Amtrak, like much of the travel industry, uses incentives to attract customers to use their services through the use of Points under their specific program and under guidelines that they set. All of this is performed through a third party known as Amtrak Guest Rewards [AGR]. While the program appears to be great on the surface with their zones indicating that you could go from Seattle to El Paso, Texas on one point redeemed ticket, looking into it further and you will find that this simply is not so.

Points are accumulated for customers through train travel taken by Amtrak passengers as well as through Amtrak Guest Reward partner programs in which they have enrolled. Each program has their own set of rules and regulations from which will either generate or will allow what is generated within their program to be converted over to Amtrak Guest Reward Points.The value for points redeemed will vary widely, so use them wisely. If getting the greatest value for the point is your objective, then you might consider using them when redeeming for Sleeper Car Accommodation aboard an Amtrak train. Always be aware of promotions that offer to Double or Triple points earned during a promotion period and learn to capitalize on them. They can really help you build up a Point Balance.

As of January 1, 2005 AGR has implemented a policy that states that there will be a minimum of 100 points set for any Train Ticket issued to Amtrak passengers. Amtrak will not allow anyone to simply purchase Points within their programs, but if you can find a low price ticket, let's say ... to the next town and where you can purchase the ticket for $5.00 each way, then for each $1.00 (in this example) you would be getting 20 AGR points instead of 2 AGR points per dollar spent when the ticket price exceeds $50. Click Here, for more information.

Furthermore, while more expensive per ticket, a reservation can be broken into multiple tickets referred to as Point-To-Point destinations [PTP]. Each ticket would qualify for this 100 AGR point minimum and along with any other Special Program in which you participate. Sometimes a Special Program will allow points collected during a period of time or on a specific train ridden to be Doubled or sometimes even Tripled. When this happens it would mean that the 100 point minimum would be Doubled or Tripled. Now this 100 point minimum would result in 200 or 300 points being issued. This would translate into 30 or 60 points for the same $1.00 of expense. These are some very important considerations you should make when you plan to book an Amtrak train trip.

These tickets are generally for much shorter distances and will often times have a higher miles per dollar spent. The price of the ticket can vary widely as well, but some of the increase can be offset by Discounts for which you may qualify such as a Special Promotion in addition to a Discount you would get for Being over 65, or with a Disability. While you can not get two discounts for being over 65 and with a disability, you can get two discounts for being either older than 65 or for being with a disability while at the same time participating in a Special Promotion that may offer a 15% discount when purchased during a promotion. Keep in mind that generally when there are multiple discounts they will often be different kinds of promotions; a Bonus Point promotion added to a Price Discount promotion. It is not unconcievable that they could offer different Bonus Point combinations to promote the use of Online Booking to register the Reservation and to promote the use of Quik-Trak machines as a means for picking up the tickets at the train station.

While each discount might be 15 percent, they are applied separately to the price of the ticket. For example, if the normal price of a train ticket was for $100 and you applied your Handicap Discount of 15%, your train ticket would now be $85.00 [100-(100 x .15)]. If the Special Promotion was a 10 discount this discount would be applied to the now $85 price of the ticket making it now $76.50 [ 85-(85 x .10)]. This would mean an actual savings of 23.5% over the normal price of the ticket price of $100.00.

For those looking for ways to increase the AGR Point Totals in their account in the quickest amount of time you might consider riding a specific train at a specific time of the day. At the time of this web page's creation Amtrak was offering a Triple Bonus for all travel done through November 30, 2005 for those riding aboard the Empire Builder. For those traveling small distances that would mean a quick 300 points once the Bonus Points were applied. These Bonus Points will not count towards the reaching of any Select status, however. Only the original points from the ticket price and taking into account its' minimums set forth in the AGR program would apply to this Select status.

In my specific situation I was riding from Seattle, Washington to Edmonds, Washington and my train train price after the applicable discounts had been applied only came to $5.06. For this price I was getting 100 minimum AGR points (which would be applied to my Select Status point balance) and additional 200 AGR points (for participating in the Empire Builder promotion). The train trip would only take about 30-45 minutes in length, and I was able to find convenient public transportation to get me back home. Two weeks later I chose to extend my same train trip to Everett while getting separate tickets; Example: Seattle - Edmonds ticket, and Edmonds - Everett ticket. By going to Everett, Washington, on the same train at the same time I was now earning 600 points per trip, because it constituted as two ticket trips. [Please Note: As of May 17, 2006, each ticket must now be on DIFFERENT TRAINS in order to continue to qualify for these second trip segments]. Each week during the month of November I would be earning 4,200 AGR points at a cost of approximately $35.42 [ $5.06 x 7 ] + $34.65 [ $4.95 x 7 ] for the week for simply adjusting how I would travel home.

