Amtrak Guest Rewards

As for the old Chase Amtrak MasterCard, mine was replaced with a Chase Freedom Visa card, which currently gives a 5% rebate at Diapers.com!

Gilbert B Norman wrote:With all of this as preamble for those who are in the plan, how liberal is Amtrak Guest Rewards? It seems like there are a lot here who ride about in Sleepers compliments of the plan. Since I joined the plan, just as I did United's, to expedite the on-line booking process (and I guess to "be one of the boys" around here), and have never redeemed any of my some 15K (if AGR offered a charity for donations, they'd be gone), what do those around here, especially those also in airline and hotel plans, think of AGR generosity, or lack thereof?

For airlines I agree with you. Back 15 years ago when I used to fly for business every week and the programs were a bit more generous I'd redeem points often for normal itineraries, but since the last time I redeemed about 5 years ago, and had to fly New York to Cincinnati to Detroit to Duluth at 6:00 am in order to use the points, I don't even look at my airline points anymore. Hotels are definitely better. Rarely do I find a hotel has "sold out" of points rooms, and we'll usually get 4-8 nights per year free, out of 20-30 total. I had mostly done Hilton in the past, but started to move more to IHG when Hilton got less generous a few years ago.

AGR has been very good to me. I find earning them with rail travel a bit of a pain since nearly all of my rail travel is leisure and they award based on fare not miles. Nearly all of my points have been from the credit cards. When I first signed up, they were offering a huge bonus (like 25,000 points) and I would put anything I could on the card. (I had no problem getting the new card. They told me I was approved on line, and I got the card about 2 weeks later.)

Using AGR points was reasonably easy once I figured out how to maximize my zone travel. I take my son with me in a roomette, so that's the room, double meals, double business class if no sleeper, and the New York, Chicago, and Portland lounges all free, so for me it was a VERY generous program. We will have managed to cover the majority of Amtrak routes for free under the old program. First year was Poughkeepsie to Miami, down on the Empire Service & Meteor and return on the Star. Second year was Toledo to LA on the LSL, Texas Eagle, & Sunset Limited, then San Diego to Toledo on Pacific Surfliner, Southwest Chief, & Capitol Limited. Third year was Toledo to Seattle on Capitol Limited & Empire Builder, and Portland to Toledo on Builder & LSL. This year was Poughkeepsie to Kansas City on LSL & SW Chief, then Milwaukee to NY on Hiawatha and Cardinal. Next summer I have 2 trips booked. First is Pontiac to Salem on Wolverine, California Zephyr, & Coast Starlight and return. Second trip is Poughkeepsie to San Antonio on Empire Service, Crescent, & Sunset Limited, then NOLA to DC on CONO and Capitol Limited. It was a really, really good deal while it lasted. I have also paid for a few sleeper trips recently, which I wouldn't have done before taking the AGR trips, so Amtrak did make something back, but I got more than my share of value out of the program.

General AGR question: Anyone have any luck/experience booking (and paying for a trip), then "converting" it to a free trip using AGR points?

I've been accumulating points via the new BoA card since the old Chase variant ceased accumulating a month ago. I should have enough for a one-way trip I'm planning in mid-December, but the "new" points from October haven't hit yet (neither the points specifically accumulated, or the 12,000 "bonus" points I should be entitled to). In the interest of securing the accommodations prior to a sell-out (inevitable for the itinerary in question given seasonal ski traffic), I'd like to make the reservation as soon as possible if a standard reservation can be transitioned into an AGR reservation prior to said trip taking place.

Mr. Byte, an "off the cuff" guess would be you'd have to CX your paid itinerary (and be subject to its refund rules) then rebook that same itinerary through AGR (and be subject to "no room at the Inn").

The 12,000 bonus points for signing up for the card require that you spend $1,000 in the first 90 days. So there will be some delay in getting those points: after the first bill is paid? After 90 days? They won't show up as soon as you get the card.

Gilbert B Norman wrote:With all of this as preamble for those who are in the plan, how liberal is Amtrak Guest Rewards? It seems like there are a lot here who ride about in Sleepers compliments of the plan. Since I joined the plan, just as I did United's, to expedite the on-line booking process (and I guess to "be one of the boys" around here), and have never redeemed any of my some 15K (if AGR offered a charity for donations, they'd be gone), what do those around here, especially those also in airline and hotel plans, think of AGR generosity, or lack thereof?

All of my sleeper travel (5-6 segments) so far has been on AGR points. I take one every few years, which is enough time to earn the required points to make such a trip.

Literalman wrote:The 12,000 bonus points for signing up for the card require that you spend $1,000 in the first 90 days. So there will be some delay in getting those points: after the first bill is paid? After 90 days? They won't show up as soon as you get the card.

My bonus points showed up the same day the bill meeting the $1,000 charge requirement was electronically posted on BoA's web site.

Not sure if this link has been posted yet or not; saw it on the America's Amtrak FB page: http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.com/ ... t-rewards/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If that's true that you can't redeem points for Saver fares, that's a really big deal.

Just booked my last flat-rate "zone" trip from Boston to Florida for March. I asked the agent about the new system and she said she didn't know much about it. She said she heard it is going to be a rate based system but they haven't even been trained on it yet.

Taking the Meteor to get the best bang for the buck!

I received this in my inbox not too long ago.

As I just mentioned above, I booked a round-trip Viewliner/2 Business Class Seat one-zone trip from Boston to Orlando on the old system for 30,000 points. So I just checked for the same trip on the new system and it was 65,999 points!!!

Glad I booked last year, but it's going to be really tough to get those free trips in the future.

Just checking I found the same trip as above now available for just over 50,000 points. So due to the changing supply/demand aspects of Amtrak's fares, you will never know when to book your trip to get the best bang for your buck. It's just way too complicated.

I wrote to Amtrak suggesting to overlap the programs. Basically, use the fare based system with a flat zone overlay and have a maximum flat redemption based on the old zone system. Then people can pick the redemption that works best for them.

<BUMP>

So we're past launch day of the new program. Does anyone have any experience on booking? Interestingly, you can still access the zone map: https://www.amtrakguestrewards.com/zonemap" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Most of the rest of the site appears to work just fine; haven't tried booking sleeper.

Right before the switch, I booked a three leg two zone roomette trip to KC from Savannah (98 - 49 - 3 Meteor LSL Chief SAV NYP CHI KC) for August. Gonna go catch me some Yankees baseball in hostile territory, and maybe visit some members as I progress along the route.

I should have setup my annual trip to Atlanta before the change. The new program SUCKS for me.

The trip down would have cost me 24K+ points for a sleeper.
I opted for coach out of pocket instead.
The trip back is just over 15K points for a sleeper. That I took.

I'm looking at some other trips and so far not liking the new numbers.

BUT, I do like you can book it all from the Amtrak.com page now and not have to call when it's a connecting trip or a sleeper trip.
That's a huge plus. But also probably saves operators the hassle of "Are you kidding me? A trip that used to cost me 15K points is now 24K? Forget that!" and hanging up.