Are Amtrak Sleeper Fares Going up Sharply?

[jmbgeg]

We certainly enjoy the sleeper car from Seattle to Oakland. The last time we traveled was early 2010 in a family room (2 beds with toilet). The added fare for it was $410. I just checked now to book again, and the added fair for the same room is $800. Bad. Next year will probably be $1200.

So some fares do go up a lot. I do understand their financial situation, but almost a 100% increase is discouraging.

If you had a toilet in the room, it was a bedroom (a/k/a deluxe bedroom). The family bedrooms don't have toilets or showers in the rooms.

 

[D.P. Roberts]

I have less money to spend on travel than I did a few years ago, but I think I'll be traveling on Amtrak more often. This is because of the extremely generous AGR program, and the AGR mastercard too. They seem to be popular with railfans, too - does anyone know what percentage of sleepers are taken up with AGR redemptions? I've always heard that most business & first class seats on airplanes are occupied by people frequent fliers - if Amtrak's AGR program is more popular than it was a few years ago, that may be the case for higher fares.

And I second the notion for choosing seats - most airline websites allow you to see the plane's layout and choose your own seat. If they could do that in coach, it might free up some time for the OBS crew - they wouldn't have to spend any time saving seats, reassigning seats, or any of that. And, in the sleepers, it would ensure that first-time travelers get a better look at their actual assigned room.

 

[jmbgeg]

I have less money to spend on travel than I did a few years ago, but I think I'll be traveling on Amtrak more often. This is because of the extremely generous AGR program, and the AGR mastercard too. They seem to be popular with railfans, too - does anyone know what percentage of sleepers are taken up with AGR redemptions? I've always heard that most business & first class seats on airplanes are occupied by people frequent fliers - if Amtrak's AGR program is more popular than it was a few years ago, that may be the case for higher fares.

And I second the notion for choosing seats - most airline websites allow you to see the plane's layout and choose your own seat. If they could do that in coach, it might free up some time for the OBS crew - they wouldn't have to spend any time saving seats, reassigning seats, or any of that. And, in the sleepers, it would ensure that first-time travelers get a better look at their actual assigned room.

There may be reasons related to Amtrak's flexibility to accomomodate parties of 2 or more travelers that could make it challenging for them to allow on line choice of coach seating. For example, if there was a high number of single travelers on a particular train who each opted for seats where the adjacent seat had not sold, it would be harder to seat families together. That consideration would not apply to on line selection of sleeper rooms, which I think would be a superb service for Amtrak customers.

 

[Ryan]

Indeed. This gets covered about once a month. It's a heck of a lot harder to do on a train that makes 30 stops along its route than it is for an airplane.

 

[Oldsmoboi]

Bob, I get what you are saying about the official rate, my point is that it is not a complete measure of the state of the economy. But I am as bleeding heart as they come.

True, but what the rate is matter less than the comparison to what it was before, and for that the "official" definition is what people talk about.

Why don't we all agree on the following: The economy sucks. Whether it's a recession (a technical term) or not and whether someone is playing with statistics, it's not a good economy. How bad depends on where you are, but this is not the 1990s by a long shot. Is it getting better? Maybe, but there are a lot of factors that are still locked up.

The problem you are running into is in the way they calculate GDP. The headline GDP numbers the government releases every quarter are "real," meaning that they are adjusted for inflation. The most recent real GDP number, for Q1, was weak: It was only 1.84% (annualized). If this were an ordinary recovery following a deep recession, the economy would likely be growing 5%-7%. This is why the recovery doesn't feel like a recovery.

But even that 1.84% GDP number doesn't tell the whole story.

The way the government calculates real GDP is to start with nominal GDP--the actual change in the output of the economy as measured by adding up all the actual sales prices ("nominal")--and then "deflating" this number by subtracting an estimated inflation rate. Thus, the government backs into the real GDP growth number, starting with nominal prices and then adjusting for inflation.

Well, the "GDP deflater" the government is using right now--the estimated rate of inflation--is only 1.9%. As anyone who has been to a supermarket or gas station recently can attest, this assumption is preposterously low. But the effect on "GDP growth" of using a very low inflation estimate is helpful, in that it makes real GDP growth look bigger.

So what would Q1 GDP have looked like if the government had used the government's own estimate of inflation for Q1 (5.7%), instead of 1.9%?

Q1 GDP would have been -1.82%.

