Amtrak Reno contact?

[Swadian Hardcore]

At what phone number or e-mail address may I contact the Amtrak Reno station?

 

[the_traveler]

I may be wrong, but I don't believe there are public numbers given to reach a specific station.

 

[KmH]

No phone number here:

https://www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=am/am2Station/Station_Page&code=RNO

 

[Devil's Advocate]

I may be wrong, but I don't believe there are public numbers given to reach a specific station.

Which is unfortunate since the specifics of each station can differ rather substantially. Amtrak doesn't seem to think their station staff are doing enough to retain their positions and yet at the same time they hide their station staff from being able to answer public calls with basic questions. Seems kind of self defeating.

 

[CCC1007]

The staffed stations here in mt have local numbers listed in google. Search Amtrak Reno and there should be a local number listed.

 

[ehbowen]

Good luck reaching anyone. The local Houston station has (had?) a listed local number, but every time I tried to call it during station operating hours it was forwarded to 1-800-USA-RAIL. Every. Single. Time. It's been years since I last bothered to even try.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

The staffed stations here in mt have local numbers listed in google. Search Amtrak Reno and there should be a local number listed.

Where do you see a local number for the Reno Amtrak station?

 

[CCC1007]

The staffed stations here in mt have local numbers listed in google. Search Amtrak Reno and there should be a local number listed.

Where do you see a local number for the Reno Amtrak station?

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I was just relaying what I had work for the stations in my state.

 

[niemi24s]

the few (very few) times I've dug up what I thought was a local number for an Amtrak station, nobody would answer it - with one exception. And I'm not telling.

 

[Railroad Bill]

I found this number on YELP. 775-329-8638. Do not know if it is accurate or if you will be transferred to the regular Amtrak number, but you are welcome to try and report your findings.

 

[KnightRail]

It's not by accident that station phone numbers are not published. If they were, stations would be overwhelmed with calls that should be going to the 800 number. Its understandable that there may be instances such as leaving an item behind at a station, etc. that a person might want to speak to the station personnel. If a need arises and doing so is warranted, the proper way to do so is to call the 800 number, as for customer relations, and explain the situation. They may or may not give the phone number or they may offer to reach the station on your behalf and get back to you.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

I found this number on YELP. 775-329-8638. Do not know if it is accurate or if you will be transferred to the regular Amtrak number, but you are welcome to try and report your findings.

All I received when I called that number was a series of rings followed by an ear piercing fax tone.

Good luck reaching anyone. The local Houston station has (had?) a listed local number, but every time I tried to call it during station operating hours it was forwarded to 1-800-USA-RAIL. Every. Single. Time. It's been years since I last bothered to even try.

&

the few (very few) times I've dug up what I thought was a local number for an Amtrak station, nobody would answer it - with one exception. And I'm not telling.

I've had the same experiences as both of you.

It's not by accident that station phone numbers are not published. If they were, stations would be overwhelmed with calls that should be going to the 800 number. Its understandable that there may be instances such as leaving an item behind at a station, etc. that a person might want to speak to the station personnel. If a need arises and doing so is warranted, the proper way to do so is to call the 800 number, as for customer relations, and explain the situation. They may or may not give the phone number or they may offer to reach the station on your behalf and get back to you.

It is plenty clear that Amtrak has decided paying customers should have no expectation or method for contacting most stations regardless of reason or need. In my experience the 800 number doesn't know jack about the details of individual stations and won't give out station numbers or forward actionable inquiries unless it's for a major terminus at the end of the line. In nearly all other cases you're simply SOL. I've never once seen any mid-route station staff overwhelmed with phone calls but I have seen them quietly manning an empty desk. In an era when Amtrak station staff are dropping like flies it seems silly not to put them to work answering station specific inquiries during otherwise quiet periods during their standard shift.

If that's too much to ask then at least give station staff the ability (and expectation) to update their station specific webpage with relevant and timely information for those who want it. For instance, Korean Air has done a lot to lessen the burden of customer phone calls, but unlike Amtrak rather than simply ignore the issue they have replaced those phone calls with airport specific web links that provide functionality that used to be handled by phone. I used one of these airport specific lost and found links to check for a pair of glasses and was able to confirm the airline didn't have them without having to call anyone. It seemed a bit cold and indifferent at first, but later on the website was proven correct after all.

 

[KnightRail]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily.

Amtrak could simply publish one station number as public and keep another station number as private. Both numbers would reach the same phones but how each call was handled would differ based on which number was dialed. The public number could be silenced to only take messages or be redirected to the 800 number during major arrivals and departures. Outside of busy periods calls to the public number would ring if the line wasn't already in use and if nobody picked up in a timely fashion they could follow the previously explained path of either taking a message or being forwarded to the 800 number.

Otherwise...

If that's too much to ask then at least give station staff the ability to update their station specific web page with relevant and timely information for those who want it.

 

[the_traveler]

Airlines have done the same thing for years! You may see a local number for UA in St Louis, AA in Albany or DL in Tampa. Those do not go to the local airport counter, they go to the national reservation desk!

 

[Lonestar648]

The only time I was able to communicate to the local people was when the central staff people dreamed it urgent or absolutely necessary so they patched me in with them on the line.

 

[me_little_me]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

Easy fix. When the agent is busy, he presses a button to send the call to HQ. Or it just rolls over if the agent doesn't answer.

The now non-existent agent in Greenville, SC used to answer the phone when called.

 

[KnightRail]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

Easy fix. When the agent is busy, he presses a button to send the call to HQ. Or it just rolls over if the agent doesn't answer.
The now non-existent agent in Greenville, SC used to answer the phone when called.

And when the agent is busy with multiple extended calls on the phone, what button does he/she press to send the customers away that just physically walked up to the station window?

