Caledonian Sleeper question

Yes, in theory you only need to use a travel day on the 17th if you have an ‘X days in Y months’ type of pass. 

But I believe the whole journey needs to fall within the validity of your pass, so your pass would need to be valid on the 16th. 

As @rvdborgt says, the app gets this wrong, and will make you use a travel day on the 16th. It would be good to get an official response from Eurail on what customers should do, and to publish this advice (about UK sleepers counting arrival day, and about non CET countries) on the page about sleepers.

I was going to suggest a practical solution of buying a ticket from Garelochhead to the first station after midnight local time, but there aren’t any on this train. (And yous shouldn't have to pay extra anyway!)

Thank you both for your advice. Yes I have a a 10 days in 2 months pass and I've included the 16th. I've also added Garelochhead to Edinburgh as my first journey so I can generate the ticket. Would you say this looks right/good enough to generate the online pass? Thank you again 

How are you getting from Edinburgh to Paris?

I’m not sure what adding Gareloch - Edinburgh achieves here? The app will use up a travel day on the 16th which is not what you want. And adding Edinburgh-London will use up the 17th.

You could add Edinburgh-London to the app, which departs after midnight local time, and guarantees that you will only use the 17th - both according to the way the rules are written, and the way the app behaves.

But you’d have to pay £8.40 for an Anytime Day Single from Gareloch-Edinburgh if you want to guarantee the travel on the 16th doesn’t use up a travel day, and you shouldn’t have to do that.

Im doing the Calidonian sleeper Garelochhead to Euston, then the eurostar to Paris from St Pancras itl. The pass doesn't cover either in full. I got the califonian sleeper supplement and doesn't cover the euro star.

Thank you for your help, I'll delete Garelochhead to Edinburgh and add Edinburgh-London on the 17th shame they have made this so awkward. 

Just to be clear, you’re using the pass for the whole journey Garelochhead - Euston - Paris - Basel? And you’re paying a the sleeper supplement and the Eurostar supplement?

Yes that's correct 👍. 

It would be really helpful to get some input from Eurail staff here. 
It’s not fair to leave customers having to guess, or use workarounds, when the app and one operator isn’t conforming to the published rules

Seems Caledonian Sleeper did change it's rules recently:

You do now need the day of departure. So there's no exception from the general rule any more.

I did also verify this with them directly, too.

@Hannahnapier080518 According to this, you would need to enter the 16th which would cause a problem for your onward connection unfortunately. Maybe you could argue that you did book under the old rule.

@Camilo. @Mukhammad 

Any update on these 2 issues? (App doesn't honour travel days in CET but uses local time, which is contrary to the conditions, and how to use the app on night trains in GB, where you are supposed to have a valid travel day for the arrival date).

@rvdborgt @Camilo. @Mukhammad See also my message above. Just got their answer. And it's also on their website, too.

Thanks, must indeed be recent. That leaves us just with the issue of the app using travel days in local time instead of CET.

Huh. They must have changed that very recently!

If that's the case, then the OP would need to use a travel day on the 16th for the sleeper and on the 17th for the onward connections.

And the time zone quirk is irrelevant in this case, since departure from Garelochhead at 2222 local time is still the 16th in CET.

So I think in this case, a paid ticket from Garelochhead-Edinburgh is the only way to avoid using an extra travel day.

That train does not have a passenger stop at Edinburgh, tickets to/from Edinburgh and splitting like that would not be valid on this train. It is not something I would advise someone to do.

Hi everyone,

Related to the time zone used on the app, it respects the usage of CET according to the information here. I did my research on trains which operate at night in CET-1 and CET+1 time zones, but I couldn't find any train which goes against the CET time zone's rule.

If it's possible to find the ones which use the local times on the app, please inform me and Camilo here. We'll be able to report it if you find one.

Thank you!

For 16 April, splitting in Dalmuir (departure 23:05 = 0:05 CET) would be good. But indeed no tickets are sold and I suppose no reservation can be made either. Although all planners, including nationalrail.co.uk, display the journey. If passengers are not allowed to do this journey with this train, then that's an error in Caledonian Sleeper’s timetable.

It's no error, they are just not selling it. Here are their rules:

Mukhammad wrote:
Related to the time zone used on the app, it respects the usage of CET according to the information here. I did my research on trains which operate at night in CET-1 and CET+1 time zones, but I couldn't find any train which goes against the CET time zone's rule.

No, the app doesn't respect the CET zone days. We've seen a few cases in this community last year and nothing has changed since. But to reproduce this once again myself, I've loaded the flexipass I recently bought and activated it (well in the future...).

First test: train leaves before midnight WET but after midnight CET.

Steps to reproduce:

1. On 28 April, look for the night train from Garelochhead (dep. 23:11) to London. (Note the timetable is wrong because it includes a change in Edinburgh, but that doesn't matter for this test.)
2. Add the journey to your trip.
3. Tap on the switch to add the first train to your pass.

Result:
The app wants to activate a travel day on 28 April:

Expected result:
The app should activate a travel day on 29 April because the train leaves after midnight CET.

Second test: train leaves after midnight EET but before midnight CET.

Steps to reproduce:

1. On 30 April, look for the train from Bucuresti Nord (dep. 0:30) to Bucuresti Aeroport Henri Coanda.
2. Add the train to your trip.
3. Tap on the switch to add it to your pass.

Result:
The app wants to activate a travel day on 30 April:

Expected result:
The app should activate a travel day on 29 April because the train leaves before midnight CET.

@Mukhammad @Camilo. 

Please see my 2 posts above for the bug description.

You can of course try to fix the app, to make it adhere to the conditions of use. Alternatively, you could also change the conditions of use and leave the app as is. That would be more intuitive anyway and it would be the same as for the paper pass.

As a bonus bug, also note that in the first test, the app decided to change its language to English, although my OS (Android 11) lists German before English. I restarted the app before doing the second test and it displayed in German again.

[Where can I send my invoice? Just kidding...]

Hi Rian,

Thank you for the search you did on your end. I definitely missed those connections.

I'm reporting this case as we speak.

Also note that this isn't train-specific. It will be the same for any train:

1. in the WET zone leaving between 23:00 and 23:59.
2. in the EET zone leaving between 0:00 and 0:59.
3. in the TRT zone (Turkey) leaving between 0:00 and 1:59, or between 0:00 and 0:59 when CEST is in effect (probably, I didn't test this).