I thought if you were truly handicapped, the Accessible Bedroom is charged at the same rate as the current bucket price for a roomette. Basically, you aren't being financially penalized for being in a wheel chair.
If you aren't handicapped, and reserving the Accessible Bedroom less that two weeks before departure, you are charged the same rate as the current bucket price for a Bedroom (which if no Bedrooms are left, is probably the highest priced bucket).
I wasn't aware when I reserved my Accessible Rooms if I was being charged the Roomette rate. So you may right about that! I do know that you are correct about the fare when the H room opens to non-handicapped at the 2 week point.
As a side note, the opening of the H room to non-handicapped only happens if there are no other accommodations left on the train.
Also, I can tell you just how helpful Amtrak people can be in a pinch.
It was 10 years ago when I had reservations for non-accessible bedroom on the SWC and found out when I boarded the train to start my westward trip that my room just couldn't work for me. The attandant checked with the H room passengers in another car, who were non-handicapped passengers reserving within the last two weeks, if they would be willing to switch rooms. They were more than happy to switch to the more desirable upper deck bedroom.
Heading back east the problem was a little more difficult. I was told that I had to call everyday around a particular time to see if there were any cancellations. Having only enough medication for 3 day beyond my original time schedule I was getting a little frantic over the long shot hit or miss method of trying to solve my problem.
I called again after about 3 or 4 days of checking for cancellations, and asked to be transferred to customer relations in Washington. I spoke to the rep. there and fully explained my predicament. Fortunately for me she took the bull by the horn and told me she would see what she could do and get back to me. Sometime before I was scheduled to board the train for the return trip I received a call back from her notifying me that she found an H room for me. She actually made calls to those who had Accessible Room reservations to find out if any were planning on keeping the reservation or were going to cancel and fortunately for me found someone who was going to cancel and the room was on the same day as I was supposed to be leaving. Boy was I relieved. Not only was the SWC problem solved, but it also meant that I didn't have to deal with not making the connecting LSL train at CHI.
As a prologue to this story, we hear a lot of problems associated with Amtrak, many of which Amtrak gets an unfair rap for. But this taught me that there are good people there and probably many times they go above and beyond in service to their customers - like in my case above. This experience probably also made me more considerate and understanding as a supervising motor vehicle representative for our customers for my remaining years until retirement. As you are probably well aware of, in our line of work we have, like Amtrak, had our share of both fair and a whole lot of unfair criticism for our service. Oh well, c'est la vie; that's history as well as the problems of my last Amtrak trip, and for that I'm happy... until the next trip anyway!
