Originally Posted by
moondog
Kiosks have two meanings in our train vernacular:
1. automated machines at train stations that print tickets
2. off site ticket offices and travel agencies that are licensed to sell/print tickets
As has been discussed up thread, there have been sightings of #1 that don't require PRC ID cards, but they are still not commonplace.
#2 is my SOP because it is far preferable to going to the train station early.
Greetings from XMN. I took a train here from WUS. I rather enjoyed the train experience as the countryside was interesting (to me) so I liked watching it zip by.
I purchased my tickets on ctrip so I had the reservation # and all that. But when I tried to pickup at an off site ticket office, I was not able to because my (Canadian) passport was not in their system. I was told that once I had picked up a ticket at the train station, I'll be able to pickup other tickets later on. So I just picked up all my tickets at the WUS train station.
Ticket pickup at WUS was more than easy largely because WUS is a "small" station. i.e. It's not busy and when I was there, there was no lineup at the ticket booth. All I did was give the lady the passports and the res numbers. I paid the 5 CNY fee per ticket and that was that. Total time to pickup 12 tickets was less than 5 min.
Obviously if I tried this at the Beijing or Shanghai train station things would be different. But if you can make it to a small station somewhere, I suspect your processing time will be negligible just like mine was.