Finally! Go Railteam!

[dianeduane]

Something worth noticing.

European national railways [are creating] an international partnership modelled after the Star Alliance airline network to compete with the discount airlines. According to the paper, the railways from Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands and Belgium along with the British train operator Eurostar are planning to kick off their partnership in December.

The group, which is referred to internally as "Railteam," plans to offer the equivalent to Star Alliance frequent-flyer miles, a program that German rail company Deutsche Bahn already offers its customers. Other perks will include seamless connections at stations, through ticketing and fares, accessible information on booking and journey information, and on-train Internet access, a press release from Eurostar says.

Yay!

Comments

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

Oh, now that does sound interesting...

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

It'd also be nice if they recognise each other's discount cards.

(Why yes, my Abo still has nearly two years to run.)

[dduane.livejournal.com]

I'm betting they will.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

So the question will be - will they stay the same price (a great bargain then, you won't need one per country to get full discounts) or will they go up in price (bad news for those that don't travel outside their own country)?

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Now you'd be asking.

I suppose they might do what they do with present abos -- only give you a discount on your "native" portion unless you've specifically bought the supplement to the whole abo that allows international discounts (like the MobilBonus on the Swiss abo).

Question also becomes, will they change the price of the MobilBonus segment of the abo -- harmonize that to its equivalents across the system?

Duh.