Using credit on Trenitalia to buy regional train tickets

Beth, here is the information for the Malpensa Express train, from Malpensa airport into Milan.
https://www.malpensaexpress.it/en/

Personally?? I'd wait to buy tickets until you arrive in case you experience a considerable flight delay. You can do that online if you wish, or from a ticket office at the airport. Spend some time with the site to explore your options? :O)

https://www.malpensaexpress.it/en/lines-and-timetable/how-to-reach-malpensa/reaching-terminal-1/
https://www.malpensaexpress.it/en/tickets/purchase-method/online-purchase/

Malpensa Express, like many of the trains in and around Milan is operated by TreNord, not Trenitalia, and controlled and underwritten by the regional government of Lombardia (Lombardy).

I don't believe Trenitalia passes are valid on TreNord - I know that when I had free passes on Trenitalia when I was working the TreNord was always explicitly excluded.

Not that you are in that situation.

One thought, although you need a Malpensa Express ticket, I wonder if Trenitalia can sell it to you. Maybe? I suppose if you can get it either online with your other tickets or at a Trenitalia ticket office you may be successful.

I'd love to know the outcome. Good luck...

I just tried a dummy booking on Trenitalia's site - Malpensa Aeroporto > Milano Centrale on a random date/time next week - and yes, it looks like tickets can be purchased through them. They do list the trains as "Regionale Trenord."

The "Tre" in TreNord is for Trenitalia, they have a business agreement. I don't know if it goes as far as accepting Trenitalia's vouchers to purchase TreNord tickets. Try on Trenitalia.com and let us know what happened.

can these be bought ahead of time

Yes, but you can easily discover it by yourself on trenitalia.com

What's not so clear on trenitalia.com is that the Regionale tickets purchased online do not need to be time-stamped before boarding. But the 4 hours clock starts with the departure of that specific Regionale train and not from the time of stamping.

Could I buy tickets for earliest time I might take and be able to use same tickets for up to four hours later?

Yes, but why? There are no reserved seats on airport trains from MXP.

More, there are only two trains departing from MXP: one goes to Milano Centrale and the other to Milano Cadorna. Telling "Milano Centrale" to the guy at the counter is not that difficult if he/she is awake. You could Note it down to make things easier for both.

Of course I am assuming that Milano Centrale is your final Destination, but the same method should work even if you are going somewhere else.

The information about regional trains and having tickets stamped when buy in station versus online was very helpful. I didn't know that.

I also didn't know that the train from MXP to Milan wasn't operated by Trenitalia.

The reason I am interested in buying tickets ahead of time online is that I want to use the credit I have. It would seem difficult to do that when buying in person or from a machine. But maybe I am wrong??

I did try to do dummy booking from the airport following Kathy's directions and it does look like I could use my credit to pay for it. There was a box to pay for ticket using credit and when I clicked on it, my list of cancelled train tickets came up with their value. I didn't go any further as I didn't want to accidentally buy it!