72625 posts
Hello Arno,
I am requesting my travel agent to get a Swiss pass. Am from India.
However, uncovered a curious thing that one of them mentioned. She told me that Swiss travel pass holders will have to pre-book visits to the mountain tops? Such as Mt Titlis, Jungfraujoch etc?
I was under the impression that it is better to take a call on whether to go up on these mountain peaks using the cable cars/gondolas/cogwheels only after checking the weather that day, the web cam etc. So, was keeping it flexible by not pre-booking but just getting the Swiss travel pass (I used your valuable excel sheet and this is the one which is working out as more cost-effective, more than the half pass with airport city transfers).
It could be that it was just a selling tactic, but she sounded earnest, even citing terms and conditions of Swiss pass that mentions that such rides will have to be booked at the time of Swiss pass purchases. I have not till now seen any mention of something like this on the Internet.
Problem is most Indian friends choose to go for a group tour which don’t need these to be figured out.
Is there any such rule in the fine-print that needs these places to be pre-booked? I could not dredge up any email id of the official Swiss pass guys either to write to. Was wondering if you would be able to help shed some light?
Thanks much.
15481 posts
Hi esskay8,
Don’t worry, there are hardly any activities in Switzerland that need pre-booking. Only a few tourist trains require that, and in very rare cases, it might be worth it to buy the Jungfraujoch tickets a day in advance (see here). So, you can buy such tickets in advance, but there’s absolutely no need to.
You don’t need a travel agent to obtain a Swiss Travel Pass (a Swiss Pass is something different by the way). Just buy it yourself and print it at home, that’s the easiest way. From India, you can either do it through http://www.raileurope.co.in/p ass/swiss-travel-pass-82 and use the promo code mentioned above, or go to the Swiss Railways web shop at http://www.swissrailways.com/ en. Another advantage of this is that the pass does not need to be validated but is ready to use (not sure if a travel agent can do that too), and that you’ll have an electronic copy (PDF document), so you can never loose the pass while traveling.
72625 posts
Hi Arno, I see most of the travel pass offers are for specific country like the one you announced one for India, why not for travellers from other countries like US, I have been looking for some kind of Swiss Travel Pass discount since they are very expensive ( 8 day SWISS travel pass cost $380), these promotional discounts will be handy….anything coming up ? Thanks
7116 posts
Hi chandraks,
Even though the promotion discussed here is exclusively for MySwissAlps travelers, we have no influence on what they would like to offer. If you would buy a computer, or even a plane ticket, you may also find that one retailer in one town offers a discount, and the other does not. This is similar I guess.
We keep a close eye on discounts and you’ll find them in the Promotions tab of all of our pass pages and here in the forum as soon as they’re available. There will be a new promotion today; not specifically for the US, but one of the sites may sell to the US as well (please check our post later today).
By the way, there currently is a promotion for the US which is not available to other countries (see here), but only for Eurail passes.
7116 posts
Hi again chandraks,
You can find the new promotion here: http://www.myswissalps.com/fo rum/topic/10-to-60-discount-on-all-train-passes-and-tickets. Please post in that thread if you have any questions about it. It should work for the US as well: http://www.raileurope-world.com/deals/Europe SummerSales.
72625 posts
Thank you Arno, once again. This forum is really helpful and insightful thank to your efforts.
Many happy journeys to you.
72625 posts
Thank you so much Annika for the information. Appreciated very much..Chandra