Amtrak Cascades from Seattle, WA to Vancouver, CAN

[Zaarh]

I'm writing to share my subpar experience with Amtrak on 5/23/24. I had planned a nice day trip from Everett, Washington to Vancouver, Canada with my parents from out of state, with 3-4 hours to explore the city.
 

First, the train departed about 20-25 minutes past the original departure (9am), and we arrived to the Vancouver station 1 hour late (at 1:30pm). We were held on the train until 2pm waiting for our turn to be dismissed. Then, we waited in a customs line for about 20-30 minutes. By the time we were free to explore Vancouver, it was about 2:30 pm (from our original plan to arrive at Vancouver at 12:30pm).

We hardly had time for lunch, then rushed back to the train station and arrived there at 4:28pm, 15 minutes BEFORE departure (4:45pm). We only found an empty terminal with signs posted saying customs was closed. There were no Amtrak personnel available. A police officer informed us the train had already left the station.

 

At least 6 other passengers also missed the train. One of them informed us that he received an automated e-mail refunding his ticket as the system recognized he was not present. Why didn't we receive the same email? The worst part, the email they send with the ticket has an entire instructions/disclaimers section, but had NOTHING indicating we would need to arrive early to go through customs. They expect us to open the attachment with the ticket and re-read a very similar section to find that warning? This is very deceitful to say the least.

Our best option to avoid the expense of a night at the hotel was to purchase Greyhound bus tickets. We now had to sit around the terminal for 1.5 hours waiting for the bus. The bus was not as spacious and very uncomfortable for my senior citizen parents. We finally arrived back to Everett around 9:40 pm- over 1 hour later than anticipated.

We called Amtrak customer service, only to be greeted by an unempathetic gentleman offering a $250 future travel credit. Would you trust Amtrak after this experience? Why did the other passenger receive a refund and not us? They keep refusing to refund us and don’t recognize how their incredibly faulty service ruined our trip and caused us additional expenses. I do not recommend their services to anyone.

I’ll keep you posted if they recognize their mistake and make it right for ruining a family trip

[cruisetonowhere10]

45 minutes ago, Zaarh said:

I'm writing to share my subpar experience with Amtrak on 5/23/24. I had planned a nice day trip from Everett, Washington to Vancouver, Canada with my parents from out of state, with 3-4 hours to explore the city.
 

First, the train departed about 20-25 minutes past the original departure (9am), and we arrived to the Vancouver station 1 hour late (at 1:30pm). We were held on the train until 2pm waiting for our turn to be dismissed. Then, we waited in a customs line for about 20-30 minutes. By the time we were free to explore Vancouver, it was about 2:30 pm (from our original plan to arrive at Vancouver at 12:30pm).

We hardly had time for lunch, then rushed back to the train station and arrived there at 4:28pm, 15 minutes BEFORE departure (4:45pm). We only found an empty terminal with signs posted saying customs was closed. There were no Amtrak personnel available. A police officer informed us the train had already left the station.

 

At least 6 other passengers also missed the train. One of them informed us that he received an automated e-mail refunding his ticket as the system recognized he was not present. Why didn't we receive the same email? The worst part, the email they send with the ticket has an entire instructions/disclaimers section, but had NOTHING indicating we would need to arrive early to go through customs. They expect us to open the attachment with the ticket and re-read a very similar section to find that warning? This is very deceitful to say the least.

Our best option to avoid the expense of a night at the hotel was to purchase Greyhound bus tickets. We now had to sit around the terminal for 1.5 hours waiting for the bus. The bus was not as spacious and very uncomfortable for my senior citizen parents. We finally arrived back to Everett around 9:40 pm- over 1 hour later than anticipated.

We called Amtrak customer service, only to be greeted by an unempathetic gentleman offering a $250 future travel credit. Would you trust Amtrak after this experience? Why did the other passenger receive a refund and not us? They keep refusing to refund us and don’t recognize how their incredibly faulty service ruined our trip and caused us additional expenses. I do not recommend their services to anyone.

