As a "train geek" that cares about price but still wants to ride, it gives me an idea of what to expect and whether a given price can even go lower. I'll pretty much pay the price even if it strikes me as high if I know it is a lower bucket and that is best I can expect. The Southwest Chief and the Lake Shore are examples of "high" low buckets. The chart gives me the information needed to make a decision on whether or not to accept a price. So, yes, knowing a price is in a lower bucket can and has changed my mind.
Sorry, I was wrong about that. Under discounts, it is Passenger Association. Not rail road workers. The discounts are very hard to miss for new comers. You have to really look hard to find them.
Railroad employees employed on 5/1/71 were entitled to passes that gave free travel on Amtrak lines over their home road. I think retirees that meet the conditions can still get them. I imagine they are kind of thin on the ground by now, though.
This is how I do it too. It has worked well in the past few years especially. Where I work we submit our vacation requests to our assistant manager. I've been at my place of work 23 years, 20 of it for my current company after it bought out the original place I worked for. Unfortunately the first three assistant managers we had after our new company bought our old one out didn't have a brain between all of them and they were forever screwing up my vacation dates or forgetting them altogether. It got so with assistant manager #3 that I'd write my vacation requests down on huge pieces of cardboard so he wouldn't lose them. Assistant manager #4 was very good. Never screwed up anything. She recently left, however, and the jury is still out on assistant manager #5. She's still learning our personnel and her new position but seems to have instituted a system so far that even outshines #4. We shall see. I have a long vacation beginning in 2 and 1/2 weeks and see she's got it pencilled in, so I should be good to go.
How did we figure this out? Is it posted somewhere?
Well, asking for Customer Relations instead of Customer Service was posted somewhere. I think it was here, but it was years and years ago when I first ran across that tidbit.
Well my question was is it posted on the Amtrak site? Since I hadn't heard about it before joining AU and it seems kinda hard to get to. How do people who don't have AU (or railfans) at their disposal find out about it?
Just looked around on the Amtrak site and cannot find a word about it. Pretty much all references there wind up at either 800-USA-RAIL or Julie. A general Google search on Customer Relations Amtrak doesn't turn up anything meaningful, either. Even the customer advocacy site Elliott.org doesn't have it, just the common numbers, but Elliott.org does have the email and contact information for the execs. So if you want to REALLY escalate you can use those.
Before I found out about the Customer Relations nomenclature, I recall asking the agent to speak with Customer Service, and the agent responded that I was speaking with customer service.
I know now when I need to speak to Customer Relations, but years ago, I did not. I know, in the past, when I have had an issue that Customer Service could not resolve, they would transfer me to Customer Relations (without my having to request the transfer). @Acela150 may know the answer as to what the protocol is these days.
But only if each of them is able to spend $2,500 on their respective card within 3 months of opening. And then they have to wait for those bonus points to show up in their AGR accounts before booking. I just met the spend requirement last week; I'm waiting to see whether those points show up after the next statement drops, or not until after the 90 days have passed.
My points showed up 4 days after I paid the balance
Thx, I just checked my account, and I've already gotten the $100 statement credit. If the points haven't shown up by the time the statement drops next week, I think I'll pay it off immediately instead of waiting until the due date as I usually do, and forego the 60¢ interest I'd have earned in my savings account.
Amtrak's contacts are under "Mass Transit" at elliott.org.
