Some eVoucher Questions

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chrsjrcj

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Tried searching, but didn't really find any threads that answered my questions.

I was able to change the day I leave for a trip next month, and doing so saved me $60 because the roomette is in a lower fare bucket. I chose to receive a voucher, so I wouldn't lose the $6 to the 10% refund fee and I was planning on taking another trip the week after. That trip is only $51, $9 less than the voucher. So when I go to redeem the voucher tomorrow and make the reservation, will I still have $9 on the voucher left, or do I lose it? Also, when I make the reservation, I assume I receive a good old paper ticket?
 
With an e-voucher, you receive 100% of the value. (The 10% reduction only applies is you ask for a refund in cash or to your credit card.) If there is a remaining amount after you get your new ticket, you will receive a new e-voucher for that amount.
 
Presumably you didn't mean to say "when I go to make the reservation" since you already have the new reservation. So, when you get to the ticket office they'll print out your new ticket and a paper refund voucher. Yes, you can use the voucher only in part, and you will get a new paper voucher for the difference. Yes, all these tickets will count toward miles.
 
When an expected voucher didn't arrived in the mail (my wife had handled getting it, so I not sure of the details), I called Amtrak customer relations. The agent said they don't mail paper vouchers any more, but that I should just call when I want to apply it. Since I already had a ticket that I wanted the voucher applied to, she right then and there credited the paid amount to my AGR card and recharged it for the original amount, less the voucher. She also refused to call it an E-voucher.

What I don't remember, or forgot to ask, is whether a regular phone rep can do this, or I need customer relations.

Caution! this is only one data point. I'm not claiming that there is no such thing as paper vouchers any more.
 
Thanks all for the replies!

Presumably you didn't mean to say "when I go to make the reservation" since you already have the new reservation. So, when you get to the ticket office they'll print out your new ticket and a paper refund voucher. Yes, you can use the voucher only in part, and you will get a new paper voucher for the difference. Yes, all these tickets will count toward miles.
I haven't made the reservation for the second trip yet, I was planning on doing that tomorrow when I redeem the voucher. Now I wonder, can I get a cash refund for the remaining $9 voucher? I imagine I'd get the 10% penalty, so it would only be $8.10? At least it would help pay for a meal in the cafe car.
 
Thanks all for the replies!

Presumably you didn't mean to say "when I go to make the reservation" since you already have the new reservation. So, when you get to the ticket office they'll print out your new ticket and a paper refund voucher. Yes, you can use the voucher only in part, and you will get a new paper voucher for the difference. Yes, all these tickets will count toward miles.
I haven't made the reservation for the second trip yet, I was planning on doing that tomorrow when I redeem the voucher. Now I wonder, can I get a cash refund for the remaining $9 voucher? I imagine I'd get the 10% penalty, so it would only be $8.10? At least it would help pay for a meal in the cafe car.
The minimum refund fee is $5, so you'd get $4 back in your case.

http://www.amtrak.com/refund-and-exchange-policy

Refund Fee
Where applicable, refund fee is 10% of the total amount refunded, with a minimum amount of $5.00 and a maximum amount of $100.00 per refund transaction. Unless stated otherwise, if a ticket is refundable, the passenger may avoid any refund fee by accepting the full refund value of the ticket as an eVoucher or other exchange credit, good toward future travel within one year.
 
More questions (of course I didn't think of them when I actually redeemed the voucher today)

1) I now have the good old paper ticket, but of course is still considered an eticket. When I go to Amtrak.com and type in my reservation # and email address/phone # (gave both, and my AGR # to the friendly agent), the reservation doesn't come up. Is this because I bought the ticket at the station? I've only ever bought tickets online, then picked them up at the station (or now, printed them at home). I imagine it's fine since the ticket has my itinerary and says "Retain During Trip" and "Eticket Travel Document".

2) I also now have a new evoucher for the remaining $9, but I'm kind of confused when it expires. I believe it is one year from the original date of payment (which was a few weeks ago). Is that date when I have to travel by, or can I make and pay for a reservation before that date, but travel a few months after?
 
More questions (of course I didn't think of them when I actually redeemed the voucher today)
1) I now have the good old paper ticket, but of course is still considered an eticket. When I go to Amtrak.com and type in my reservation # and email address/phone # (gave both, and my AGR # to the friendly agent), the reservation doesn't come up. Is this because I bought the ticket at the station? I've only ever bought tickets online, then picked them up at the station (or now, printed them at home). I imagine it's fine since the ticket has my itinerary and says "Retain During Trip" and "Eticket Travel Document".

2) I also now have a new evoucher for the remaining $9, but I'm kind of confused when it expires. I believe it is one year from the original date of payment (which was a few weeks ago). Is that date when I have to travel by, or can I make and pay for a reservation before that date, but travel a few months after?
It's one year from date the eVoucher was issued. I believe if there's any remaining balance from an eVoucher, the new eVoucher expires the same one year from the date the original eVoucher. Now it gets really weird if you start applying eVouchers to travel and request an eVoucher for those. By using an eVoucher, you put a time limit on when you can request an eVoucher on any ticket paid for (even partially) with that eVoucher.

I believe you could definitely do what you're proposing, but in that case it might not be possible to request another eVoucher if you can't make it.
 
1) Only reservations made on the website show up online under your profile. Those made by an agent over the phone or with an AGR agent do not. And even those that you made online but later change with an agent over the phone do not.

2) The only restriction is that it must be REDEEMED by the date! You could make a reservation for travel 6 or 10 months later!
 
AFAIK the new E-Voucher would be valid for one year from the date of issue of the new E-Voucher. At least that's how the expiration dates on mine are. So in theory if you used a few cents off one almost every year, you could keep the value for another year and so on and so forth.

I could be wrong, but that's how my new vouchers were dated after I used old vouchers to pay for tickets. I usually combine multiple vouchers though. They always give me a funny look when I ask for a print out of my vouchers and it comes back with 20+ on it...
 
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AFAIK the new E-Voucher would be valid for one year from the date of issue of the new E-Voucher. At least that's how the expiration dates on mine are. So in theory if you used a few cents off one almost every year, you could keep the value for another year and so on and so forth.
I could be wrong, but that's how my new vouchers were dated after I used old vouchers to pay for tickets. I usually combine multiple vouchers though. They always give me a funny look when I ask for a print out of my vouchers and it comes back with 20+ on it...
I may be confused about what they call the "refundable amount". Amtrak says this amount could be less than a year and is based on when the original payment was made. So if you bought a ticket almost a year in advance, cancelled and requested an eVoucher, you'd barely have any time left to request a refund.
 
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