The importance of the price deflater used by the BEA cannot be overstated. In calculating the "real" GDP the BEA continued to use an overall 1.9% annualized inflation rate, which is substantially lower than the inflation rates being reported by any of the BEA's sister agencies. The mathematical implications of the deflater are simple: a lower deflater creates a higher "real" GDP reading. If April's CPI-U (as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics) of 3.2% year-over-year inflation is used as the deflater, the reported 1.84% annualized growth rate shrinks to a 0.56% annualized rate, and the "real final sales of domestic products" is actually contracting at a 0.63% rate. If instead of the year-over-year CPI-U we were to use the annualized CPI-U from just the first quarter (5.7%), the "real" GDP would be shrinking at a 1.82% annualized rate, and the "real final sales of domestic products" would be contracting at a recession-like 3.01%.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

We certainly enjoy the sleeper car from Seattle to Oakland. The last time we traveled was early 2010 in a family room (2 beds with toilet). The added fare for it was $410. I just checked now to book again, and the added fair for the same room is $800. Bad. Next year will probably be $1200. So some fares do go up a lot. I do understand their financial situation, but almost a 100% increase is discouraging.

Jay, That's not a fare increase that you're bumping into, that's Amtrak's bucket system that you're bumping into.

Out here on the LD network the low buckets we're used to seeing no longer seem to come up anymore. As a result we're getting hit with fares that are routinely double the amounts we were used to paying. I and several other members have been talking about this for months now. The fares are indeed rising by leaps and bounds and it doesn't seem to have much if any correlation with how full a given train is. Even if you purchase a ticket far, far in advance you are unlikely to find the same price you paid last year. Whether this is due to a rise in base fares or the result of Amtrak cutting off the lowest fare bucket probably makes no difference to most people. They still have to pay double what they paid last year, and that's what they actually care about. In the last few months I've seen no evidence than anyone is still receiving low bucket fares on the segments I ride.

There may be reasons related to Amtrak's flexibility to accomomodate parties of 2 or more travelers that could make it challenging for them to allow on line choice of coach seating. For example, if there was a high number of single travelers on a particular train who each opted for seats where the adjacent seat had not sold, it would be harder to seat families together. That consideration would not apply to on line selection of sleeper rooms, which I think would be a superb service for Amtrak customers.

So we're potentially inconveniencing all single passengers, all of the time, in order to avoid inconveniencing the one family that waited until the last minute to look for five seats together? Makes sense to me. :wacko:

 

[D.P. Roberts]

There may be reasons related to Amtrak's flexibility to accomomodate parties of 2 or more travelers that could make it challenging for them to allow on line choice of coach seating. For example, if there was a high number of single travelers on a particular train who each opted for seats where the adjacent seat had not sold, it would be harder to seat families together. That consideration would not apply to on line selection of sleeper rooms, which I think would be a superb service for Amtrak customers.

Indeed. This gets covered about once a month. It's a heck of a lot harder to do on a train that makes 30 stops along its route than it is for an airplane.

I'll agree that coach would be problematic. But for sleepers, it would probably increase revenue. Due to load factors, there are always empty sleepers for some segments. I read somewhere that 65% is considered basically a full train, meaning that 35% of the revenue is being lost on an allegedly "full" train.

For example, consider a train with 4 stops, A-B-C-D. Someone might easily want to book a trip from stop A to stop D, but be unable to do so because all the rooms are filled from people traveling C-D. He or she never finds out that A-B was open all the time. It would be nice if the website could say "We're sorry, the train is sold out A-D, but a bedroom is available from A-B."

You can do that manually (many of us, I'm sure, have done so), but with 30 or more stops on a train there's no way you could guess all the combinations. For example, if you're traveling from Chicago-Portland on the EB, and all the roomettes are booked, you might try Milwaukee-Portland, St. Paul-Portland, Fargo-Portland... and then try going backward (Chicago-Whitefish, Chicago-Minot, etc.). What you'll get to after many guesses is that Spokane-Portland is available. You could get 7 1/2 hours lying flat in a roomette, a shower, and at least a cold breakfast, especially when you might have just given up and taken a plane. And Amtrak gets more revenue from empty sleepers. It's a win for everyone (except the SCA, who has to clean the bedrooms a little more often).

 

[Guest]

I have less money to spend on travel than I did a few years ago, but I think I'll be traveling on Amtrak more often. This is because of the extremely generous AGR program, and the AGR mastercard too. They seem to be popular with railfans, too - does anyone know what percentage of sleepers are taken up with AGR redemptions? I've always heard that most business & first class seats on airplanes are occupied by people frequent fliers - if Amtrak's AGR program is more popular than it was a few years ago, that may be the case for higher fares.

