Bargains? Best Route? New Registree!

[jimbo]

re: discount codes.

I find nothing unethical about using any discount possibly available. This is basic "Retail 101". Companies use discount promotions because the MAIN goal of all retail operations is current SALES VOLUME. Lowering prices via discounts usually results in greater total dollar sales numbers. Of course net profit is slightly lower, and an operation must ultimately make enough profit to sustain itself. This is a totally different discussion.

At the risk of boring everyone, let me use an example. I happen to work for Home Depot. Twice a year, we have what is called a "Friends and Family " event. Each employee is given 10 cuopons good for 10% off any purchase (no dollar limit). Actually, any number of coupons are available if you have a lot of friends!.. This sale is not advertised in the papers, but word gets around. HD does not care who or how many people have coupons. The more the merrier! Someone who is thinking of buying 2 to 3 thousand dollars of remodel supplies decides the 10% makes the time right.

In my store,where we do an average of $1.3 million per week, this sale week we do $1.8 million. Multiply that extra 1/2 million by 1800 stores, this is serious money. SO the fact that 10% gross profit is given up is totally overshadowed by that very important gross SALES VOLUME.

This is how retail works. You might say comparing Amtrak to Home Depot is apples to oranges, but I do feel Amtrak doesn't care who uses a discount code, only that someone who might otherwise not have travelled at all decides to take advantage of a coupon an take the trip.

 

[Guest]

...but I do feel Amtrak doesn't care who uses a discount code, only that someone who might otherwise not have travelled at all decides to take advantage of a coupon an take the trip.

But that's the whole point of this endless debate! The discounts ARE being used by folks who WOULD otherwise travel. Only now, they're travling for less than Amtrak could have charged them and still had their business. That is called revenue dilution.

 

[AlanB]

...but I do feel Amtrak doesn't care who uses a discount code, only that someone who might otherwise not have travelled at all decides to take advantage of a coupon an take the trip.

But that's the whole point of this endless debate! The discounts ARE being used by folks who WOULD otherwise travel. Only now, they're travling for less than Amtrak could have charged them and still had their business. That is called revenue dilution.

Revenue dilution is simply a part of doing business and is something that Amtrak readily accepts. After all, what is Guest Rewards, if not revenue dilution?

I would have still traveled last year on the Auto Train with half my family, but instead I got a free family room, 1 free standard room, plus the transportation of a van.

 

[railman]

...but I do feel Amtrak doesn't care who uses a discount code, only that someone who might otherwise not have travelled at all decides to take advantage of a coupon an take the trip.

But that's the whole point of this endless debate! The discounts ARE being used by folks who WOULD otherwise travel. Only now, they're travling for less than Amtrak could have charged them and still had their business. That is called revenue dilution.

Revenue dilution is simply a part of doing business and is something that Amtrak readily accepts. After all, what is Guest Rewards, if not revenue dilution?

I would have still traveled last year on the Auto Train with half my family, but instead I got a free family room, 1 free standard room, plus the transportation of a van.

Yes - but you have to take enough paid trips to earn the reward. That's the point behind Guest Rewards, and you played by the rules. We're debating here the use of such discounts by customers who didn't earn them as Amtrak intended.

Also, revenue dilution is a very hotly debated topic at 60 Mass. Amtrak does not cavalierly accept that as a cost of doing business - the pricing folks work very hard to minimize it!

 

[PRR 60]

We're debating here the use of such discounts by customers who didn't earn them as Amtrak intended.
Also, revenue dilution is a very hotly debated topic at 60 Mass.  Amtrak does not cavalierly accept that as a cost of doing business - the pricing folks work very hard to minimize it!

Although Amtrak may offer available discounts to specific groups, for example Amtrak Guest Rewards, unless the discount is specifically limited to that group, the discount is open to everyone and anyone. The H426 discount is a perfect example. Evidently, the H426 discount was offered to inactive AGR members as an incentive to travel Amtrak. That’s fine. But did Amtrak intend to limit the use of that discount to only inactive AGR members? There is no evidence of that intent. No notice on the booking screen. No citation on the tickets. No requirement for either ticket agents or conductors to check AGR membership cards. You do not even have to have your AGR number in your profile to book the ticket. In short, there is nothing that says or even hints that H426 is only for AGR members. So, how can anyone say that this fare was for AGR members only when Amtrak does not say that? If “the pricing folks are working very hard to minimize (revenue dilution)”, then the absence of so much as a simple notation on the printed ticket that AGR membership is required is further evidence that this fare has no such requirement and is available to the public.

Amtrak certainly has the ability to limit discounts to specific groups. You cannot book a AAA discount ticket without supplying your AAA number and, in theory at least, having to show your AAA card at the ticket window or on the train. Any attempt to use a AAA fare without AAA membership would clearly be against the expressed intent of Amtrak and would be wrong. But exactly what is wrong with a non AGR member booking a discount fare that has no AGR membership requirements? It is said that Amtrak really only wanted the fare used by AGR members, but where, other than unsubstantiated hearsay from "haolerider", is there even the slightest evidence that that is the case? Absent any expressed limitation to usage of a discount fare, the use of that fare by any person is both ethical and legal.

 

[railman]

The offer in question (H426) does in fact require users to be amember of AGR. Unfortunately, there is currently no mechanism built in the reservations system to require the member number to be input.

 

[AlanB]

While I’m certainly not shutting down this topic, it does appear to be winding down (of course anyone who wishes to post further on the topic is free to do so), so I thought I would add a few thoughts not specific to the topic at hand.

As a member of Amtrak Unlimited, I thought that I’d take a moment to thank all who posted, for one of the livelier and more interesting debates that we’ve had on here, especially since it all started with a very innocent question. I think all of us have learned some things that maybe we didn’t know and have needed to consider both sides of the coin here.

I’m not sure that either side has succeeded in convincing the other side to there way of thinking. In fact, at least IMHO, if this had been a Debate Club topic, I think that the judges might well have had a tough time declaring a winner.

The one thing that we all have managed to prove though is the fact that we can agree to disagree and still be civil and pleasant. That’s one of the things that makes this country the great place it is to live in.

As a moderator, I think that it also speaks volumes about the quality members we have here at Amtrak Unlimited. While we may not always agree about everything, we can all still end up in the lounge car at night on an Amtrak train, share a drink (or a soda for you youngsters), and watch the miles roll by as we indulge in our favorite thing, riding trains.

Thanks!

 

[GG-1]

The one thing that we all have managed to prove though is the fact that we can agree to disagree and still be civil and pleasant.  That’s one of the things that makes this country the great place it is to live in.
As a moderator, I think that it also speaks volumes about the quality members we have here at Amtrak Unlimited.  While we may not always agree about everything, we can all still end up in the lounge car at night on an Amtrak train, share a drink (or a soda for you youngsters), and watch the miles roll by as we indulge in our favorite thing, riding trains.  

Thanks!

Alan B

Mahalo and I hope to join you in the lounge one day

Eric