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Booking a Free travel Pass ticket with Irish Rail

  • 16-08-2015 6:08pm
    #1
    Brussels Sprout
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,412 ✭✭✭


    My father asked me to help him out. He wants to book an OAP (free travelpass) ticket for the train for next Sunday between Cork and Dublin. He told me that he went to the office in Cork city to book this and the lady told him that he could only book 1st class tickets there and that they'd cost him €20 each way (or something to that affect). She told him that if he went to irishrail.ie he'd be able to book the tickets for €5 each way.

    He's a techno-phobe so asked me to do this. I've been on the website but only see options to buy tickets for full value (€36 each way). He has free travel so doesn't want to buy a ticket, just book it.

    Is it actually possible to do this on the Irish Rail website?


Comments

  • #2
    G_R
    Moderators, Education Moderators Posts: 5,028 Mod ✭✭✭✭G_R


    Brussels Sprout wrote: »
    My father asked me to help him out. He wants to book an OAP (free travelpass) ticket for the train for next Sunday between Cork and Dublin. He told me that he went to the office in Cork city to book this and the lady told him that he could only book 1st class tickets there and that they'd cost him €20 each way (or something to that affect). She told him that if he went to irishrail.ie he'd be able to book the tickets for €5 each way.

    He's a techno-phobe so asked me to do this. I've been on the website but only see options to buy tickets for full value (€36 each way). He has free travel so doesn't want to buy a ticket, just book it.

    Is it actually possible to do this on the Irish Rail website?

    Just had a look on their website there. Once you choose your journey, change the adult drop down to zero, and then "reserve seat only" to 1. You then get a popup message saying "to avail of this you must be in possession of one of the following...." and that list includes Free Travel Pass.


  • #3
    Brussels Sprout
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,412 ✭✭✭Brussels Sprout


    Yup, thanks. That zeroing the ticket dropdown confused me.


  • #4
    Caquas
    Registered Users Posts: 1,470 ✭✭✭Caquas


    Irish Rail have introduced a new charge under the radar for "free travel". Only a limited number of seats can now be reserved online for free, and when these seats are booked, all remaining seats are charged at €2.50 per leg of the journey i.e. a return trip in €5.

    Irish Rail say the system was being abused by people booking multiple trains for the same journey. I can well believe it - some Irish people will milk the system without consideration for others. But there are many ways to tackle this problem. As usual in Ireland, the innocent must pay.

    https://www.thejournal.ie/irish-rail-free-travel-pass-holders-multiple-bookings-6158048-Sep2023/



  • #5
    whisky_galore
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,489 ✭✭✭✭whisky_galore


    Pay €2.50, wow that's punitive alright....won't someone think of the oldiewonks.



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