And I second the notion for choosing seats - most airline websites allow you to see the plane's layout and choose your own seat. If they could do that in coach, it might free up some time for the OBS crew - they wouldn't have to spend any time saving seats, reassigning seats, or any of that. And, in the sleepers, it would ensure that first-time travelers get a better look at their actual assigned room.

Airlines and Amtrak are not the same thing.

Airplanes go from point A to point B. Everyone travels that one full length of that flight segment.

On Amtrak, people are free to purchase any combination of segments from the train origination point to termination point. If other passengers were to select their seats before you did, the train could conceivably be half full, but you may not be able to find a particular seat available for the entire length of your trip so you would be unable to book the trip. Or if the reservation system was sophisticated enough, it may let you book the trip but you would have to switch seats, perhaps several times, to properly accommodate the passengers who selected their preferred seat before you did.

Combine that scenario with Amtrak's liberal cancellation policy and you have a nightmare for finding your through-seat.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

For example, consider a train with 4 stops, A-B-C-D. Someone might easily want to book a trip from stop A to stop D, but be unable to do so because all the rooms are filled from people traveling C-D. He or she never finds out that A-B was open all the time. It would be nice if the website could say "We're sorry, the train is sold out A-D, but a bedroom is available from A-B."

It's not just a problem with the website. Many Amtrak reservations staff are just as clueless as Amtrak.com when it comes to which segments might still allow for a sleeper and which would not. It would be nice to have a third-party tool that allowed you to check for which segments allow for sleepers and which do not. It would be especially helpful in the case of a room being available for the whole journey but broken up between two different rooms. It would be even better if Amtrak provided such a tool themselves, but I don't see that ever happening.

Airlines and Amtrak are not the same thing. Airplanes go from point A to point B. Everyone travels that one full length of that flight segment.

I and millions of others have flown multiple consecutive segments on the same aircraft. Some folks got off and others got on. In that regard it was no different than a train. If you only rarely fly or only fly short trips then maybe you have no concept of this but if you routinely fly to distant locations you'll encounter this sort of thing from time to time. In those situations you may indeed need to move to another seat but even in that case you will have still picked your own seat. There is no specific reason that Amtrak would need to allow every single station pair to select seats. If you're only traveling for a tiny portion of the route then maybe you don't get to pick your seat. If you're traveling a moderate distance maybe you're able to select aisle vs. window. But if you're traveling a substantial distance maybe Amtrak allows you to select the specific seat of your choice. Maybe a third of the route gets you aisle/window. Half a route or more gets you specific seat. Something like that. Not a perfect solution but a bit more interesting than simply saying "never gonnna happen!"

 

[Ryan]

For example, consider a train with 4 stops, A-B-C-D. Someone might easily want to book a trip from stop A to stop D, but be unable to do so because all the rooms are filled from people traveling C-D. He or she never finds out that A-B was open all the time. It would be nice if the website could say "We're sorry, the train is sold out A-D, but a bedroom is available from A-B."

That's really orthagonal to the issue of being able to select a particular room at the time of booking, though. It'd be nice to have, but I'm not sure if the cost of programming that up will ever be paid for by increased revenue, which is the only way that you can expect for it to happen. In any event, such a feature still won't allow you to book a particular room at the time of booking.

I and millions of others have flown multiple consecutive segments on the same aircraft. Some folks got off and others got on. In that regard it was no different than a train. If you only rarely fly or only fly short trips then maybe you have no concept of this but if you routinely fly to distant locations you'll encounter this sort of thing from time to time.

And (excluding SWA, since it doesn't do assigned seating), how many stops did the plane make? Most Amtrak LD trains make upwards of 35 stops. The only time that I've made a flight with a stop and continuing service was on United flying through DFW. With one stop, it's pretty easy to work out the 3 possible itineraries (LAX-DFW, DFW-DCA, LAX-DCA for example). I did the math in another thread, but on a train that makes 35 stops there are something like 1500 different combinations that you can make - it's a lot harder to keep track of. The other thing that United has going for it is that it has many flights a day between those points, so it can afford to limit capacity for the shorts to ensure that there are enough seats for the through travelers. Someone wanting to go DFW-DCA or LAX-DFW can easily pick one of the other flights. Obviously, that isn't possible with Amtrak.
Even if you were able to work out all of those issues (and that's a HUGE "IF"), the fact remains that Amtrak tried this once on the Acela and it was an unmitigated disaster. People have the expectation of getting on a train and getting to pick out any seat that was empty. It's been that way for well over 100 years, and when they tried to force people into assigned seats it didn't work out very well at all.

It might be interesting for you, but no. It's never gonna happen, and I'd be pretty upset with them if they wasted their limited resources on something like that. There's plenty of other worthwhile endeavors that Amtrak can work on with their limited time and budgets.

