A good fare has appeared on the De Bahn website for us to travel from Amsterdam to Schweinfurt April 16. We leave for this trip April 11. The special fare is only available for tickets by mail. The website said that world wide tickets should arrive in 8 business days. We only have 7 business days until we leave.

If we don't receive the tickets in time, can we go to a window and get replacements at either Frankfurt or Amsterdam train stations?

We also could have the tickets sent to our hotel in Amsterdam. I could try emailing the hotel to let them know that we are expecting mail.

Ordering tickets by mail would mean a savings of over 130 euro.

Does anyone have any ideas?

I believe that having the tickets mailed to you at the hotel would be your best bet. It doesn't look like the tickets can be printed online; that is unusual for this kind of offer. Usually they are only available for self-print. Also unusual is the fact that the travel can start outside Germany.

The offer says that tickets are available at ticket counters for a €5 additional fee, but that might not apply to ticket counters outside Germany. Anyway, tickets at that price might not still be available by the time you get to Amsterdam.

Larry,
Where did you see that the tickets could be picked up at the train station for an extra 5 euro? Can I purchase them online and then pick them up or do they have to purchased at the counter?

We're flying in and out of Frankfurt. I already purchased tickets (80euro total) to get to Amsterdam. Now I'm trying to get tickets to return to Frankfurt.

I'm leery of having them sent to the hotel.

Maybe it's best to wait until we get there and pay whatever.

Hi B,

>We also could have the tickets sent to our hotel in Amsterdam.

An excellent idea.

>I'm leery of having them sent to the hotel.

Why? Is it any more likely that they will be lost than if they were mailed to the US?

Try calling www.euraid.com at their Florida office. They charge the same price as in Germany.

Larry i believe has said that euraide has a hefty mailing fee - $40 or so? Not sure but that would negate the same price as in Europe aspect.

Is it not possible to establish an account with Die Bahn and have a PDF file of your ticket sent to you?

I did that last year for my train ticket from Munich to Basel.

I registered, gave my credit card number, printed my ticket at home, took it with me to Germany, and used it like I would any other ticket.

I printed the ticket on stardard A4 typewriter paper in my inkjet printer.

The only restriction was that I had to have with me for ID the same credit card I used to make the purchase.

Back about euraide.com, which i have recommended at times for their German expertise - wonder if they sell the so-called SPAR, or discounted online fares or if they just sell regularly priced at German station prices - if the latter i'd certainly wait until Frankfurt as you should have no problem getting on these trains, but if they do provide you SPAR fares then even $45 would be well worth it in your case.

Thanks everyone,

I've emailed the hotel to see if they received mail for us if it would be there when we get there. I've never had anything sent to a hotel before but I know that people do it. If I get a positive response I'll have the tickets sent there.

The problem is that the special fare is only good on tickets purchased on line, then sent in the mail. They are not on-line tickets, but paper tickets. Maybe De Bahn is trying to only let people in Germany in on the special fare by doing this.

I booked online tickets already for Frankfurt to Amsterdam and printed them out. They were online tickets. Now I need tickets going back to Frankfurt.

I thought maybe someone knew if we went to a ticket window and said we had lost the paper tickets if they would issue new ones. I guess maybe that's dishonest.

Euraide would only be able to purchase the full fare tickets and tack on an additional amount.

Thanks again,
Denise

Hi D,

>I thought maybe someone knew if we went to a ticket window and said we had lost the paper tickets if they would issue new ones. I guess maybe that's dishonest.<

Let's say that it depends on what your definition of "is" is.

The DeBahn people would look up your "lost" tickets before reissuing them, assuming that they aren't nonrefundable, nonexchangeable.

BoniseA,

go to the German language side of the Bahn website and click on "Angebotes-ABC". Then find "Frühlings-Spezial" and click on "Info". On that page it says, "Bei Ihrer Online-Buchung sparen Sie nicht nur 5,-EUR gegenüber dem Kauf am Schalter." [By your online booking you save not only €5 against the puchase at the counter...]. It also says "Im personenbedienten Verkauf zggl. 5,- EUR-Aufpreis" [In personal service purchase an additional €5 supplement.].

You certainly scooped me on the spring special. I had not found it yet. Maybe you just stumbled on it using the query page, but that is the official information from German Rail.

I was very surprised to find that they are not offering a self-print option on the proposal. They usually do, particularly if it is train specific (Zugbindung - Ja).

If, when you arrive in Frankfurt, the discount tickets are still available (they are limited in quantity), you can buy them at the counter for only €5 more (I assume that means per ticket, not per purchase).

I don't think they indicate that there is any provision to buy them online and pick them up at a counter at FRA.

BTW, that is "Die" Bahn. Die, pronounced "dee" is one of the German words for "the".

BTW, tickets at the Fruhlings-Spezial (Spring special) fare must be purchased at least three days in advance. On that German language page there is a table and one row is labeled "Vorkaufsfrist, 3 Tage"; thats advance purchase, 3 days. But if you purchase your tickets the day you arrive at FRA (that's the 12th, yes?) then the advance purchase will not be a problem. However, these tickets are limited in quantity, and I can see that, for connections entirely in Germany, the lower priced ones have already sold out. After the €39 tickets have sold out, the next ones are €49, then €59, then €69.

Larry,
I emailed the hotel and they said if they got mail for us they would hold it until we got there.

I went ahead and ordered the tickets and had them sent to the hotel. 37 euro apiece to go from Amsterdam to Schweinfurt. That means more beer money for us!

I printed out my receipts and will take them along. If for some reason the hotel doesn't get the tickets, I'm hoping they will give us new ones at the station. But this saved us about 130 euro. For that amount I'll take a chance.

Doing this all in advance is kind of nerve wracking but it's saving money. We're going from Frankfurt to Amsterdam for only 40 euro each.