TGV alert for Dijon to Paris

The SNCF site says that more trains will be available soon for this route. Is it possible that you looked too early?

It is not that the pickings are slim. It is that a lot of the services haven't even opened for booking yet. If trains really sold out months in advance they would be useless. Most inhabitants of Dijon do not know months in advance when they will want/need to go to Paris. It does happen that trains sell out, but only close to the travel date.

But October? Impossible that trains already have sold out. What is really going on is that most trains for that aren't even open for booking yet. If you go to the French SNCF site you will get a message that "more trains will be available soon, do you want to be notified?", and there you can sign up for an email alert that is going to inform you when the rest of the trains become available.

One thing that does happen on that route is that some of the TGVs from Dijon to Paris originate in Switzerland, and the SNCF opens the train first for customers in Switzerland, and only later adds inventory for Dijon to Paris in to the booking system. I have seen it that you could buy a ticket from eg. Belfort-Montbeliard to Paris on a train that did stop in Dijon, but not from Dijon itself. That is just SNCF being SNCF...
(It is my humble opinion that the current management of SNCF should be sacked, and forced to walk everywhere as punishment...)

JHK--yep, I think I panicked and booked too early!
When I checked the SNCF site briefly (before I defaulted to the Rail Europe website which is what I usually use), I did not happen to see the note about more trains being available later. (Nor the ability to be alerted when those become available, WengenK).
I thought I read somewhere in RS that for critical routes (like getting you back to where your plane leaves for home!), you should book them 3 -4 months ahead of time, but I may have gotten that wrong too!!

WengenK, I am laughing at your last few sentences regarding the proposed punishment for the current SNCF management :)
I must concur with you-- at least in my own frustration with trying to use their website.

I know many people disagree about booking through intermediaries instead of directly with SNCF, but I have much preferred Rail Europe's website (way more user friendly), and the hassle-free process of using my American credit card with them. Yes, they charge a service fee-- annoying, but it is minimal, and worth the ease of the booking process, at least for me.

You provide quite interesting information about the particularities for the Dijon route as related to the Switzerland connections. Did not know that, interesting!

In the end, the train I booked to take us back to Paris is only a couple-three hours earlier than I would have wanted anyway. The upshot is we have more time in Paris that day--nothing to cry about! (we fly out early the following morning). They are also relatively inexpensive tickets, and I bought the "Standard, semi-flexible" version, so maybe as other trains become available we'll think about making an exchange if it is possible.
Thanks for the input, very helpful as always!

The message that more trains may open in the near future appears only on the French version of the SNCF site I believe. I always use the French language site.
I think advising people to book 3 to 4 months in advance is not good advise. If you book that early you run in to the problem that not all trains may be available, and that there might be schedule changes between now and your date of travel, leading to all kinds of confusion as the way you are expected to deal with those will not be obvious to people not used to train travel.

I always advise people to book between 1 and 2 months in advance if they want a good price, and just the day before it they want maximum flexibility.

I travelled to Paris six time last year for business. I always booked the outward trip the week before, and the return while in Paris once I knew how long I needed to stay. That always worked fine, except once when a strike resulted in half the trains being cancelled and I then returned a day later than planned.

This is indeed not something you want to see happen on the day of your flight back to the US, but that is what you have travel insurance for, not?

One problem with SNCF is that they just do not run enough trains. That is because they are not very efficient (which is also why they are relatively expensive). The Italians do a much better job running high speed trains. Trenitalia has just started to compete with SNCF in France itself (on Paris - Lyon). I hope they do scare SNCF in to getting better.

Thank you for the further advice, WengenK. Indeed it seems I was a little overzealous in my planning this time.

Twice in the past I have booked ahead of time (how far, I don't recall, but a ways out) the TGV from Paris to St. Pierre de Corps in the Loire Valley. Also, day trips to Versailles and Chateau Vaux le Vicomte. No issues then, thankfully.

I did find in RS most recent France book where I had read to book critical trains 3 -4 months in advance. So per your reasoning, this recommendation should probably be revised.

I do always check the timetable as the date approaches to be aware of any schedule changes. If I need to re-book, so be it. Lesson learned. Hopefully the specific trains I already booked will continue to be available!

Our experience with Trenitalia and other trains in Italy have been seamless; I agree they are efficient.

FYI to others who may have made train reservations prematurely:

I was able to cancel, at no charge, our 2 TGV tickets from Dijon to Paris. Our tickets were "semi-flexible"-- I expect that there was no penalty because I JUST purchased them and the date is so far out.

I will also go into Rail Europe website and add the "alert" feature to my account so that I will be notified when additional trains will be added. I am especially pleased to have been able to do this as I just read that Beaune has a really great Saturday market on our departure day, so now we can enjoy that and catch a later train to Paris. The other tickets I already booked (from Paris to Avignon, and to and from Carcassonne) are ideal times for us so I'll keep those and make sure to check if there are any changes to them.