Thanks, Overmod.
It is certainly involved; I have not read it in full yet (it's close to my lunch time). I doubt that the individual railroad passes were that involved.
Johnny
CMStPnP 243129 A feeble try at damage control. .........and it's working, score for me! I guess your going to have to figure out how to live with this.
243129 A feeble try at damage control.
.........and it's working, score for me! I guess your going to have to figure out how to live with this.
Forsooth, how will I ever be able to go on!
I love trains and train travel, but flying is much cheaper, so I'll fly from now on. Jim K
DeggestyAmtrak certainly has cracked down on reduced fares.
I have to wonder whether this is associated with the Congressional 'mandate of profitability'.
Every dollar Amtrak 'leaves on the table' by providing an actual discount is a dollar that could have gone to reduce a "deficit". On the other hand, not providing enough juicy-sounding discounts will fail to motivate potential butts to buy tickets. So make your Web-site discounts panel look really, really long, and really good in the language and pictures, and keep 'em rolling in ... if you lose them on the back end, aw shucks!
But there's still the advantage that you can go into a Congressional committee hearing and point out with a straight face that you did everything possible to reduce 'that part' of the Amtrak deficit. And even justify the strategy above as 'incenting' (to use a fine Wisconsin phrase) the maximum number of potential marks while simultaneously diligently arranging for the Government to actually 'lose' as little as possible.
I wonder if there are performance awards for the best combination of offering attractive-sounding things with one hand and ensuring minimum actual 'fulfillment' with the other. I'd also think it's a safe bet that there are people in Amtrak legal who are pretty well compensated for carefully ensuring that there is full and fastidious compliance with the actual 'letter' of the fine print, as with circ/promo at Time Warner on mass mailings and sweepstakes offers.
Makes you yearn a bit for the 'good old days that never were' where incentives to buy would be made with a real smile and a desire to establish ongoing return custom. Much of what Amtrak does at present along these lines appears to be anything but.
JMK I love trains and train travel, but flying is much cheaper, so I'll fly from now on. Jim K
Depends on when you fly. I always fly first class for leisure over the holidays because a good portion of the time the plane is late and we are just sitting there waiting for a gate to open or some other nonsense (almost as bad as getting stuck behind the Metra Express). I have long legs and coach is unbearable for me longer than an hour flight.
Christmas flight in September was more expensive than RT on the Texas Eagle from Dallas to Chicago. So Amtrak landed the ticket.
Not really so different than the argument going on in retailing 30-40 years ago: when to offer promotions and price-off sales. It culminated in clearance sales before Christmas and increased sales while greatly reducing sustainable markups. It's a balancing act.
charlie hebdoNot really so different than the argument going on in retailing 30-40 years ago: when to offer promotions and price-off sales. It culminated in clearance sales before Christmas and increased sales while greatly reducing sustainable markups. It's a balancing act.
But this is different.
Look at the discussion we had earlier, about 'marginal pricing' relative to actual demand. Would it be 'immoral' for Amtrak to run pricing up (and perhaps make discounts more inapplicable) in timeslots or services that are either near-filled or expected to be? I'd argue 'of course not' even though there's a certain amount of mercenary zeal involved in the idea. (In fact I'd argue that not to do so, which in essence would mean that the early birds who could afford to lock up tickets and space sufficiently in advance would get all the worms, and anyone else has to ride standby or see about the bus, is unfair in a different way.) I see no despair in adjusting to 'supply and demand' so that it just closes ... the flip side of this being standby allocation so that the last seat on as many segments as possible is sold without leaving anyone seatless or bedless as applies.
But this is a form of bait and switch, where you're attracted by discounts and then repeatedly and somewhat viciously nickel-and-dimed down. That's not the same thing as running a Christmas sale with loss leaders, or the kinds of promotion with coupons that 'stack' with discounts at your local grocery store that's savvy about human nature. I'd point out that the perception that a company 'cares about you' has been a principal concern in "marketing and promotion" since well before the age of Elbert Hubbard ... and it is just as important to avoid the perception that a company essentially doesn't give a crap after the customer is in the door, or out of the showroom.
I knew they had raised the age for seniors from 62 to 65, but did not affect me as I was already 65. Never belonged to AAA but did hear that one was discontinued too. They did restore the military one after a lot of complaints. I use Amtrak Guest rewards charge card and accumulate points to redeem for free or discounted trips. They also send email surveys that I answer and get points for those also.
JMK I love trains and train travel, but flying is much cheaper, so I'll fly from now on. Jim K Depends on when you go, I have not flown since 2003 and luckily I have no need to do it, no family to visit etc. So I can take the train wherever I go. I have heard too many complaints lately about airlines and how small the seats are and no leg room. One friend is 6'3" and over 200 lbs, and he says his fat axx never fits in the seats. Have read stories of dragging the man off the plane to make room for a crew person to fly, a dog dying in overhead and child sitting in vomit on a seat that had not been cleaned up at a terminal. When her mom questioned the attendant was told "that's not my job", Maybe not but it was her job to make sure the seats were clean. The mother and child were kicked off the plane for causing commotion and she said she'd never fly again. I flew a lot with TWA and no airline comes even close to the level of service they had. I have never flown Southwest but friends do like them. I'll stick to Amtrak.
Depends on when you go, I have not flown since 2003 and luckily I have no need to do it, no family to visit etc. So I can take the train wherever I go. I have heard too many complaints lately about airlines and how small the seats are and no leg room. One friend is 6'3" and over 200 lbs, and he says his fat axx never fits in the seats. Have read stories of dragging the man off the plane to make room for a crew person to fly, a dog dying in overhead and child sitting in vomit on a seat that had not been cleaned up at a terminal. When her mom questioned the attendant was told "that's not my job", Maybe not but it was her job to make sure the seats were clean. The mother and child were kicked off the plane for causing commotion and she said she'd never fly again. I flew a lot with TWA and no airline comes even close to the level of service they had. I have never flown Southwest but friends do like them. I'll stick to Amtrak.
Uncle HowieAt the moment the only sure fire discount from Amtrak is to join the Railroad Passengers Association.
AFAIK, while the senior discount is not available (never was?) on the Auto Train, the NARP discount is and was.
Yes, I know that it's no longer "NARP", but, similarly, that really tall building in Chicago, to me, will always be the Sears Tower, even though it isn't.
Pete
JPS1Amtrak has a lot of discounts.
I love it when a man of his experience and skill quotes something like this without either reading the fine print or actually observing the actual discounts being offered.
Suggest he do so, whether or not he thinks he's too busy to read such minutiae, and report back on, for example, the actual 'children's discount' if, as the language implies, there are multiple children riding.
Overmod JPS1 Amtrak has a lot of discounts. I love it when a man of his experience and skill quotes something like this without either reading the fine print or actually observing the actual discounts being offered. Suggest he do so, whether or not he thinks he's too busy to read such minutiae, and report back on, for example, the actual 'children's discount' if, as the language implies, there are multiple children riding.
The objective was to summarize the different discounts offered by Amtrak.
If one wants the details for each class of discount, they can be found on Amtrak's webpage or by calling the company. In some cases, i.e. group travel, one has to call Amtrak for the details.
Well stated, Overmod ! Summaries are worthless if the correct information is omitted, distorted or misleading.
I don't see alot of distortions ! He just stated thier we're discounts.
Read my post more carefully. Note the word 'or' not 'and.' The summary omits key conditions, as Overmod points out.
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