Roomette available to purchase but unable to book with AGR points.

[BOS-T-Time]

Hlello,

I'm trying to book a Roomette on the Crescent Nov 15 ATL-NYP connecting to BOS. AGR is telling me there are no rooms available to book using points, yet there is one Roomette left to purchase at full bucket on the website. Is this correct that only a certain quantity of Roomettes are available to use AGR points for?

BOS-T-Time

 

[the_traveler]

Not that I'm aware of. I've gotten the last room on the train many times - including a few weeks back.

Call back!

 

[BOS-T-Time]

Thanks,

I called back and received the same answer. In fact, when I told the agent that I could purchase it online they assured me that the purchase would not go through as there is no inventory available from ATL-NYP even though it is showing on the website. The agent stated that it would not let me proceed with the purchase at some point during the process. The agent stated Roommette inventory was only open from WAS-NYP which makes sense since you can not purchase a Roommette from ATL-WAS but it does not make much sense to advertise space at a stated price (ATL-NYP) only to be told it does not actually exist.

BOS-T-Time

 

[Devil's Advocate]

I've run into this problem numerous times myself. In some cases the website can see two compartments but simply can't book them as a single ticket. In those cases it's a matter of convincing an agent to sell you two separate rooms on the same route. In other cases the empty rooms simply don't actually exist. For whatever reason Amtrak's website still shows unsellable compartments that only serve to confuse and irritate customers who don't realize all those rooms were actually sold out long ago. The AGR staff are not lying when they claim that Amtrak's website is showing phantom tickets that can't be actually be purchased. This is probably a fixable issue but even though Amtrak obviously knows about it they don't seem very concerned about it. Better to spend that limited IT budget on more important projects like Facebook integration I suppose. :lol:

 

[AlanB]

Bos-T-Time,

Sunset is correct, what's happening is that one room is available from NYP to say Charlotte, where it then fills up. In the meantime a room sold from NYP empties out at or before Charlotte. The system sees that and says "Oh, there is a room available the whole way."

Only when the computer actually tries to secure that room, it can't because the computer only wants to pull 1 room, not 2 rooms.

If you can figure out where the overlap is, then you can get an AGR agent to book you those two rooms in conjunction, assuming that you're willing to move. And realize that move could come in the middle of the night. But most agents won't go looking for you, you have to be armed with the knowledge that room X empties at A, while room Y is sold starting at C. So you need switch at some point.

 

[BOS-T-Time]

Thank you very much for your answers.

I was thinking along the lines of an airline where seats are from point A to point B, whereas people get on and off a train at different stops along the route. A train may be full, as you say, from NYP to Charlotte, and then have rooms available to ATL, maybe fill up again at another stop and then become empty at another, depending on where people board and alight. Again, thank you for the information as it is more clear to me. It must be frustrating on Amtrak's part knowing they have a room available (albeit a different room) for the duration of the train but it is not easily sold as it would require someone to physically move.

Thanks again, I am learning more and more as I travel by rail.

BOS-T-Time

 

[the_traveler]

In my case of a few weeks ago, there were not any rooms available CHI-NYP. However I got a great AGR agent who (without my asking) went out of her way to find me a room on a "sold out train"!

She did find me a room on train 448 (the BOS section) from CHI-SDY and then I had to switch rooms (and "trains") to train 48 (the NYP section) for a room from SDY-NYP. But again there were no rooms available straight thru from CHI to NYP!

 

[amamba]

Ask if they can book you ATL - WAS in the roomette and then WAS - NYP in coach, if you really want to travel that badly and no one will help you figure out where you need to switch rooms.

 

[the_traveler]

That can't be done, because they can't sell seats between WAS and NYP. I think ALX is discharge only. Try all stations before that. I'm sure one is there. Or maybe the next call will be with a great agent, like I had!

Best of luck to you!

 

[SubwayNut]

I know I'm bumping a two year old thread! but thought it would help with perspective.

The website revamps since 2012 clearly haven't fixed this problem!!

Just got off the phone with AGR trying to book a room on the Cardinal, the website claims there's one or even two available but they can't "snatch" it.

Knew it was too good to be true (all the other trains from New York to Chicago next week were sold out of roomettes as well. I'm not desperate enough to book a bedroom. So much for my attempt at a spontaneous summer trip to ABQ when I just realized I could pull off a trip next week and even found a cheap return flight. Talked to two agents (called back thinking perhaps it was my computer blocking the room) who both apologized that the website is buggy.

 

[Ryan]

Yeah, they need backend work to get this fixed, no amount of updates to the website is going to make this better.

Alan, how would to go about trying to find where the room shift would have to occur? The only think I can think of is to look at adjacent city pairs all the way down the line and see where it goes from 1 room available to 2 rooms available. But that won't help if there isn't any overlap where both rooms are available?

 

[SubwayNut]

I did discover a way of checking that the website is telling the truth (without entering a credit card and trying to buy the ticket) by using the iPhone app. On the iPhone, the screen before the payment page (after claiming the train isn't sold out) does bring up a "Sorry the train is sold out alert" just not the website.