Hi everyone. We are planning on reserving overnight train tickets from Paris to Milan from trensitalia.com. My only concern is that I've heard people saying you need a smart card credit card to retrieve the tickets from the machine. Is that true for the Paris stations? Can I go to the ticket booth and hand my email confirmation to an attendant and get my tickets? I am worried that we bought tickets online but not able to get on the train

I think www.voyage-sncf.com is a better choice for this type of ticket. Sample itinerary on an arbitrary date shows lower price on a restricted ticket at SNCF. Dealing with all Italian trip is difficult enough at www.trenitalia.com. I would always use the SNCF site give a choice.

The first choice for retrieving this type of ticket is an SNCF boutique.

To find one, goto:
http://www.voyages-sncf.com/guide/vo...ndexGuide.html
goto the bottom, in the box "Votre choix", select "en France", then select an area in Paris.

My experiences dealing with ticket agent at large Paris SNCF stations have been unpleasant. I rather want to deal with an SNCF boutique staff. Non-chipped credit cards are ok when doing a transaction with a person.

SNCF ticket machines will only issue tickets booked on the SNCF system. If you're travelling from Paris, you should book through SNCF. If you cannot retrieve the ticket from a machine, you can always get it from a ticket office where the staff can access any booking made on-line.

I checked the SNCF website before but it's in French. Is there other alternatives? If not I will probably try to understand it and make reservation anyway. Thanks for the replies!

You can pick up your tickets bought on the SNCF site at an SNCF boutique in Paris:

http://tinyurl.com/qjznuc

This id often a better option in case there is a long line at the station. In addition to your confirmation number you will also need the same credit card as you used online.

If you have trouble booking in French come back here and someone will no doubt help.
The site seat61.com has a section where it walks you through a purchase including screen shots:

http://tinyurl.com/pl3kfc

Bon voyage!

Rob

Thanks for the suggestion. I took ParisAmsterdam's suggestion and tried to reserve it through SNCF website. This is a silly question but am I suppose to choose:

Gare ou boutique : munissez-vous de votre référence de dossier et de la carte utilisée pour le paiement en ligne.

Thanks

It's simply saying that if you pick up your ticket from a station or shop, you need to take your reference number and the bank/credit card you used to buy the ticket. You don't have to choose where you collect the ticket - all outlets have access to the same computer system.

vvshirley,

It sounds like you won't have much trouble handling the French on the SNCF site. However, you can book in English on www.tgv-europe.com (run by SNCF) and get the same discount fares (if available). To keep the site in English and to avoid being bumped to the Rail Europe site, choose Great Britain as both your country of residence and the country in which you will retrieve your tickets. You will be able to pick up your tickets at any SNCF station or boutique in France, even though you initially chose Great Britain.