Rail Europe Comments

You pay additional fees for using another web site and may not see the full schedule of opportunities via a site other than RENFE.

Rail Europe is not a train company but basically a travel agency selling limited number of train tickets to North American. Rail Europe generally does not list the discount tickets available and as a travel agency charges extra fees for their services. Renfe is the national rail road site of Spain and as such all tickets at the normal pricing is shown. R Europe can be useful as any travel agent can be but they do charge directly and indirectly for their services. Not wrong with that but just be aware of who R Europe is.

The key with RENFE is to purchase using the Paypal option. The website has always been notorious for not easily accepting US or Canadian credit cards, even with pre-approvals and such. Since they have added the Paypal option, it is much easier to use.

My experience is that RailEurope is not a good travel agency to use. The trains they sell are limited and are not realistic about transfers. And they don't offer the discounted tickets.

Now, now, Neil, calm down. Rail Europe is not disgraceful. For the people who need it, they provide a high service level. It is just most of the folks on this site do not need that much hand holding. But when needed they do a good job. And 20,30 years ago, they were critical. The internet for many people has reduced the need for agencies like R Europe.

And they don't offer the discounted tickets.

Rail Europe absolutely does offer discounted tickets. I've used them a couple times over the years when "national" train sites wouldn't accept my credit card. Everything worked out fine, I was able to receive the discounted rates (but it had a service charged added) and print my tickets out at home. RE is a bit more expensive for most trains due to the service charge, but their site is easy to use, kind on the eyes, and everything is explained in easy to understand lingo.

Rail Europe ain't the ISIS of rail travel.

^^ Perhaps things have changed then. Hopefully for the better.

You can use Rail Europe for references purposes. Since Rail Europe generally lists better or direct service or connections, you can enter your itinerary and find the trains and connections they show, then go to Renfe to find the same trains and all the different classes of service and book your itinerary knowing the trains to look for.

The benefits are the Rail Europe website will always be in English and the site is never "down" as Renfe might be. We were actually in Spain in May and wanted to buy tickets. The Renfe site was down but there was no problem with Rail Europe. We figured out which trains we wanted, and ultimately booked them on Renfe.

Lastly if you do buy tickets on Rail Europe you can do it on their website directly and there will be a savings over doing it by phone. That's where there charges are highest. As someone else stated, for those that need it, it's an option. For others it can be used for reference purposes, and the information is more accessible than Renfe (especially if you don't know Spanish).

Although Rail Europe has contracts and software in place to sell advance-discount tickets for several countries of western Europe, they only have the full-fare option at this time for Spanish (Renfe) train tickets. They had a wider price range once, but it only lasted about 6 months, before Spain changed their reservation system.