early tickets on thetrainline

First off I generally do not encourage people to use third party ticket sellers. But Trainline does have a decent reputation. But you are limited to tickets that are available to them. I have never, ever seen first class sold out anywhere. It may happen but it is infrequent. Sometimes, and it is fairly rare also, to find second class sold out but it happens especially around holidays. Not sure what you were encountering but I know the tickets were not sold out. Just may not been available for sale at that time. Six months is very early for train tickets.

And I have never encountered a cancelled route so I am not sure what you are referencing. Routes can be cancelled especially on the weekends when major maintenance projects are undertaken. Have encountered that the train generally provides a work around with bus transfers. Slower but it works. Also, routes will change slightly from one time period to another but again that is fairly rare. I think you are finding too many things to worry about.

Thanks Frank. I definitely worry too much and was just discussing this with the husband. I could create all kinds of scenarios in my head that likely won't happen.

Just one clarification: the tickets I purchased were 4 months ahead of our train travel. And I am just going to assume there won't be issues. It's nice to hear again that thetrainline has a good reputation so IF something happens to either of these routes, they will email me ahead of time.

Many thanks for your reply. I appreciate it.

I'd like to a cautionary note. Last summer I had booked a Thalys train from Antwerp to Amsterdam through Trainline. There was a reason I did not book direct but don't remember what it was. Man in seat61 says Trainline is OK so I wasn't worried.

We arrived at the platform and saw a train with the correct time. We did not check the train number because the time and destination were correct. When we boarded we found people in "our seats". There was another group of Flemish or Dutch having the same problem. The conductor assisted us and our train was combined with another train(?) and changed number and when the conductor scanned our ticket she could see that our seats had changed. Unfortunately they were in a carriage at the far end of the train. She found us seats in the closer carriage and she was very helpful. I had not received any notice from Trainline and kept wondering how we were to know about the change. I got on the Thalys app and with our confirmation# could see our tickets with the new seat numbers. I should have been checking with them. In hindsight it makes sense, if you bought an air ticket through a third party you would check with the airline not the third party, right?

SO--- there is a possibility you won't be notified of changes by Trainline. However, you can probably check your ticket directly with Renfe and I would encourage you to keep an eye on that.

I'm a worrier also - no need to apologize.

Hint - being a worrier, I double check the departure time of my scheduled train the night before and prior to heading to the station on day of the journey. Not Spain, but this paid off last summer when my departure station in Hamburg, Germany was changed. I didn't receive a text or email despite having purchased through an account attached to my phone and email with the rail carrier. I was lucky I had checked. The new station was not close to the original on the ticket.

Spain specific - I purchased Renfe tickets via my Renfe account about 2 months in advance for an upcoming trip. I have received emails that one of the arrival times has changed slightly. I will still follow my standard operating procedure and continue to verify the specifics of my booked journeys. I would hope to be notified of changes, but am not risking missing a message.

Renfe does not use the term "First Class". It calls that service "Elige Confort". After selecting the ticket under the "1st Class" banner on Trainline, it will display those words on the "Selected Journey" detail.

Renfe's fare and ticket levels and terminology are not intuitive to many. Scroll down here to Scudder's explanation https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/spain/sevilla-to-barcelona-ave#:~:text=%27Elige%20Standard%27%20will%20be%20in,access%20and%20food%20service%20included.&text=*Only%202nd%20class%20seating%20offers%20a%20formal%20Quiet%20Car.

For what it is worth, I have had very good experiences purchasing Renfe tickets directly from their website for multiple trips with a US Visa and MC. I use the app to store my tickets and easily transfer them to Apple Wallet on my phone.

Thanks Syd. So interesting and thanks for the tip!

And thanks to you too ORDTraveler. I hesitated to even write this post but I know there are other "worriers" in the world and it's always good to know you're not alone! Thanks for your advice too. I'll definitely be checking Renfe periodically.

For our first trip to Spain in 2010 I did use Renfe as there wasn't another option then. And likely for our 2011 and 2016 trip but I used loco2 for our 2019 trip and I don't recall why. But I had no issues in 2019. And yep, I did notice the first class wording too. It used to say "Club" but as you say it's now "Elige Confort". so noted in case others are looking for first class tickets.

And I just reminded myself of another thing to keep checking. I used a travel agent to book our flights and she always finds us a great package. BUT, she said to keep checking to ensure our seats don't change? I don't recall this from past trips we've taken with her packages. Just one more thing to double check and I could check both at the same time.

Ah....I think I might be getting too old to travel. So many things to remember!!

If you purchased your package in January (or before) for May, there is a decent chance that one of your flights will change before May! That seems to be much more common now than prepandemic. I just received notice from United about an April flight to Athens that was moved forward 2 hours, meaning I needed to change the connecting flight. I've had similar major changes in 3 of 5 trips in the past year. Your agent should get notified, but still a good idea to keep checking.

Yes you made a mistake, although not a big one.

If Renfe isn't selling tickets for a train, there are no tickets being sold for that train. Trainline can't sell you a ticket for the train, instead will try to buy a ticket for you once Renfe starts selling tickets. But if the schedule is not what Trainline thought it would be, your actual train might be different.

Renfe is notorious for being late in selling tickets, a way to deal with that problem is to use their competitor Iryo that actually seems interesting in selling tickets https://iryo.eu/en/home

I've gotten a variety of opinions and I appreciate all of them. There's not much I can do right this minute and I'm going with the stance that if things change we will just deal with them at that time.

But, I like the advice of checking the tickets periodically. Would I do that on thetrainline with the localizador number? Or would I check on Renfe?

Thanks again. Really appreciate the time people take to answer all of my questions 👍

I needed to buy some train tickets for Sevilla to Madrid and didn’t see many trains running at the frequency I would expect. So, I checked the same route for a date coming up in a week. Then I could see the expected frequency. I just kept checking a few months before we were going to travel and saw them become available. This was on Renfe’s website.

I've answered my own question. Just checked "my bookings" on thetrainline and both show as what I purchased. I'll keep checking until we leave but I feel so much better having posted in this forum. Cheers to all of you!

Don't just rely on Trainline, you really need to go to the source (Renfe)

At this point in time I wouldn't expect a change as RENFE haven't issued times or tickets for mid May yet, and likely won't for quite some time. Thus there is essentially nothing to check against yet.

In a month to 8 weeks time (maybe later still) RENFE will issue timetables. Only then is there anything to check. The important thing to remember is that if there was an engineering disruption then any European railway will make some kind of alternative arrangement. They will not leave you stranded.
And if the total worst did happen then there will be inter city buses for these city pairs, which are very competitively priced.

The real message is that Spaniards do not book anything like so far out. And they know that they will, by some means, reach their destination.

Really just sit back for a good while yet, and relax.