Bedroom downgraded to Coach a week before departure

[zephyr17]

By the spring of 2022 neither COVID nor staffing and equipment shortages were in any way surprising. Yet Amtrak offered inventory on trains they ultimately could not provide. Worse yet, they did not notify passengers holding confirmed reservations when the decisions were made and inventory withdrawn, but rather elected to delay informing them until relatively shortly before departure, increasing the impact of disrupted travel plans.

If that is not a management failure, I do not know what is. The staffing and equipment issues have been apparent for quite awhile now. Given the known situation, the proper course of action would have been to release minimum inventory for sale this summer, then add inventory when they knew they could support it. Instead they appear to have adopted an approach based, well, what would appear to be somebody's wildly over optimistic projection. Wishful thinking is not the basis for sound decisions.

 

[joelkfla]

Thanks to all for the information here. I had heard the reports of people being bumped from sleepers on Reddit, so I figured I'd pop by and see if the community here had any knowledge of what was going on.

I was a bit concerned because we have a trip planned (2 adults, 1 child) cross-country for December, to spend Christmas with family—the first time we will have spent the holidays with them since 2019, due to the pandemic.

If Amtrak were to pull the rug out from under us on that trip, I would be rather...unhappy.

But, based on what I'm reading here, it sounds as if we were bumped already:

We booked our trip (PHL-WAS-CHI-LAX) back on 2/15, with a family bedroom on the Capitol Limited, and two roomettes on the Chief.

On 4/30, I got a new and unexpected "eTicket and Receipt" email from Amtrak for the reservation, and noticed we had been bounced from the family bedroom into two roomettes.

I was meaning to call and ask Amtrak about the change and hadn't yet—but now it makes sense. Looking at the original eTicket, our family bedroom was in the 2901 car, and the new ticket has us in two roomettes in the 2900 car.

Our Southwest Chief reservation was in the 330 car, and that didn't get changed.

Sounds like it's possible that they're planning on shortened consists in the winter as well.

I suppose we'll be fine as long as the train goes with a sleeper, but honestly Amtrak sounds a bit of a mess right now. Weren't they supposed to be getting a ton of funding from the federal government as part of the infrastructure bill? I kind of expected that things would be getting better, not worse.

Are the Roomettes opposite one another? That would be one odd-numbered, and the other the next higher sequential number (e.g. 3 & 4, or 5 & 6). If not, you might call and ask if two opposites are available, but they might not be if the train has been downsized.

 

[Rasputin]

By the spring of 2022 neither COVID nor staffing and equipment shortages were in any way surprising. Yet Amtrak offered inventory on trains they ultimately could not provide. Worse yet, they did not notify passengers holding confirmed reservations when the decisions were made and inventory withdrawn, but rather elected to delay informing them until relatively shortly before departure, increasing the impact of disrupted travel plans.

I wonder how many passengers have had their sleeping car reservations canceled in this debacle. I don't think this has happened to only a few dozen passengers but probably the number affected is much higher.

 

[zephyr17]

I wonder how many passengers have had their sleeping car reservations canceled in this debacle. I don't think this has happened to only a few dozen passengers but probably the number affected is much higher.

Given that the ones we know about are those posting here and on FB are probably a tiny minority of riders. Probably at least a 10 to 1 ratio of those that it happened to versus those we know about

 

[user 14106]

By the spring of 2022 neither COVID nor staffing and equipment shortages were in any way surprising. Yet Amtrak offered inventory on trains they ultimately could not provide.

I think the slow communications is ultimately the real problem - I totally agree they need to get their act together on the reservations side of things and that's a problem that should be less time consuming and complex to solve and they need to solve it and would be my biggest beef. I wouldn’t really be that offended by the optimistic overbooking of sleepers if they gave sufficient notice so people could make other arrangements - not being able to honor flights and what not certainly also happens in the airline industry. Obviously it's going to hurt Amtrak more on a one a day train given the limited capacity and limited ability to re-accommodate during the busy season and the lower in general threshold people are going to have for "never again" on trains vs planes. But overbooking isn’t a uniquely Amtrak thing nor is disruptions in capacity (it just takes the form of flight cancellations with airlines.) I think we realistically have to expect at least another year of operational challenges - but Amtrak can certainly mitigate this by improving how passengers are notified - and promptly cancelling or downgrading the reservations well in advance or a week before.

