Seat Reservations

It depends on the time of year, route, and if there are any holidays in the surrounding countries. Last week on our train from Munich to Venice, it was packed full. People were sitting on the jump seats in the halls next to the compartments. People were sitting on the floor next to luggage in the doorways. It was a German holiday and there were tourists, plus school/youth groups packed in. A few days ago on the way from Venice to Munich, I couldn't get a compartment on the reservation, but found quite a few open ones when we got on. We talked to the ticket taker and he said we were fine taking anything open (that didn't have the reservation ticket in the window).

If you are traveling on a rail pass in Italy on anything above a Regionale train, that's IC and above you are required to pay the fee. Call it a seat reservation, call it a supplement, you pay. Nobody cares if you stand, stand on your head if you like, but you still need to pay. No pay = big fine. On the spot. In France, some trains require a fee, like TGVs, others, like RER and TER don't. Board a TGV without a reservation fee, big fine. Spain, never been there. Dunno.

Kathy's post is a little misleading, as they were likely using tickets, not passes. How necessary reservations are does not depend on the time of year, it depends on whether reservations are required on that particular train. In Italy. Reservations are required on most trains apart from the local R trains, and the price of the reservation is included in the price of the ticket. This is true even if you buy your ticket too late to get the reservation, which it sounds like happened on their return journey. But if you are using a railpasses, you MUST pay the seat reservation fee on trains that require reservations. You have to check and see. In Italy you can avoid it only by riding local trains that stop all the time. This mens it ftakes longer ifnyou are going very far at all. In France, the TGv trains require seat reservations. And in Spain, they have lots of different names for their trains but almost all require seat reservations. There they check tickets before you board so you are less likely to make a mistake and get on a reserved train and get fined like Nigel says. So you will need to check each train you plan to ride.

Seat reservations are not just important, they are required for passholders on particular trains, as noted above. Trains that require reservations are especially common in Italy, France, and Spain, where you will be traveling. You cannot avoid the reservation fee by riding standing up.

Howdy, Neighbor! If you could simply stand on trains that required reservations to avoid actually 'using/paying for' a seat, European trains would be plum FULL of vertical college students LOL!

I used www.bahn.com (German site but it has train schedules for everywhere else). It seemed like when we crossed borders we had to buy a reservation (they were usually the faster trains). But it has a little R for reservations required on the website. We would buy the reservations to leave the town when we arrived in the town. You can also ask at the ticket counters, they can tell you if you need reservations.

I used www.bahn.com (German site but it has train schedules for everywhere else). It seemed like when we crossed borders we had to buy a reservation (they were usually the faster trains). But it has a little R for reservations required on the website. We would buy the reservations to leave the town when we arrived in the town. You can also ask at the ticket counters, they can tell you if you need reservations.