 

[VentureForth]

I am still a huge proponent of seat assignment, but NOT choose your own seat. A decent reservationist should be able to maximize space on a train and thus ease boarding at major enroute stations. Yes, that means that a group booking at the last minute may not get to sit together. Plan ahead and sit together.

TS: I consider Southwest Airlines to be the "railroad in the sky". I have flown with them multiple times and have been on those flights where you stop at an airport, some get off, some get on. Of course, on SWA, the seats are all non-reserved (or, per Amtrak lingo, "reserved" meaning you will get a seat - somewhere).

Question is, though, can you have seats assigned and NOT have choose your own seat when the airlines offer it? It's difficult to convince the masses why you can't offer the exact same reservation experience as the more popular airlines...

 

[had8ley]

When Amtrak was born there were many ex-airline people running the show. If one booked a sleeper from NOL to Lafayette it was blocked all the way to LAX. This went on for quite some time until someone told the reservations centers that this was not an airline. I was both the benefactor and misfortunate one in experiencing this useless blockage of rooms. Now I see manifest with triple sold rooms on LD trains.

 

[Ryan]

I am still a huge proponent of seat assignment, but NOT choose your own seat. A decent reservationist should be able to maximize space on a train and thus ease boarding at major enroute stations. Yes, that means that a group booking at the last minute may not get to sit together. Plan ahead and sit together.

That's still a solution casting about for a problem.

There's nothing wrong with the way that the system is working now.

 

[VentureForth]

I don't know about that. I find it quite irritating to be disturbed asking if I could move from my window seat to an aisle so that a couple can sit together. I am generally very amiable to doing that, but it shouldn't have to happen.

There's also a huge problem with people not knowing where to sit before they are on the train, therefore having to queue in a VERY hot sun, or rain, or snow and being assigned a seat by the conductor, after the train arrives, then delaying the train to get everyone on board.

There is a better way. What is a problem with assigning seats? Other than the fact that people who book at the last minute may not be able to sit together, which happens in every other industry...

 

[Oldsmoboi]

On the DeutscheBahn I.C.E., you can reserve seats ahead of time, but you cannot pick exact seats. You are assigned to a specific car number and seat number for the duration of your trip. Your last name is displayed in a small readout over the seat. You pay a small fee (2.50 euro) to have this specific seat. Otherwise you just pick any empty seat and just get the luck of the draw any pay no fee.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

I find it quite irritating to be disturbed asking if I could move from my window seat to an aisle so that a couple can sit together.

Yes, but think of all the families who find it quite irritating to ask single travelers to move. In the future be sure you sit with another single traveler to avoid this sort of problem. That way everybody wins.

 

[Ispolkom]

I don't know about that. I find it quite irritating to be disturbed asking if I could move from my window seat to an aisle so that a couple can sit together. I am generally very amiable to doing that, but it shouldn't have to happen.

Of course, if you read other Web sites, seat poaching and requests to switch seats occur all the time on airlines that do assign seats, so I don't know that Amtrak assigning seats will solve anything.

 

[Oldsmoboi]

And when I"ve paid a slightly higher fee (even just 2.50 euro), then no, you can't have my seat. Take it up with the conductor if you can't find two seats next to each other for you and your brat. You should have paid the fee like I had.

 

[njulian]

I always had thought the buckets were pretty well set to sell out lowest first, then go up and so on. I had booked a trip for this August as soon as I could and paid my, what I thought was lowest, bucket rate for my sleeper. In March I was checking for another trip and looked at my booked trips and noticed the rate for my sleeper in August had dropped considerably which really surprised me. I was able to call AMTRAK and take advantage of the lower price, and get a refund of over $200 on my Credit Card. So..it does pay to check and the old rule of the rates always going up seems to be gone. I'll be checking repeatedly from now on.

 

[Oldsmoboi]

I always had thought the buckets were pretty well set to sell out lowest first, then go up and so on. I had booked a trip for this August as soon as I could and paid my, what I thought was lowest, bucket rate for my sleeper. In March I was checking for another trip and looked at my booked trips and noticed the rate for my sleeper in August had dropped considerably which really surprised me. I was able to call AMTRAK and take advantage of the lower price, and get a refund of over $200 on my Credit Card. So..it does pay to check and the old rule of the rates always going up seems to be gone. I'll be checking repeatedly from now on.

It does appear that the Revenue Management team is being more proactive and setting the price higher out of the gate only to drop the price later if the traffic doesn't materialize. But on some routes, it appears they are still close to filling the train even with high(er) bucket starting prices. I can't say I blame them for trying to make more money where they can.