 

[jebr]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

Easy fix. When the agent is busy, he presses a button to send the call to HQ. Or it just rolls over if the agent doesn't answer.
The now non-existent agent in Greenville, SC used to answer the phone when called.

And when the agent is busy with multiple extended calls on the phone, what button does he/she press to send the customers away that just physically walked up to the station window?

1. There really shouldn't ever be multiple extended calls on the phone for a single station agent. If there's multiple station agents, maybe, but each agent should only have one call at a time.

2. The person in line simply waits until they're done with the person on the phone. Usually it shouldn't be that much of a time between calls, as the local agent could let the customer know that if they need help with something non-station specific (buying tickets, complaints, etc.) that they'll be forwarding them to the national reservation center and then transfer the customer accordingly.

Does the national reservations center even have the ability to call or chat the office to answer those station-specific inquiries? I'd assume so, but sometimes I'm not 100% sure.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

Easy fix. When the agent is busy, he presses a button to send the call to HQ. Or it just rolls over if the agent doesn't answer. The now non-existent agent in Greenville, SC used to answer the phone when called.

And when the agent is busy with multiple extended calls on the phone, what button does he/she press to send the customers away that just physically walked up to the station window?

Why would a station agent need to answer multiple extended phone calls? The station staff can provide a concise and timely answer or put the caller on hold or allow the phone to take a message and log the callback number or simply redirect the caller to the 800 number while they handle the counter or work with the luggage. Modern business phones can be programmed and reprogrammed for almost any workflow. Many stations are open even when there is little ticket counter tasks or checked luggage activity. Put a little thought into the deployment, follow up afterward to ensure any unintended consequences are resolved or worked around, and you're golden.

 

[Hal]

Does the national reservations center even have the ability to call or chat the office to answer those station-specific inquiries? I'd assume so, but sometimes I'm not 100% sure.

Most of the station specific answers are on their computer. Like is there parking or taxis available. Even how to get from the station to nearby locations. If they need to call a station they can.

 

[KnightRail]

Can't have it both ways. Those numbers go public, then the station staff can never get off the phone, and those standing in front of them get to wait unnecessarily. The 800 number doesn't give out the numbers on purpose, but like you said it's not even going to matter that much because increasingly there will no longer be anyone there to answer the phones.

Easy fix. When the agent is busy, he presses a button to send the call to HQ. Or it just rolls over if the agent doesn't answer. The now non-existent agent in Greenville, SC used to answer the phone when called.

And when the agent is busy with multiple extended calls on the phone, what button does he/she press to send the customers away that just physically walked up to the station window?

Why would a station agent need to answer multiple extended phone calls? The station staff can provide a concise and timely answer or put the caller on hold or allow the phone to take a message and log the callback number or simply redirect the caller to the 800 number while they handle the counter or work with the luggage. Modern business phones can be programmed and reprogrammed for almost any workflow. Many stations are open even when there is little ticket counter tasks or checked luggage activity. Put a little thought into the deployment, follow up afterward to ensure any unintended consequences are resolved or worked around, and you're golden.

Because people feel more comfortable knowing where they are calling and whom they are speaking with. Undoubtably calls would be made to stations looking to book complex itineraries and other calls that are not quick less than a minute answers which should go through the call center from the get go. Modern phone systems are great, but like most problems faced, where is that money coming from? There's not even money to cover or justify the agents themselves.

Just playing devil's advocate on this topic, pun intended, with some insight on maybe why things are the way they are.

 

[Lonestar648]

I see having calls go to the 800 number just before and during the time a train is in the station, probably the busiest for the manned station. During other times, the agent could handle various phone calls in between having people come into the station to conduct business. It would be easy to have an Agent working by themselves have a bypass switch for the times they have people at the window. Most likely, Amtrak wants ALL calls routed to the 1-800 number so the computer can distribute accordingly. Plus they can track number of calls, from where etc. they also know how many people gave up waiting and how long they waited. Managers want data to count their beans and make numeric decisions. The fall out is the station agent. There is no one tracking how many bags were checked, loaded and unloaded each day. How many questions were answered each day, how many people walked up to the window each day. They only data is how many tickets were sold, there is no data on how many bought on line were after talking in detail with the local agent. Bottom line, numerically, there is nothing that justifies what the agent does each day, unless there are a lot of revenue transactions.

 

[jebr]

I see having calls go to the 800 number just before and during the time a train is in the station, probably the busiest for the manned station. During other times, the agent could handle various phone calls in between having people come into the station to conduct business. It would be easy to have an Agent working by themselves have a bypass switch for the times they have people at the window. Most likely, Amtrak wants ALL calls routed to the 1-800 number so the computer can distribute accordingly. Plus they can track number of calls, from where etc. they also know how many people gave up waiting and how long they waited. Managers want data to count their beans and make numeric decisions. The fall out is the station agent. There is no one tracking how many bags were checked, loaded and unloaded each day. How many questions were answered each day, how many people walked up to the window each day. They only data is how many tickets were sold, there is no data on how many bought on line were after talking in detail with the local agent. Bottom line, numerically, there is nothing that justifies what the agent does each day, unless there are a lot of revenue transactions.

A call center phone system could pretty easily make a "local" phone number route into the call center system, place in a specific queue, and ring that local office first and forward over to national reservations after a predetermined period of time (or if the operators in that queue are busy or unable to be on the phone.) It's not as easy as just plugging a phone into a wall jack, but given that Amtrak likely has the call center software already it likely could be modified to add those additional queues.

 

[JoeBas]

Modern business phones can be programmed and reprogrammed for almost any workflow.

To be fair, Amtrak's phones probably have rotary dials on them...