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The Local Dialect
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« on: July 24, 2012, 02:40:34 PM » |
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Has anyone tried purchasing train tickets online yet? Supposedly you can now do this, but when I go to the official website I get a warning that the security certificate for the site has expired. What gives? Has anyone done this recently and run into this problem? Think it is safe just to click through even with the expired cert.?
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Fozzwaldus
Barfly
Gender: 
Posts: 1721
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« Reply #1 on: July 24, 2012, 04:54:12 PM » |
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yeah that was the same for me about a year ago, and I was very loathe to put any personal details into such a dodgy looking site...
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两只老外， 两只老外，跑得快，跑得快，
一个是老酒鬼，一个是老色鬼，真奇怪， 真奇怪
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Arnold J. Rimmer
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Posts: 211
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« Reply #2 on: July 24, 2012, 07:05:08 PM » |
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It's certainly possible. I can't read Chinese at all, so the Mrs booked train tickets for me a couple of times in the past. After she had booked them I just went and picked them up at the station before travel. I will ask her which website she used and how she did it, and get back to you. She's asleep now  |
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The Local Dialect
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« Reply #3 on: July 25, 2012, 01:18:13 AM » |
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Thanks for the replies guys. Fozz that was my reaction but it seems like Chinese people do this all the time?! Maybe I'll try it using my husband's personal details instead.  |
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Nolefan
Lord of Avalon
Benevolent Despot
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八九不离十
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« Reply #4 on: July 25, 2012, 02:43:48 AM » |
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TLD
site is fine... it's just as badly coded as other Chinese ones but no viruses have come out of it so far.
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alors régressons fatalement, eternellement. Des débutants, avec la peur comme exutoire à l'ignorance et Alzheimer en prof d'histoire de nos enfances! - Random food, music and geek tales from the 'Jing: http://beijingdaze.com |
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The Local Dialect
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« Reply #5 on: July 25, 2012, 06:54:14 AM » |
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Thanks guys. We're trying to buy tickets for a trip to Xinjiang but the tickets to Urumqi seem to have sold out practically immediately. We were online first thing this morning and already they were gone. Ugh. I have never had this much trouble getting tickets. I am thinking of booking tickets to Lanzhou instead and then trying to get onward tickets from there tomorrow.
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The Local Dialect
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« Reply #6 on: July 26, 2012, 06:29:38 AM » |
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Well, bought tickets today. Could not, for the life of me, book tickets direct from Beijing to Urumqi. Had to settle for tickets going to Lanzhou first, then on to Urumqi the next day. The system wouldn't let me put in English either so I put in a Chinese translation of my name. It will accept passport as a valid form of ID though so foreigners can use the system.
Apparently students can buy tickets really far in advance so lots of routes sell out quickly because of this. The system also seems to have some bugs to where tickets will show up as being on sale but sold out a day before they actually go on sale, so yesterday we were seeing tickets for the 5th of August as all being sold out, but this morning they were available again ... for like 2 seconds anyhow.
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The Local Dialect
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« Reply #7 on: July 27, 2012, 12:20:15 PM » |
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I keep updating my own thread but I figure it might be helpful for future people wanting to use the online ticket system.
Even though I'd already gotten tickets to Lanzhou and onward to Urumqi, this morning I gave the direct from Beijing tickets one last try and was successful! I think it was because this time our info was already stored in there so I just had to click on add passengers and our names and ID numbers would automatically fill in. So I returned my other tickets. Just two clicks and the tickets were cancelled, with an 18RMB cancellation fee for each. The money was immediately credited to my bank account.
Today we took our IDs and the transaction number to one of the little ticket offices around town and picked up the tickets.
One of the morals of this story is that if you are travelling during peak times or on really popular routes, it is really important to learn how to do the online ticket buying thing. People who buy tickets online and on the phone have a 2 day head start over the people buying at the windows. Students have an even larger head start. Tickets sell out fast, and if you wait to do it the old fashioned way by going to the train station and buying them in person, you're going to run into problems. Lesser traveled routes are fine, but the routes in and out of the big cities (GZ to almost anywhere, BJ to almost anywhere) are an issue.
You also can't (yet) choose your seats on the train. If you have a large party this might be an issue. The system seems to assign bunks that are on top of each other before they assign bunks next to each other. They should really write a code that prioritizes bottom bunks in the same cabin, then middle in the same cabin, then top, but as it is you usually, if you buy two tickets, end up getting a bottom and a top or a bottom and a middle rather than two bottoms. We have kids so we need 2 bottoms as the tops are not safe for them so we'll have to try and switch a bunk with one person.
The site is poorly designed and buggy, but safe. The security thing is apparently a bug. If you have certain versions of IE it will prompt you to download a security certificate. In any case, once you pay for the tickets you are taken to your bank's site which is always secure, so the bank account numbers are safe.
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Fozzwaldus
Barfly
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« Reply #8 on: July 27, 2012, 12:31:38 PM » |
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very useful advice LD - thanks for updating
I never dared use the site b4, but I will give it a try next time
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两只老外， 两只老外，跑得快，跑得快，
一个是老酒鬼，一个是老色鬼，真奇怪， 真奇怪
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