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How to book seat reservations

  • 6 May 2023
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Matthew Kerr
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Hi all, 

I am unable to figure out how this seat reservation works. At the moment I've seen it pop up from Munich to Rome and Paris to London (via Eurostar I think).

The articles and topics I've come across on here aren't that helpful for me because I don't understand how it needs to be booked. I booked a train from Amsterdam to Berlin and although it said "seat reservation required" I didn't book anything and my friends and I were still able to find a seat. 

Any help would be greatly appreciated please and thank you!! 😊

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Best answer by AnnaB 6 May 2023, 20:22

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A
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The seat reservation between the Netherlands and Germany are only mandatory during the summer. If you hade tried to board that train during the summer without seat reservation, you would have been asked to leave the train. 

If you plan to use the Eurostar, you should make the reservations ASAP. 

There is a limited number of pass holder seats on the Eurostar between London and mainland Europe. 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 and make reservations on the Eurostar is 

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

If you don't get any result, press "later trains" and eventually you will find the next available connection. 

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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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 train in addition to the fee for the seat reservation.

 Activation of pass

During the activation process you choose the start day of the validity of the pass. Once the validity has started it can't be changed even if you haven't travelled. The advice is therefore to wait with activating the pass and starting the validity until the first day of your travel as you only can deactivate the pass no later than 23.59 CET on the day before the validity starts. If your travel plans change in the last moment you can't deactivate the pass and change the validity. 

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 and create the ticket (QR code), 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.
Matthew Kerr
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Thank you for the detailed replies! I have booked seat reservations on our 9 hour Munich to Italy trip, but only for the Italian part of it. How would we book tickets for the Munich part? Would it be the same website? 

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Thank you for the detailed replies! I have booked seat reservations on our 9 hour Munich to Italy trip, but only for the Italian part of it. How would we book tickets for the Munich part? Would it be the same website? 

Maybe. Please specify route, date and departure time.

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.
Matthew Kerr
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Muenchen Hbf - Roma Termini (interchange at Verona Porta Nuova): depart 11:32am on the 9th of May.

 

Ticket reservation has been booked from Verona to Roma Termini, but not from Muenchen Hbf to Verona

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Muenchen Hbf - Roma Termini (interchange at Verona Porta Nuova): depart 11:32am on the 9th of May.

Ticket reservation has been booked from Verona to Roma Termini, but not from Muenchen Hbf to Verona

Yes, you can also book that on tickets.oebb.at. Just like for Verona-Rome, add the Interrail/Eurail discount and then select "One-way tickets and day tickets”.
This train has optional reservations and a mandatory pass holder supplement of €10 in 2nd and €15 in 1st class, so that's the price you'll see. Reservations can be added in a second step.

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.
Matthew Kerr
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Thank you so much to all for the detailed information and speedy replies! My friends and I are currently on a trip and we just got on at Berlin Hbf to go to Munich and we didn't know about the reservations so we had to move and now I'm currently sitting on the floor in between carriages! Lol

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