Question about changing reservations with Amtrak

[ljohn2030]

Hello! Love the forums, and love the input from all the members. I have heard/read mostly great stories about contacting Amtrak Customer Service, but I want to be ready tomorrow when I call. I made a reservation on January 2, 2015 for a trip from Reno to Harrisburg in late July. When I checked the same itinerary today, it is almost $1000 less! Is it as easy as calling Amtrak and requesting the change? I was actually checking to see how much more it would be to have a bedroom for the Zephyr portion, bedroom for the Capital limited, and Business class for the Pennsylvanian - and found it would be so much less. Currently we are booked for a Roomette for the Capital Limited, but considering it is 1840 - 5 AM, probably doesn't matter (roomette versus bedrom). Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

In other news, I devoured Jim Loomis's book: "All aboard..." this weekend - AWESOME! I am seriously considering traveling south of the border for the Copper Canyon train in Mexico!

And I did book myself, and stepsons for a quick ride from Reno to Sacramento for Train Days in June! They live in West Texas, love trains, and of course there is no service and all they get to see are oil tanker trains....

Thank you in advance! Have a great day!

 

[Dovecote]

No need to wait until tomorrow. That rate might be gone by then. Call 1-800-872-7245. Provide the reservation number and tell the agent of the cheaper fare. They will check to see if the lower fare is still available and if so book it for you. There are some refunds options available that they will explain in detail to you.

 

[tomfuller]

If your departure date is flexible, you may even find a better deal by using Amsnag http://biketrain.net/amsnag/amSnag.php

Be sure to join Amtrak Guest Rewards before your paid trip.

 

[niemi24s]

In addition to Tomfuller's advise, above, it's best to continue checking periodically until a day or so before you depart - even if you do get the lower fare tonight or tomorrow. That's because it may change again. And if it does change again, there's no way of predicting whether it will go up or down. In addition, when you call Amtrak don't use the word "cancel" - say you want to modify your booking. That's because (if I remember this correctly) if you tell them to cancel, five seconds later it's possible for someone to book your cancelled trip online and if it's the last one available - you can't book it - it's gone! Modify - not cancel.

 

[ljohn2030]

Success Success Success! I 'modified' the reservation and saved >$500, with an upgrade to all bedrooms. I will continue to check periodically to see if the fare decreases. Thank you everyone!

 

[niemi24s]

Success Success Success! I 'modified' the reservation and saved >$500, with an upgrade to all bedrooms. I will continue to check periodically to see if the fare decreases. Thank you everyone!

Great! Glad you got it.

Most forum members here would say you simply got the fare at a lower bucket price which is based on certain well-known price setting methods used throughout the travel industry. My simplistic idea of a "bucket" is the one the blind Amtrak monkey reaches into every day and pulls out the "fare du jour". This seemingly random selection of fares is exemplified by my just-completed study of a trip between CHI and SEA starting on 8 Apr 2015 which I've been tracking for the last 12 weeks. Rounded to the nearest $100, here's how that fare has fluctuated: 1300; 2000; 1700; 1300; 1700; 2000; 1700; 1300; 800; None Left; 1100; 800; 1300. That's 12 changes in as many weeks! And I may have missed some changes because I didn't check daily!!

I also discovered that while the likelihood of a fare changing was only about 19%, when it did change the likelihood of a decrease was a bit more than 47% - not too shabby. There are 6 decreases in the sequence in the previous paragraph. So keep on checking - no telling what fare the Amtrak monkey will pluck from his bucket tomorrow, next week or next month.

 

[Train2104]

1300; 2000; 1700; 1300; 1700; 2000; 1700; 1300; 800; None Left; 1100; 800; 1300.

The 1100 is confusing me, since I was under the impression that there were only 4 buckets for each accommodation type (A, B, D, Y) and the system picks one "seemingly at random".

 

[Ryan]

My simplistic idea of a "bucket" is the one the blind Amtrak monkey reaches into every day and pulls out the "fare du jour".

It's a little bit more complicated then that.

Found this on the web, 2 years old, but interesting.

AASHTO v4.ppt

 

[niemi24s]

Hmm-m-m. I recorded $1098 on 31 Mar 2015 with 2 bedrooms available. There's a chance I simply wrote it down wrong. Or perhaps an anomaly following the bedrooms becoming available once again? Or maybe the monkey reached into the wrong bucket? Or there's actually five buckets? Or there's actually five buckets? One of the four buckets had a short-lived change? Beats me. A definite answer could be found if anybody knows of a way to check what a fare was when checked on a certain date in the past.

And I fully realize it's more complicated than my analogy with the monkey. But because I'm not privy to any of the things covered in that Power Point presentation (and thanks for that) my monkey & bucket analogy meet the criteria of Occam's Razor - simplicity.

 

[niemi24s]

After reading the AASHTO... link provided by RyanS again, I noticed the reference to four buckets was for coach - no mention af sleepers that I could find. The only fare I recorded in my study was the total fare (and not the two individual fares, coach fare and additional sleeper fare) so I can't say anything about those two components of the total fare. But after reviewing all of my data I found the (rounded) $1100 fare was recorded 51 times for 20 different dates of travel. That leads me to believe that, while I do occasionally write down some quantity incorrectly, doing so 51 times out of 560 or so was a bit too many for me.

Because of all that, I've edited Post #9 to line out writing it down wrong and reinstating the 5 bucket possibility previously lined out. The study referred to covered the 124 consecutive travel dates from 19 Jan 2015 through 31 May 2015, inclusive. The (rounded) fare of $1100 was recorded in: January, once; February, 48 times for 17 different dates; March, once; April, once; May, not recorded.

And please note that 8 April 2015 was simply the travel date for which the fare experienced the greatest number of changes. 59 of the 124 dates had no recorded changes at all.

 

[the_traveler]

I believe there are 5 buckets for coach and 4 buckets for sleepers. (Or is it the other way?) Also note that roomettes and bedrooms have their own set of buckets.

 

[Train2104]

My fault, I mixed up coach and sleeper. There are 5 sleeper buckets.

 

[niemi24s]

Another informative link... There are 5 sleeper buckets ...so thanks for that one. Learned from it that total sleeper fares always (apparently) include the lowest coach bucket fare, so any changes I saw were due solely to changes in the extra charge for the sleeper. Wonderful! Now I wonder:

• What was so special about 8 April 2015 that caused its sleeper fare to change that many (12) times?

Fares for travel on the 10 days prior to 8 April and the 6 days after 8 April never changed more than once. But that was a rhetorical question - no answer needed - I probably wouldn't understand it anyway!