 

[zephyr17]

I think the slow communications is ultimately the real problem - I totally agree they need to get their act together on the reservations side of things and that's a problem that should be less time consuming and complex to solve and they need to solve it and would be my biggest beef. I wouldn’t really be that offended by the optimistic overbooking of sleepers if they gave sufficient notice so people could make other arrangements - not being able to honor flights and what not certainly also happens in the airline industry. Obviously it's going to hurt Amtrak more on a one a day train given the limited capacity and limited ability to re-accommodate during the busy season and the lower in general threshold people are going to have for "never again" on trains vs planes. But overbooking isn’t a uniquely Amtrak thing nor is disruptions in capacity (it just takes the form of flight cancellations with airlines.) I think we realistically have to expect at least another year of operational challenges - but Amtrak can certainly mitigate this by improving how passengers are notified - and promptly cancelling or downgrading the reservations well in advance or a week before.

And, with regard to sleepers, Amtrak had never, ever overbooked sleepers.

Until this clown car arrived.

PS, "slow communications" is an issue of management competency. Or incompetentcy. Which COVID does not explain or provide an excuse for.

 

[dcipjr]

Are the Roomettes opposite one another? That would be one odd-numbered, and the other the next higher sequential number (e.g. 3 & 4, or 5 & 6). If not, you might call and ask if two opposites are available, but they might not be if the train has been downsized.

They are for the Capitol Limited, which got the downgrade.

They aren't for the Chief, but that was the case even when we booked. The roomettes are relatively close together so it should be fine.

I may call..I'd almost rather not push my luck...

 

[user 14106]

And, with regard to sleepers, Amtrak had never, ever overbooked sleepers.

Until this clown car arrived.

PS, "slow communications" is an issue of management competency. Or incompetentcy. Which COVID does not explain or provide an excuse for.

All true - and overbooking sleepers isn't something that should become a normal part of the business. But in this case it's very much a continuation of the disruptions that began with reducing service to 5 days a week - while this is a lousy situation on the two trains it's affecting getting back to daily is at least somewhat progress. But I totally agree the way they are handling the communications is something advocates should be hitting management on.

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

I realize I must sound like a complete prima donna from some of my remarks here.

I’m really not—I commuted on NJ Transit for many years, and that made Amtrak coach look like the Orient Express.

Normally, if I were changed to coach from a sleeper, I would treat it as an adventure.

The reason I’m so concerned this time is that I have a shin splint, and, although it’s getting better, the absolute worst position for my leg is sitting with it out diagonally. Ten minutes in a friend’s car going to a restaurant is fine, but not 8 hours in a coach seat.

Plus I can barely walk through a moving train without stumbling when everything is fine, so with a cane and wonky leg I don’t know how I’d manage the bathroom. That’s why I splurged for the bedroom —I would never, ever do that normally for this short a trip—bit I wanted the long seat so I could put my leg up whenever I wanted, plus the bathroom in the room so I wouldn’t have to go down the hall.

Just wanted to clarify that I’m not as spoiled as I must have come across.

I just don’t want the leg to get worse and then have to go to the orthopedic guys and be told “No more train trips for you for a while”!

And after all of that, Mother Nature is having the final say. Just cancelled the trip. It’s going to be high 90s to 100° the days we would be in Chicago and meeting a friend in a nearby town.

Rebooking for the early fall.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Until this clown car arrived.

A clown car with bookable chefs to ensure the top clowns never have to eat their own clown chow.

