Booking train ticket in India has been easy these days with the emergence of many travel websites that makes it possible for us to just sit at our homes and book train tickets for our journey. Lets look at several ways to book train tickets online. As stated earlier, there are many websites through which we can book the tickets, lets take a glance at each of them:
Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Ltd:
Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), is a subsidiary of the Indian Railways that handles the catering, tourism and online ticketing operations of the Indian railways. Lets look upon the process of registering on the website, booking e-tickets, booking tatkal tickets and cancelling the ticket.
USER REGISTRATION ON WEBSITE:
- Individual registration is free in IRCTC.
- Valid mobile number and valid email id must be provided to be registered as individual user.
- Please click on sign up link on home page of https://www.irctc.co.in
- After filling up the details, please click on Submit to submit.
After you click on “Submit” button, a pop up as shown below will appear on the screen:
The entered email id and mobile number should be correct and if they are correct click “OK” button to proceed further for registration process. Then, a pop up regarding your agreement to the terms and condition will appear as follows:
Click on “I Agree To Terms and Condition” to proceed further. You should click on “Accept” button to accept the terms and condition of IRCTC website.
If you have been successfully registered, a message like shown below will pop out:
After successful registration you should check your registered email for your user id, password and activation link. For mobile verification check the mobile you have registered. You must have got a code from the website for the verification process.
Now, after the successful registration, you can login to your account using the the user id and password you have selected at the time of registration.
Put the OTP received through mail. The page appears as follows:(Email verified successfully). Verify your mobile number by entering the verification code received on mobile. in the box given.
After your email and your mobile number has been verified, a message will appear in your screen, which will redirect you to the login page. Click on the message to login.
BOOK e-TICKETS FOR TRAIN:
- After you have successfully logged on the website, the page “Plan My travel” appears.
- If the From/To station selected by you are correct in the route of the train then :
- Select e-Ticket option.
- Click on “Submit” option.Now you will find the List of Trains which shows the number of trains available for that route.
- If you wish to know the route and the timings of the train, click on the train name available under the “List of Trains” option.
- Now, click on class available in the selected train under “List of Trains”, you will get to know the fare. Fare will be shown according to type of class you have selected. The fare that appears is for a single adult Passenger and the service charges charged by IRCTC.
- You should click on the type of class available in the selected train in order to select the train from the train list.
- If you will click on the class in the train list then it will show the train details with its availability.
- If you are satisfied with your train tickets, click on “Book Now” button under availability option to book tickets.
- You can click on “RESET” button anytime if you change your mind and you wish to select other train.
- Ticket reservation page then appears; make sure that the train name and the station names displayed on the top of the page are the ones you booked.
- You need to then enter the names, age, sex and berth preference for each passenger. The maximum length of names should be restricted to 15 characters. If the Passenger is a senior citizen (60 years and above for male and 58 years and above for female) and wants to avail Senior Citizens’ concession (40% of Base fare for male and 50% of base fare for female), click the box provided. Senior citizens are requested to carry some proof of age in original during their journey. (The allotment of your required berth depends on the availability).
- The ticket details, availability of tickets at the particular time and the fare, including the service charge, appear on the screen, along with the payment option do follow the instructions provided then.
- In “Payment Option” you can select the Payment Mode and Bank From the Drop Down List.
- Then, Click on the “Make Payment”. It will redirect you to the Bank Site you have selected.
- After successful payment and booking of accommodations is done, the user is shown the ticket confirmation details along with a “Print Reservation Slip” Button. On clicking the button it is shown with an option to print.
- The customer can subsequently also print Electronic Reservation Slip from the ‘BOOKED TICKETS’ link on the left navigation bar which looks like the picture shown below:
CANCELLATION OF e-TICKET
If you suddenly change your mind or if you need to cancel your e-ticket then, there is a provision to cancel the tickets as well.
- You need to go to ‘My Transactions’ and Click ‘Booked Ticket History’ link on the menu bar. Select the ticket to be cancelled and click on ‘Go For Cancellation’ and initiate the cancellation by selecting the passengers to be cancelled.
- In case you want to do partial cancellation of ticket, you have to select only those passengers who are to be cancelled. The passenger should get a fresh printout of the ERS (Electronic Reservation Slip) for them to continue with their journey.
Click on “OK” to proceed the Cancellation Request.
IRCTC has also launched an android app for your mobiles. You can download it here. It will be easier for you to use app and book your train tickets.
goibibo.com
Using goibibo.com you can book tickets for bus, car, flights, trains and many more. You can use this site to book online tickets for train.
Yatra
Yatra is another website that provides a platform for you to book online tickets for train.
Cleartrip
Cleartrip offers the single most comprehensive travel experience to users, through Mobile and Desktop solutions. Using Cleartrip, you can book online tickets for train.
These are some of the websites which you can use for booking online train tickets. Nowadays, there are many travel websites available which I have not mentioned. I hope you found this post helpful. Comment below your views on this.
