2022
  • 7 replies
  • 298 views
H

I am trying to make a seat reservation from Montpellier to Barcelona for July 7th. It offers paper tickets only, so I tried having them shipped to an address in France that we’ll be staying at, but I keep getting the following message:

 

”Your order contains one or more paper tickets. Based on our calculations, your order will not arrive on time. Please send your reservations to another address, such as your hotel in Europe, or try booking at a European train station.”

 

Other posts I’ve read suggested they got their tickets within 5 days. Is this a bug in Eurail’s site or why won’t it allow us to have the tickets shipped to places in Europe. We tried changing the country for the shipping address to other neighboring countries in Europe and they all show the same message. The form won’t let us move past this page presumably because of this.

7 replies

A
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The delivery times are that long as so many people order reservations and paper passes that have to be shipped.

I ordered a paper pass on the 9th of May that should have been delivered by the 29th of May, but it has not yet been shipped from the Netherlands. 

You better make your reservation in a place that gives you an e-ticket.

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 create a new topic with your travel details (departure date, time and route) and you will get advice.

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

Any idea why they require two months to mail tickets?
Unfortunately the recommendations on that thread didn’t help. I can’t book through SNCF or Belgium railways because the train crosses into Spain. I tried calling the SNCF phone line, but each time after starting to talk to someone about wanting to book a seat reservation, they then played an automated message in French and then hung up.

A
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Userlevel 7
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You should be able to make the reservation by phone at SNCF so try calling them again. Did you press #85 for English?

Sometimes the person answering is not so service minded and then you need to call again. You need an American Express Card to pay with.

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

Yeah, I called twice and dialed #85. Both times a person started to help me, but then at some point the call switched to the automatic recording and that was the end. They only take AmEx?

A
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 They only take AmEx?

If you are from the US the experience is that only AmEx is accepted. The take Visa and Mastercard, but only from some European countries. 

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

This is more of a rant than an answer -  can we just agree that it is ludicrous that, with the excuse that three weeks is not enough to ship a paper ticket from France to Europe (including France itself!!), what many of us have had to do in practice is to buy a full-price ticket, which we are able to get online?

How is a full-price ticket easy peasy to get online but not a reservation? (especially when tickets and interrail cards are always checked on the station or train)

The same applies to Spain whenever buying e.g. AVE tickets - there it is simply impossible to get a reservation online.

Please do better. Having to buy a ticket three weeks in advance almost beats the point of an interrail trip…!

A
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Userlevel 7
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This is more of a rant than an answer -  can we just agree that it is ludicrous that, with the excuse that three weeks is not enough to ship a paper ticket from France to Europe (including France itself!!), what many of us have had to do in practice is to buy a full-price ticket, which we are able to get online?

How is a full-price ticket easy peasy to get online but not a reservation? (especially when tickets and interrail cards are always checked on the station or train)

The same applies to Spain whenever buying e.g. AVE tickets - there it is simply impossible to get a reservation online.

Please do better. Having to buy a ticket three weeks in advance almost beats the point of an interrail trip…!

You have answered the question yourself.

Because SNCF and RENFE would much rather sell a full price ticket than an interrail reservation for a fraction of the cost and unlike some countries they have no shame in openly screwing over tourists.

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