 

[Bob Dylan]

And after all of that, Mother Nature is having the final say. Just cancelled the trip. It’s going to be high 90s to 100° the days we would be in Chicago and meeting a friend in a nearby town.

Rebooking for the early fall.

Excellent idea Patty!Chicago is Nice in the Fall, and hopefully Amtrak will have its act somewhat together by then including Traditional Dining on the Eastern Trains, enough Sleepers to meet the demand, and enough Employees to Crew the Trains anx the Stations!

 

[Mystic River Dragon]

Excellent idea Patty!Chicago is Nice in the Fall, and hopefully Amtrak will have its act somewhat together by then including Traditional Dining on the Eastern Trains, enough Sleepers to meet the demand, and enough Employees to Crew the Trains anx the Stations!

Thanks, Jim! All things to look forward to. But if I had to pick one, it would be comfortable weather.

 

[zephyr17]

All true - and overbooking sleepers isn't something that should become a normal part of the business. But in this case it's very much a continuation of the disruptions that began with reducing service to 5 days a week - while this is a lousy situation on the two trains it's affecting getting back to daily is at least somewhat progress. But I totally agree the way they are handling the communications is something advocates should be hitting management on.

Disruptions that by late 2021, early 2022 were very much in evidence and well known. Yet the inventory stayed on the books until late spring. Hmm, I still do not see evidence of a valid excuse for Amtrak's management here.

 

[joelkfla]

And after all of that, Mother Nature is having the final say. Just cancelled the trip. It’s going to be high 90s to 100° the days we would be in Chicago and meeting a friend in a nearby town.

Rebooking for the early fall.

I've decided not to book any trips before September, with the awful weather around the country, and the lousy connections without the Silver Meteor.

 

[PaTrainFan]

Any idea why I would get a new receipt and eticket, three weeks after making the inital reservation for a trip planned in September, but one that has no changes? I'm ticketed in a bedroom on the EB from PDX to MSP using AGR points. My immediate thought when I saw the email was, uh oh, they are involuntarily downgrading me. But no such thing, not even a change in cars or rooms. Curious.

Edit: Now I see why. Schedule change.

 

[zephyr17]

Any idea why I would get a new receipt and eticket, three weeks after making the inital reservation for a trip planned in September, but one that has no changes? I'm ticketed in a bedroom on the EB from PDX to MSP using AGR points. My immediate thought when I saw the email was, uh oh, they are involuntarily downgrading me. But no such thing, not even a change in cars or rooms. Curious.

They changed the schedule today effective July 11th. The PDX departure time didn't change, but your arrival time in MSP will have been moved back from 7:43 am to 8:33 am.

 

[user 14106]

Disruptions that by late 2021, early 2022 were very much in evidence and well known. Yet the inventory stayed on the books until late spring. Hmm, I still do not see evidence of a valid excuse for Amtrak's management here.

I don’t really think we have a disagreement here - I agree with you. An earlier communication/canceling out of the inventory would have increased the chances of those affected getting moved to an open slot. The moment they suspected they wouldn’t be able to make summer consists they should have canceled it out for everyone to give people opportunities to secure an open spot before things sell out - which is what happens when you do it a week out.

 

[zephyr17]

I don’t really think we have a disagreement here - I agree with you. An earlier communication/canceling out of the inventory would have increased the chances of those affected getting moved to an open slot. The moment they suspected they wouldn’t be able to make summer consists they should have canceled it out for everyone to give people opportunities to secure an open spot before things sell out - which is what happens when you do it a week out.

I think it may be only a matter of degree that there is any disagreement. Personally, I think they should have seen it coming as early as late last year, and started planning and selecting trains for minimal consists in daily service then. COVID was already a factor, they knew their HR department was short staffed and unable to handle the needed ramp up in personnel, they knew the lead times required to train mechanical, OBS, and T&E personnel, and they knew the Great Resignation was well underway. Also, legal weed, often cited for Amtrak's hiring woes, was a known factor. Heck, it has been legal in Washington since like 2012. They should have made a worst possible case projection, because it was already a perfect storm that was plainly visible, and set their equipment and staffing plans, which drive inventory, based on that. If they exceeded them, capacity could be added if firmer projections based on actual hiring, training, and equipment recommissioning allowed it. Granted, they might not have been able to get high bucket for a car added only 4 months out, but that is preferable to yanking the rug out from someone paying thousands of dollars, and with major associated plans, some likely non-refundable, at the last minute.