Now the funny part to all of this is that only after many train reservations had been made this way did one Supervisor say that this was not allowed. Why is it not allowed since you are paying a higher price per ticket? All the same, after explaining what I was trying to do with regard to increasing my "Select" points for qualification purposes, all of my tickets desired for the month of November, 2005 were issued and the points collected.

Since I like using my AGR points for Amtrak Sleeper CarTrain Travel, if I rode in an Econo-Sleeper over a One Zone region from Seattle, Washington to El Paso, Texas if I were to extend this analogy farther, a 15,000 AGR point balance could be earned to redeem for this one-way econo-sleeper car trip that would otherwise cost me .approximately $1,163.00 in 25 days of one-way train travel and would cost me $253 for the train travel between Seattle and Everett during such a Triple Points promotion. This Sleeper Car train trip would require a one day Lay-over in Las Angeles, California and would continue on the very next train that would leave for El Paso, Texas. If you redeem for such a trip when there is a discount on the points required, it could be as few as 12,000 AGR points. As you can see in this example by thinking ahead and with a little creative thought you could really maximize the benefit of the AGR points you collect and later use.

And Now for the bad news! Amtrak Guest Rewards program may try to deny your desired train travel by saying things like: "To go from Seattle to El Paso will constitute as two trips, because you will need to transfer to a second train. Their maps do not provide full disclosure of how each train will constitute as a single trip or that to get to some destinations will require you to transfer to a second train and therefore require more points in order to make such a reservation. Their program is therefore very misleading to those who may want to redeem their points for a long train trip. They may try to say that if you have to wait for a second train and it takes a number of hours to wait for the second train segment to begin that it will constitute as a second trip. All of these practices only serve to undermine the actual benefit of the points you may wish to use. If this happens to you and you still want to get the greatest available value in that situation, then CONSIDER THIS as an alternative idea. Begin your Sleeper Car train trip in Los Angeles, California on Train 442 and ask to travel to Chicago, Illinois. This train will only service three days a week, but as it is the same physical train that continues from San Antonio, Texas to Chicago there would be no transferring to the second train. This train trip will last very close to a full three days aboard the train.

Another bit of bad news... may come if AGR tries to promote an Online Booking promotion as their system has not been designed to accommodate the handling of special instructions often times needed to be place on the train's manifest in order to provide the best service for the handicap passenger. This manifest is a sheet of paper that the conductor of the train gets that informs them of who are boarding the train, when and where they will be scheduled to board the train and may include additional information such as special dietary needs or the needing of Red Cap service when arriving at a destination point. In their effort to prepare for handicap needs on the train they have not been able to overcome (though I do not believe they have actively tried) linking the profile information of a customer to the ticket pricing strata or to alert Amtrak's Customer Service that a follow-up call may be needed. One factor that does justify their concerns is the fact that their Handicap Car is intended for people with mobility issues. Are they able to climb the stairs to gain access to the rest of the train? Not all handicaps involve blindness, and so they could still type their own needs in their own words.

To one of Amtrak's Customer Service Agents I suggested that an option be added to their discount stratas for handicap passengers, like they have for the Senior Citizen rider, that would provide the handicap ticket rate information (which would be the same as the Senior Citizen rate), and if a voucher is used from past paid tickets that a link be able to access the credit card information on which tickets might have been charged and the date of charge. They could even provide the actual ticket numbers that were never used. They could even link into a database that could be able to verify whether a passenger was actually handicapped.

I am very leery about relying on their willingness to grant me bonus points under such conditions because there is no assurance of how they will respond to such a request and it does not seem to appear in their Terms and Conditions either. As it is they already stipulate who a promotion can be given when it comes through an email message from Amtrak. What other exclusions might they try to impose on a passenger later on who acts in good faith? When I had learned of one of their Online Booking promotions and had registered for the promotion I had already purchased a series of tickets. When I had suggested that I cancel the reservation and rebook through the Amtrak.Com website, they said "No. Continue doing what you have been doing.". Amtrak's Internet people would say "Book Online using the Senior Citizen tab, and then call up the Amtrak Guest Reservation people and they could rebook it. In my case for the month of this promotion, this would mean tying up their system while I give them potentially 62 reservation numbers since I purchased two tickets for each day of the month.

