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Amtrak eVouchers now redeemable over the phone and online

Amtrak eVouchers now redeemable over the phone and online

Old Oct 4, 2013, 1:57 pm
  #1  
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Amtrak eVouchers now redeemable over the phone and online

Just spotted this in the most recent NARP hotline:

Amtrak eVouchers (issued to passengers when a reservation is canceled and all or part of the fare paid is non-refundable) can now be redeemed over the phone by speaking to a reservations sales agent at 1-800-USA-RAIL. Simply provide the agent with the eVoucher number and your phone number and email address (which should match the ones printed on the eVoucher). Previously, eVouchers could only be redeemed by ticket agents at staffed Amtrak stations. Passengers should soon also be able to use eVouchers as a form of payment online at Amtrak.com and by using Julie, the automated agent, at 1-800-USA-RAIL. Amtrak is still performing testing on the latter capabilities.
Has anyone tried this yet?
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Old Oct 6, 2013, 11:34 am
  #2  
 
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Just did it this morning. No issues at all. Much faster and easier than at the station.

She was also able to pull up all evouchers attached to my AGR # which the in-station agents are never willing to do.

Huge improvement if you make a lot of travel changes.
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Old Oct 6, 2013, 5:56 pm
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Online Booking

According to a phone agent, e-vouchers will be redeemable on amtrak.com around the middle of October. How come it's taken Amtrak a decade or more to get to this point, vs. the airlines?
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 7:07 am
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Without any real dedicated long-term funding and consistently being a political football, it's probably pretty hard to plan multi-year projects the same way that a corporation can. I'd imagine this was low on the priority list as far as capital investments.

Would've liked to have seen this sooner too but budgeting for them is a different beast. Someone like Southwest can run this through a finance committee made up of (smart) people with the same company goal. This probably involved going to the hill and dealing with politicians each with their own agenda and varying degrees of business acumen.
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 11:23 am
  #5  
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People are wondering why so many cool things just got released. Our capital fiscal year is 10/1 through 9/30.
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 11:29 am
  #6  
 
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Cool Cool!

Thanks Anthony! Way to Go Amtrak! Keep on Keepin' On!
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 1:02 pm
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Originally Posted by AGR Insider
People are wondering why so many cool things just got released. Our capital fiscal year is 10/1 through 9/30.
Wow, such great work in just seven days! Imagine what the next 358 days will bring.
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 1:53 pm
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Originally Posted by PHLviaUS
Wow, such great work in just seven days! Imagine what the next 358 days will bring.
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 3:43 pm
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So any set date when evouchers will be exchangeable online? I just hate talking on the phone.
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Old Oct 7, 2013, 6:30 pm
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Originally Posted by saxman66
So any set date when evouchers will be exchangeable online? I just hate talking on the phone.
I hope AGR Insider can answer that question.
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Old Oct 8, 2013, 8:06 am
  #11  
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I'm told the plan is to do it this month -- I don't know about "exchangeable", because that's a pretty vague term. I think the plan is to allow people to apply eVouchers as payment toward a reservation.
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Old Oct 9, 2013, 2:36 am
  #12  
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^^^^ (It's about time!)
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Old Oct 12, 2013, 11:31 am
  #13  
 
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Two questions regarding telephone redemption of eVouchers.

1. Can they still be used for someone else's travel? An old email stated "An eVoucher may only be redeemed by the person to whom it was issued (with proper identification); however, the owner may choose to apply it toward another person's travel."

2. Can they be applied to an existing paid reservation? The email also stated " This eVoucher may be used as payment toward future Amtrak travel. " It says future "travel", not future "purchase". but two calls to Amtrak yielded two different answers. I wasn't trying to redeem it over the phone, only getting information for when I would be able to get to a station.

Recently, while changing trains in Chicago, the ticket agent didn't know the answer; but the one at the adjacent window after a lot of discussion said that it could be done if I were to call customer relations and ask them to place a note in the paid reservation record to which I wanted to apply the voucher. I had to board the next train, but did later speak with customer relations and was able to apply the voucher to future paid travel the next time I passed through Chicago.

Amtrak might be the only civilized way to travel, but there's too much of this - policies that differ from what one would normally expect (no funds to update computer systems), are too complicated for employees to be properly trained in their application, and not clearly communicated to the public. In this case one would expect future travel to include future paid reservations; that ticket agents would know the answer to this question; and the Amtrak.com page that deals with eVouchers would answer the question and certainly mention putting a notification in the reservation record if that is required.
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Old Oct 20, 2013, 7:58 pm
  #14  
 
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E-Vouchers Now Redeemable Online

It's live! You can use up to 8 eVcouchers at once. I just booked some trips

EDIT: You won't see it until the payment page. Try doing some dummy bookings, it may be difficult to see.

On the PAYMENT page, there will be "Pay with an eVoucher" section, right above the usual "Pay with a Credit Card" section.

Forgot to mention: Once you entered your eVoucher number and clicked on "ADD EVOUCHER" button to the right (or hit return), make sure to click "okay" on a pop up and then click on the check box so that the check mark appears, to ensure that your eVoucher is credited correctly. It will be easier to see once you are on the payment page.

Last edited by radiowell; Oct 21, 2013 at 7:20 am Reason: added even more details
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Old Oct 21, 2013, 8:36 am
  #15  
 
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Just completed one and pretty easy. Only confusion/question...

When I spoke with reservations a week ago she was able to pull up all of the evouchers attached to my profile (at least 5). On the site, there's a button that calls up all evouchers under your name. Only 2 show up here.

I have all the evoucher numbers written down so it's not like the funds are gone. Just wondering why the site is unable to pull them up if the agent can do it, presumably both accessing the same database.
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