As it stands, my understanding is, for the Builder, they initially set daily service with a full consist to start in May, they pushed it back to July in like late March or early April, then ditched it entirely in May sometime. My contention is they should have allowed for it and reduced inventory by January or February at the latest because it had become predictable by then. Yes, that would have booted early bookers out of some rooms, but with a lot of lead time, and prevented some other bookings entirely. It would have lead to a lot of wailing and moaning here about high bucket prices and lack of inventory. If Amtrak had a competent IT department, those having been kicked out their rooms by an early inventory reduction, could have been put on some sort of waitlist and offered rooms back at the original fares if inventory was subsequently re-added. Even without that, the right thing to do was to have been conservative in their projections, and therefore inventory, based on the knowledge and facts clearly available early this year.

Where we most heartily agree is the delay in notification, regardless of when the decision to remove inventory was made, is frankly unforgiveable. We talk here often about "Never agains" due to a bad initial Amtrak experience due to extreme lateness, surly OBS, poor food, or all of the above. The current management team has managed to create some "Never agains" without them ever even having stepped onboard a train.

 

[Eric in East County]

IMPORTANT UPDATE

We called Amtrak again this morning (Sunday, June 5th) and this time asked to speak to an agent. (To do so, we had to request a “call back,” which we received in about 15 minutes.) We spoke with “James” who initially told us that, yes, there had been some changes made to the Southwest Chief sleeping cars, but our bedroom reservations were still good as we’d been transferred to a different car. We thanked him and ended the call. Then a few minutes later “James” called back to say that that the sleeper on SWC No. 4 that we’d been reassigned to had been removed from the train on the date we’d planned to travel, and that Amtrak couldn’t downgrade us because the train was sold out! Needless to say, we had no choice but to cancel our trip. (At least we didn’t have to wait until two weeks before our departure date to learn that Amtrak couldn’t honor the reservations that we’d made and paid for last December!)

So far, we have not been contacted by Amtrak to acknowledge that our reservations were cancelled, to apologize for the inconvenience we were caused, or to let us know if and when we can expect to receive a full refund for the cancelled reservations. (But since this is a Sunday, they might not have a full staff on hand, so we probably won’t hear anything until tomorrow.)

Our connecting trains had been paid for using travel points, so we are now trying to get through to the Guest Rewards agent to cancel those reservations, too. We’ll also have to cancel our hotel and rental car reservations.

We’re now looking to reschedule our trip in the Fall, depending upon the availability of SWC bedrooms. In the meantime, we plan to write some letters to make our dissatisfaction known and possibly obtain special consideration for future Amtrak travel.

We’ll provide updates on how we make out.

Eric & Pat

On September 7th, we made new reservations for late September – same trains and accommodations – and ended up paying $600 more than for the reservations made in December.

This morning we called Amtrak Customer Relations to see about a $600 courtesy refund, seeing as how Amtrak was to blame for our having to make the new reservations. Since we'd already received a refund for the reservations we had to cancel, the best they could do for us was issue a $300 credit voucher which was applied to our new reservations and which will result in a $300 refund to our credit card. We can live with this.

 

[jacket94]

Booked last September for the Empire Builder CHI-SEA this coming Thursday (June 23). In April of this year, Amtrak moved my reservation from the regular sleeper to an added transition sleeper (I did not ask or want this; it just showed up in my email one day). Reservation was just downgraded one week in advance. Amtrak says the car has been removed from the train, and customer relations just shrugs their shoulders (and suggested that I take the trip in 4-5 months at a higher fare!). I asked why I (who booked when the train was 10% full and sleepers were offered for at least 6 months after I booked) was downgraded while others who booked after me were left alone - including the people they moved into my previously assigned room. Dead silence, followed by "You can still go in coach."

I have always been a proponent of rail, but I'm of the opinion that Amtrak is no longer the way to make it ever happen in the US.

 

[Rasputin]

When customers are screwed over by a company for the company's own purposes or due to the company's incompetence, you would think that any company that wished to be reasonably successful would pull out all stops to try to correct or rectify the situation by overcompensating if necessary those customers who have been screwed over. Merely giving people their money back for the non-service and perhaps some paltry lunch money besides that just doesn't cut it.

This is especially true when the customers being screwed are Amtrak's highest paying customers.

Personally, I am just glad that I have no travel plans this year (except maybe another Acela trip). It seems to be a time of high anxiety.

 

[jacket94]

Booked last September for the Empire Builder CHI-SEA this coming Thursday (June 23). In April of this year, Amtrak moved my reservation from the regular sleeper to an added transition sleeper (I did not ask or want this; it just showed up in my email one day). Reservation was just downgraded one week in advance. Amtrak says the car has been removed from the train, and customer relations just shrugs their shoulders (and suggested that I take the trip in 4-5 months at a higher fare!). I asked why I (who booked when the train was 10% full and sleepers were offered for at least 6 months after I booked) was downgraded while others who booked after me were left alone - including the people they moved into my previously assigned room. Dead silence, followed by "You can still go in coach."

I have always been a proponent of rail, but I'm of the opinion that Amtrak is no longer the way to make it ever happen in the US.

Update: Sometimes it pays to hang up/call back as well as be a bit vulnerable. I called back and waited about an hour and a half for customer relations. I started the call by explaining how angry and upset I was. Agent replied that he would also be livid in the same situation, how unfair it is to everyone being impacted (so there are lots of people!), and how someone "in Washington" is making random decisions while leaving the frontline people to clean up the mess. All very true. After emphasizing again how unfair this situation is, we started to work together for any solution other than a refund. The end result is a train two days earlier, but an upgrade from a roomette to a standard bedroom. Refund of my connecting train from Indy, but I need to fly to Chicago.

I have lots of other issues to work out and I am still a little out of pocket, but it was good to find someone in customer relations that was willing to work with me. I'll call this a win.

 

[Amtrakfflyer]

I’m worried about my Dec 18th trip in the family room I talked about earlier. I called and asked to get out of 32 car but couldn’t as 30 and 31 car the family room is sold out. The CZ as of now doesn’t have a 32 car and guest relations said to check back for updates. She insinuated something bigger is at play here and expects service to go back to 5 or possibly 3 days a week after summer due to lack of personnel and equipment coming from “the top”. If anyone has tickets more then 6 weeks out I’d highly suggest checking your reservation online weekly to check for changes.

As Jacket94 pointed out, these are not isolated issues. They are getting angry calls all day long about changes.

 

[trimetbusfan]

I’m worried about my Dec 18th trip in the family room I talked about earlier. I called and asked to get out of 32 car but couldn’t as 30 and 31 car the family room is sold out. The CZ as of now doesn’t have a 32 car and guest relations said to check back for updates. She insinuated something bigger is at play here and expects service to go back to 5 or possibly 3 days a week after summer due to lack of personnel and equipment coming from “the top”. If anyone has tickets more then 6 weeks out I’d highly suggest checking your reservation online weekly to check for changes.

As Jacket94 pointed out, these are not isolated issues. They are getting angry calls all day long about changes.

I believe the CZ has a 32 car for the summer. Is your reservation for later on in the year when that car might not be running?

 

[Amtrakfflyer]

Dec 18th. As of recently it’s been 3 sleepers but one of them is a transition. Who knows. It’s always been fun planning out a train trip, until now, now its just a headache