kopflyer brings up a good question:

What is the process for getting AGR credit when the conductor does not submit your ticket (either because he does not collect it, or throws it away, etc.)?

The online system does not work in this case, and based on my experience, neither does mailing in the ticket stub to AGR customer service.

Do you mean the missing point request form doesn't work in this case? Under what circumstances does it work then? Presumably if they have the physical ticket & they have the reservation info there shouldn't ever be missing points...? Can you shed some light on this, AGR Insider?

In any case, I decided to do some ARD-PHL runs today since they're longer than PAO-EXT, but cost the same. The extra time on board gave the conductors plenty of time to come around and pocket my tickets. Not all stubs were punched, but at least they didn't throw my ticket away!

Yes: online system = missing point request form.

The missing point request form has only worked for me when 1) I booked a ticket and forgot to add my AGR number, and 2) the ticket was collected by the conductor.

The missing point request form does not work if the conductor fails to submit your ticket stub.

The missing point request form also does not work for tickets that are purchased aboard the train (e.g. when boarding at unstaffed station), even if you've provided your AGR number during the booking process.

For regular printed tickets that don't post, I find the missing points form usually works. HOWEVER - when it doesn't work it becomes a very painful process to get points posted.

Before North Carolina rolled out Quik-traks at the unstaffed stations, I quit bothering to send in the onboard fare tickets because they rarely posted and phone calls just led to "well, send it in again."

Indeed. It's a pain in theAss for 100 points. Even if with a triple points promotion, it's barely worth it.

If you've sent in the ticket stub (they request the original), how do you "send it in again"?

Remember, you can get 20 points for one ($1) dollar spent by shopping at the Amtrak Mall, which includes hundreds of stores. If you have a business, buy supplies, etc, all it takes is $1000 to get 20,000 easy points to your Amtrak Rewards account. Spend $4000 for business purchases, and you get a free 3-day Cruise Ship voyage for 2 people!

Interesting. Are these rail points?

Wirelessly posted (SAMSUNG-SGH-I617/1.0 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 7.6))

Unfortunately, no. Rail points can only had by taking paid Amtrak rides (a common practice).

I believe they are honest-to-goodness Amtrak AGR points we're talking about, but don't count towards elite status?

Haha. Search is my friend.:)
My turn to bump this up, because I mistakenly thought that rail points were based on how many miles you travelled.
Too bad for me that I didn't realize rail points were based on how much money you spend with Amtrak to travel those miles.;)
Oh well, there's always next year.:):rolleyes: