Asking for a onboard upgrade-that is rude?

[Gingee]

I read that asking for a onboard upgrade is anoying to the crew. Is that true? I have asked for one a few times (never got one). I am willing to pay a little more. I thought it was all right - no?

 

[jmbgeg]

I read that asking for a onboard upgrade is anoying to the crew. Is that true? I have asked for one a few times (never got one). I am willing to pay a little more. I thought it was all right - no?

It is an Amtrak approved standard operating practice and they do it all the time. Some conductors are more receptive to stopping and hand writing a new ticket and receipt than others.

 

[PetalumaLoco]

We asked conductors a couple of times 2 years ago on the CZ, and were basically ignored. They never got back to us with an answer.

Last year on the SWC we asked our SLA to check with the conductor, and the SLA came back with a positive response from the conductor.

The conductor stopped by a while later with our upgrade tickets and we moved. I gave the SLA $20, it was well worth it. We were moving to a different car, I would have tipped him at the end of the trip if we stayed in his car, I wanted him to know I appreciated his help with the upgrade, and that he didn't cut himself out of a tip for good service by helping us move.

 

[Gingee]

I think the times we go they usually are booked up (so they say). We have a roommete booked from Galesburg to LA but it would be nice to have more space (two of us in a room). Of course we did this all the way from Chicago to Seattle in a roommete.

 

[sunchaser]

Last October on the westbound CZ, we asked and upgraded from roomette to bedroom without any hesitation at all from the Conductor or our SCA. They both seemed happy to do it. We stayed in the same car, moving from roomette #4 to bedroom E. Both the Conductor & SCA stopped by to see how we liked the bedroom.

 

[transit54]

I only did an on board upgrade once. I was on the LSL out of Chicago, heading to NYP (I had a sale fare, so an on board upgrade was my only option). Coach was absolutely packed, but I knew there were some roomettes available, having checked Amtrak.com. I asked the conductor for an upgrade when he pulled my ticket, and he told me he'd get back to me. He never did. About an hour into the trip, I walked over to the lounge and ran into the assistant conductor, and I asked if he might be able to see if I could upgrade. He was very happy to do so, processed my upgrade right aware, and walked me back to my sleeper and introduced me to the attendant.

I don't think it's an annoyance if you ask nicely, are patient, and go into it with the understanding that the answer may very well be 'no.'

 

[Gingee]

How much of a discount would you say you got by being upgraded?

 

[transit54]

How much of a discount would you say you got by being upgraded?

IIRC, it was on the order of about $100. I paid about $160 for the room, and I think they were going for about $250 or so at the time. But it depends how far in advance you are booking...I was booking three weeks out, so the sleepers were a tad more expensive than normal.

 

[AlanB]

I've only ever tried once for an onboard upgrade just this past summer and the conductor was most receptive. We were already in a roomette, wanting a bedroom, and it took him a bit (he was busy collecting tickets), but he did come back to us with the info. We decided to pass however, as since we had gotten the roomette on AGR points, we got no credit towards the price of the bedroom. In fact the conductor even came back and said, "I've got good news and bad news. The good news is that there is a bedroom still available, the bad news is that the bedroom costs X and you get zero towards the upgrade because this room is booked by AGR."

As for the cost Gingee, you have to pay whatever the low bucket rate for that room is from the next station to where you get off the train. If by some chance, and it does happen, the low bucket is lower than what you've already paid, then you pay a minimum $50 towards the room.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

I am just wondering if it is difficult, or easy, for a conductor to figure out if a particular room is empty for the entire portion of the trip that the passengers wants to upgrade for? I mean, does he/she have nice graphical occupancy charts which he/she can quickly scan thru, or does he have to wade thru long tables trying to match up when passengers embark and when passengers disembark, for each and every room?

The reason I ask, we just had another thread here highlighting that even the reservation computer sometimes has difficultly doing this successfully.

 

[sunchaser]

I am just wondering if it is difficult, or easy, for a conductor to figure out if a particular room is empty for the entire portion of the trip that the passengers wants to upgrade for? I mean, does he/she have nice graphical occupancy charts which he/she can quickly scan thru, or does he have to wade thru long tables trying to match up when passengers embark and when passengers disembark, for each and every room?
The reason I ask, we just had another thread here highlighting that even the reservation computer sometimes has difficultly doing this successfully.

In our case, the Conductor called Amtrak to verify that it was open. It wasn't a long distance, it was from Grand Junction, Co, to Salt Lake City, Ut, about 300 miles. It cost $50 to go from the roomette to the bedroom, we were fine with that price.

if it was more than that, we probably would have declined the offer.

 

[daveyb99]

How much of a discount would you say you got by being upgraded?

I think it the greater of $50 or the room value at the lowest tier (which samples of can be found in the paper schedules pg 104-105).

I know folks want to try to save a buck or two, and sometimes sleeper prices get very high.

But I NEVER hear anyone complaining about their experience booking a sleeper in advance, and boarding in the sleepers right away.

I hear lots of negatives (including some in this thread) about trying to upgrade onboard.

Trying for an onboard upgrade is a crap shoot. Buying in advance is a sure thing. You pick.

 

[AlanB]

I am just wondering if it is difficult, or easy, for a conductor to figure out if a particular room is empty for the entire portion of the trip that the passengers wants to upgrade for? I mean, does he/she have nice graphical occupancy charts which he/she can quickly scan thru, or does he have to wade thru long tables trying to match up when passengers embark and when passengers disembark, for each and every room?
The reason I ask, we just had another thread here highlighting that even the reservation computer sometimes has difficultly doing this successfully.

In our case, the Conductor called Amtrak to verify that it was open. It wasn't a long distance, it was from Grand Junction, Co, to Salt Lake City, Ut, about 300 miles. It cost $50 to go from the roomette to the bedroom, we were fine with that price.

if it was more than that, we probably would have declined the offer.

Correct, the conductor phones into Amtrak to check the availability and to get the price for the upgrade. If the you accept the price and pay for the upgrade, the conductor calls back and has them block that room from sale for the remainder of the trip.

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

Correct, the conductor phones into Amtrak to check the availability and to get the price for the upgrade. If the you accept the price and pay for the upgrade, the conductor calls back and has them block that room from sale for the remainder of the trip.

Ah, I get it.

Could (or does) the conductor on this second call have the option of saying something like "process the upgrade using the same method as the original ticket purchase"? Yea, I realize that some people pay cash, though I would have to think that the vast majority of those upgrading would have paid with plastic.

 

[AlanB]

Correct, the conductor phones into Amtrak to check the availability and to get the price for the upgrade. If the you accept the price and pay for the upgrade, the conductor calls back and has them block that room from sale for the remainder of the trip.

Ah, I get it.

Could (or does) the conductor on this second call have the option of saying something like "process the upgrade using the same method as the original ticket purchase"? Yea, I realize that some people pay cash, though I would have to think that the vast majority of those upgrading would have paid with plastic.

No, the conductor takes care of the payment himself right on the train. He can take either cash or credit card.

 

[Gingee]

I was talking about the upgrade once you are on the train.

 

[amtrakwolverine]

I was talking about the upgrade once you are on the train.

and that's what we are talking about. its not rude. the conductors are required to do it but allot of them refuse cause of the extra paperwork.

 

[Gingee]

Gotcha. I thought some of you were talking about onboard upgrades and then some talked about booking or changing a couple weeks ahead.

 

[EB_OBS]

It's not necessarily a lot of extra paperwork to process an upgrade on board. Heck, in general the AC is going to do it so it doesn't really matter to the conductor at all. I think the most annoying behavior I've witnessed on board is when a passenger asks the conductor or the AC and is told the sleepers are sold out, but then the passenger proceeds to ask the next attendant they see and the next.

I also see and hear a lot of misinformation about on board upgrades out there. Many passengers automatically assume there will always be a cheap upgrade on board and are quite surprised and disappointed when there isn't a room available. I mean this happens in peak season too, not just off-peak seasons.

Now here's an example of how Amtrak's on-board upgrade policy does annoy conductors. I see this a lot at stops like Whitefish, MT. Whitefish is a manned station. There are usually two ticket agents on duty during both the morning and nighttime arrivals/departures. Amtrak's goofy policy of selling the room at the low bucket fare actually promotes passengers that boarded at a manned station to want to upgrade on-board instead of at the station. Even on heavily sold trains, selling rooms in the top tier buckets, where a room would and should cost several hundreds of dollars, Amtrak policy sells it at rock bottom price on-board. When you leave a station that was manned for several hours before the train even arrived, and you have passengers asking about an upgrade as soon as they board the train, that is when I seen conductors get the most annoyed about on-board upgrades. It's not the request that's annoying, it's the retarded fact that purchasing the upgrade from ticket agents staffed there to sell tickets will cost so much more than waiting to get on-board and trying to upgrade.

I may be in the minority but I disagree with selling upgrades on-board at the low bucket fare all the time. Especially if you just departed a manned station where the upgrade should have been done prior to boarding the train. I seen plenty of demand for rooms, at least on the Empire Builder, so I see no reason to sell the rooms at low bucket fare in every single instance.

 

[amtrakwolverine]

It's not necessarily a lot of extra paperwork to process an upgrade on board. Heck, in general the AC is going to do it so it doesn't really matter to the conductor at all. I think the most annoying behavior I've witnessed on board is when a passenger asks the conductor or the AC and is told the sleepers are sold out, but then the passenger proceeds to ask the next attendant they see and the next.

that's cause conductors and A/Cs have been known to lie to get out of doing onboard upgrades. there have been trip reports posted where someone asked for a onboard upgrade was told :sold out" when they knew for a fact there were rooms still available. they will also pass the buck like say on the SWC for example you ask for a upgrade and they say ask me after ABQ yet ABQ is a crew change point so that conductor won't even be on the train when you go looking for him/her. all of the above has been reported on this forum.

 

[Tony]

I may be in the minority but I disagree with selling upgrades on-board at the low bucket fare all the time. Especially if you just departed a manned station where the upgrade should have been done prior to boarding the train. I seen plenty of demand for rooms, at least on the Empire Builder, so I see no reason to sell the rooms at low bucket fare in every single instance.

I agree with you.

However, I would offer an alternative.

Possibly Amtrak needs to do what the cruise line industry does. offer their lowest cost fares starting two days before departure, rather than wait 'til after departure. In Amtrak-ese, this is to offer accommodations at the lowest bucket. Passengers can take a risk, not book an accommodation, but still get a "cheap upgrade" during those last two days either on-line, on the phone, or in the station. Just like one is expected, even at the last minute, to purchase a ticket in a manned station, one would be expected to do the same thing and that would relieve the Conductor of having to do one on-board.

If two days is too much, then make it a 24 hour window.

 

[Tony]

that's cause conductors and A/Cs have been known to lie to get out of doing onboard upgrades. there have been trip reports posted where someone asked for a onboard upgrade was told :sold out" when they knew for a fact there were rooms still available.

OK, you got me wondering and curious. How exactly does an avg passenger go about knowing for certain, that there are indeed rooms still available?

I could easily envision that rooms which appear empty (can a coach passenger really wander thru the sleepers checking?) because (a) the occupant is elsewhere on the train, or (b) will become occupied at an upcoming station, or © the room was already sold as an on-board upgrade to someone else, or (d) will be used by crew later that evening.

 

[transit54]

I may be in the minority but I disagree with selling upgrades on-board at the low bucket fare all the time. Especially if you just departed a manned station where the upgrade should have been done prior to boarding the train. I seen plenty of demand for rooms, at least on the Empire Builder, so I see no reason to sell the rooms at low bucket fare in every single instance.

Well, what about a policy where upgrades can be purchased from manned stations at a low bucket 30 minutes prior to departure? That way the conductors don't have the hassle of getting inundated with a flood of requests on board.

I'm guessing that the people buying on-board upgrades are just not interested in a room at the higher price points. They'd rather go coach. If the demand is there, then why haven't those rooms been sold in advance? Sure, some will hold out in hopes of upgrading on board, but that's such a hassle and a toss up that it's really not worth it if you're set on going in a sleeper.

 

[sunchaser]

I may be in the minority but I disagree with selling upgrades on-board at the low bucket fare all the time. Especially if you just departed a manned station where the upgrade should have been done prior to boarding the train. I seen plenty of demand for rooms, at least on the Empire Builder, so I see no reason to sell the rooms at low bucket fare in every single instance.

Well, what about a policy where upgrades can be purchased from manned stations at a low bucket 30 minutes prior to departure? That way the conductors don't have the hassle of getting inundated with a flood of requests on board.

I'm guessing that the people buying on-board upgrades are just not interested in a room at the higher price points. They'd rather go coach. If the demand is there, then why haven't those rooms been sold in advance? Sure, some will hold out in hopes of upgrading on board, but that's such a hassle and a toss up that it's really not worth it if you're set on going in a sleeper.

If they were willing to allow a low bucket fare for roomettes or bedrooms at the manned station, IMHO, it should be started at least 3 hours prior to departure. This way the station agents will have extra time to process them. The reason we did not book bedrooms originally for that trip is because it was way too high for such a short trip-IIRC it was $400 to $500. For a 9 hour ride that seems excessive to me.

If they do an upgrade-whether at the station or onboard even at low bucket, IMHO, they fill the bedroom or roomette, which creates more revenue for Amtrak. The other option is staying at the higher bucket price & gamble that someone will want it bad enough to pay the higher prices.

 

[AlanB]

I may be in the minority but I disagree with selling upgrades on-board at the low bucket fare all the time. Especially if you just departed a manned station where the upgrade should have been done prior to boarding the train. I seen plenty of demand for rooms, at least on the Empire Builder, so I see no reason to sell the rooms at low bucket fare in every single instance.

Well, what about a policy where upgrades can be purchased from manned stations at a low bucket 30 minutes prior to departure? That way the conductors don't have the hassle of getting inundated with a flood of requests on board.

I'm guessing that the people buying on-board upgrades are just not interested in a room at the higher price points. They'd rather go coach. If the demand is there, then why haven't those rooms been sold in advance? Sure, some will hold out in hopes of upgrading on board, but that's such a hassle and a toss up that it's really not worth it if you're set on going in a sleeper.

If they were willing to allow a low bucket fare for roomettes or bedrooms at the manned station, IMHO, it should be started at least 3 hours prior to departure. This way the station agents will have extra time to process them. The reason we did not book bedrooms originally for that trip is because it was way too high for such a short trip-IIRC it was $400 to $500. For a 9 hour ride that seems excessive to me.

If they do an upgrade-whether at the station or onboard even at low bucket, IMHO, they fill the bedroom or roomette, which creates more revenue for Amtrak. The other option is staying at the higher bucket price & gamble that someone will want it bad enough to pay the higher prices.

Agreed, 30 minutes is too little too late. At some smaller stations they actually stop selling tickets 30 minutes prior to arrival since the ticket agent is also the checked baggage attendant and has to get the bags ready for the arriving train and out to the platform.

I'd say that 24 hours is a good window. Although I still wouldn't throw onboard upgrades out the window either, as there are unstaffed stations and someone might just change their mind once they see the coach seats or during the journey on say a two night run, they might decide to spring for the second night if indeed there is still a room open.