While it is becoming more difficult to get a long trip pieced together using AGR Points, it can still best be done best using the following rout which I plan to schedule in the next few weeks. The trip inside the Sleeper Car will be about 72 hours.

I will ride in Coach from Seattle to Los Angeles; price near $75 with my 15% Handicap Discount applied. The next morning I will then pay $92 to go by Coach for 17 hours of this trip on the Texas Eagle train that leaves 3 times a week to El Paso, Texas. From this point on I will use 15,000 AGR Points for Sleeper Car and Meals for the next 3 Days, 2 Hours of travel getting me into Chicago and continuing on to Wolf Point, Montana. From here it will cost another $97 to return to Seattle, Washington. While the AGR portion of the trip will be the same distance as going from Los Angeles to Chicago, By going by this rout I will be saving 5,000 points that can be applied to my next trip. Because I would be traveling First Class I would also be given Full Access to Chicago's Union Station's "Metrolounge" a lounge that provides Internet Access, a series of pay phones, Television viewing, convenient Rest Rooms, and access to free Sodas, Fruit Juice, Tea and Coffee during the time waiting for the next trip. This privilege will exist for anyone arriving to or departing from the Union Station of Chicago.

This Select Status is an added incentive to frequent train travelers and offers an added bonus of 25% or 50% more AGR points for Select Plus members earned in the qualifying period beginning in the second month of the following year. While it was more difficult to justify spending the money to travel on Amtrak to obtain the needed Select Plus Points, this was lessened in reaching the Select Plus status for the following year.

Once again I was able to capitalize on one of Amtrak's special promotions even better than than the Triple Point Bonus program offered a few months prior. I was now receiving the 100 base points for each of my 2 Point-To-Point tickets; I was now receiving the 50 Select Plus bonus points and now their Special Promotion was offering 250 bonus points for Online Booking per ticket. All together now I would be getting an additional 200 points (or 800 points) for each day's worth of travel over the prior year's special promotion. The Online Booking portion for this promotion would be given at the conclusion of the promotion in the following month. It is worth maintaining the Select Plus status if you are able to reach that status and the benefit could be substantial depending on how much traveling you do that following year.

From qualifying for the Select Plus status from the prior year's train travel I was now receiving an additional 100 points for an hour's amount of commuter travel back home, and would continue to receive this benefit as long as I was able to accumulate the same 10,000 AGR point for each subsequent year's travel with Amtrak.

Amtrak Guest Rewards has added some Partners that can also help you add to your account balance. Among them are MBNA M/C Credit Card program [ (800) 421-2110 ] and Trip Rewards, a program that addresses a fairly large number of hotel chains as well as providers of car rental services. When using this program I highly recommend that you collect their Trip Reward Points initially and wait until you reach their 8,000 Trip Reward point balance. As they are earned 10 points per $1.00 expense paid or $800 to reach this 8,000 point balance, they can be redeemed for 3,200 AGR points or 4 AGR points per $1.00 expense paid. If you use the MBNA M/C AGR credit card to pay for these services it could add an additional 1 point per $1.00 spent to your AGR point balance.

Imagine using the ease and inexpensive ways of earning Points through the Amtrak Guest Rewards program! I have shown how points can be accumulated quickly through their Double and Tipple programs and when Amtrak Guest Rewards has placed a minimum point value to each train ticket. Can you purchase a plane ticket for $5.00 and earn 100 Air Miles instantly and maybe given an additional 250 Bonus Points for the same ticket's worth of travel? Well, it may be cheaper to use those Rail Miles for Air Miles instead. As many of these Air Miles programs trade straight across point for point with no loss in their conversion with Rail Miles, consider all of the techniques I have discussed on this page and how they have been collected for pennies on the dollar. These same "pennies on the dollar" points could now be used in Air Miles programs (programs that might have charged much more for the same points). It might prove useful to consider this kind of application if you need to be somewhere in a hurry. While I may personally believe that you would get the biggest bang for the buck going by Rail on these points, it is of worthy consideration to what the value the Airline Carrier would otherwise charge at the time you might redeem them. Before you Leap into their program however, look carefully into their own respective program because they may have restrictions on how they can be used once they are transferred into their program.