I’ll keep you posted if they recognize their mistake and make it right for ruining a family trip

Oh boy…that is unfortunate.  I had a great experience on the train (one way from Seattle to Vancouver) but this gives me pause recommending it.

[princeton123211]

17 hours ago, cruisetonowhere10 said:

Oh boy…that is unfortunate.  I had a great experience on the train (one way from Seattle to Vancouver) but this gives me pause recommending it.

To be fair to Amtrak, they state very plainly in their cross border information when booking a ticket like this that you are required to arrive to the train station at least 1 hour prior to departure to complete immigration formalities. The OP clearly didn't read. 

 

18 hours ago, Zaarh said:

The worst part, the email they send with the ticket has an entire instructions/disclaimers section, but had NOTHING indicating we would need to arrive early to go through customs. They expect us to open the attachment with the ticket and re-read a very similar section to find that warning? This is very deceitful to say the least.

This is selective memory-- Amtrak's own website when booking this ticket says "

• Departing from Vancouver, BC - arrive at least one hour prior to departure for border crossing processing. To complete ID checks, Customs and Immigration closes the gates 15 minutes before the scheduled departure; gates will not reopen once closed.

 

18 hours ago, Zaarh said:

We called Amtrak customer service, only to be greeted by an unempathetic gentleman offering a $250 future travel credit. Would you trust Amtrak after this experience?

Given their disclaimers this is quite generous of them. They really owe you nothing. 

 

18 hours ago, Zaarh said:

Why did the other passenger receive a refund and not us?

They most likely had a higher status than you in Amtrak Guest Rewards or there was some extenuating circumstance that didn't apply to you. I'm not saying it's necessarily fair but it's how any major airline handles these situations as well. 

 

The bottom line is there is no reasonable expectation you can show up for public transportation with an international border crossing 15 minutes prior to departure. What was Greyhound's policy? You were already there but I'm sure they had a similar 1 hour prior requirement. 

[princeton123211]

2 hours ago, Zaarh said:

So, Greyhound bus expects you there within 15 min, as border inspection happens in the US side (the country I was traveling to), which to this day has been my only experience with international travel.

 

2 hours ago, Zaarh said:

customs is usually done after you cross the border.

It is not done exclusively after crossing the border. When you fly from Dublin, Ireland to the US you pass through US Immigration (Customs is only for monetary declarations) in Dublin with US Immigration Officers there before you board your flight and your flight arrives in the US as a domestic arrival. 

 

In fact in addition to Amtrak preclearance in Vancouver it exists in 16 other instances in Dublin, Shannon, Aruba, Bermuda, Abu Dhabi, Bahamas, and several major cities in Canada when travelling by air. 

 

It's always important to read the fine print when travelling internationally because nothing is standard or usual anymore. 

[Zaarh]

[Reposting this response: I accidentally added personal information and CruiseCritic kindly removed the post for me. I may have rephrased things as I don't know where I saved the original text... 😭😂 I added some comments too]

 

Thanks for your feedback, @cruisetonowhere10 and @princeton123211.

 

So, Greyhound bus expects you there within 15 min, as border inspection happens in the US side (the country I was traveling to), which to this day has been my only experience with international travel. [Note I did not claim this was an exclusive way of dealing with customs, it's just how it is usually done and how I've always experienced it]

 

You're right, @princeton123211, Amtrak does disclose on their website that we should be there 1h in advance. That's simply not enough. They should also disclose it in the email they send with the ticket, not with a "for more information, click this link" messaging. I'm not claiming they are being malicious, but if 6 other guests also had the same misfortune as me on that trip alone, this should tell Amtrak the way they communicate this policy is not clear enough. Faulting a customer for not reading fine prints (or in this case, clicking additional links) is NOT good customer service. Offering some customers cancellation and denying it to others is even worse.

 

In the end, I'm posting this here just so people won't have to go through what I've been through.