Eurostar - really have to check in 30 mins in advance?

Jamp

Hi All

I do a lot of commuting to the Netherlands and have recently started trying out the Eurostar as the flights are getting more expensive and my environmental conscience becoming bruised.

Tomorrow I have the choice of arriving in Brussels 75 or 15 minutes before my Eurostar departure. 15 would be a bit too close for comfort but I always seem to have an irritating choice from London - arrive exactly 30 minutes before or an hour if I play safe.

So far I've always played safe but I spend so much of my time travelling I would like to keep it to a minimum, so in future, do I really have to check in 30 minutes in advance? Will the check in machine reject my ticket if I'm late? What about the ticket issuing machine?

Lastly, is there any leniency if you miss your Eurostar due to a late running connecting train (i.e. from NL) if you're on separate tickets for each section of the journey?

Jamp

Well I ended up putting my question to the test last week: the international train from Amsterdam (arrives in Brussels 75 mins before the Eurostar so playing safe) was cancelled so I couldn't join it at Roosendaal as intended. Had to get the commuter train to Antwerp and then the next international train (the 15 minutes in advance one) was late so I had to get another stopping train to Brussels to get me there 12 minutes before Eurostar departure. In fact that was a little late and Brussels Zuid/Midi is so large that it was less than five minutes before departure that I (and a few others) made it to check in. Checked in fine but they had been expecting us so perhaps this is an exception.

Voyager2002

Last summer, I caught a Eurostar back from Paris with very few minutes to spare (my own fault). They were a good deal more lenient than the staff in London.

Anyway OP, rather than buying separate tickets for your onward journey from Brussels, pay an extra ten pounds for your Eurostar ticket and then it will be valid for travel to/from any station in Holland. And if your entire journey is on a single ticket then delays to your train from Holland to Brussels would not be such a problem for you.

martindow

There never seem to be queues for security and the platform seems to be closed just a few minutes before departure. It is a risky strategy though if you have tickets tied to a particular train as you would need to buy a new ticket if the train were missed.

BernadetteN

It would depend upon which train and which day how long the queues for boarding Eurostar at Brussels are. you have check-in, then Belgian Federal Police checking passports, then Eurostar security checking bags, then UK Border Agency checking passports, so 4 queues in total.

The trains have a capacity for around 900 passengers. Some early trains get only 200 boarding in Brussels, some evening trains get near to 900 in Summer and it's really hard to get 900 passengers checked in within the hour allocated between trains. The last train of the evening is always particularly busy Monday to Friday and turning up with 15 minutes or less to go would be highly risky.

One thing is a cert and that is Eurostar will NOT hold the train up for a late arriving passenger, no matter if their connection is late or any other reason. The slots through the channel tunnel are set for Eurostar's use. If they held one train up, it has consequences for all the following trains of the day which also have to be held up.

abacab

Thanks for the info here.Will be trying out the London-Brussels and then thalys to Amsterdam next week thanks to free tickets on Eurostar as a result of the St pancreas testing days last december.
Have been to Holland many times but it has always been train or ship.

Jamp

Voyager, how do I pay the extra tenner for including travel to Eindhoven? Currently I buy a ticket to Any Belgian Station from Eurostar.com which is the only option I can see for the trains to Brussels. I then top up my ticket to get me from the border to Eindhoven which costs just over €20 return (discounted as I'm under 25). If the £10 is return then that's better though, and it saves the risk of queuing for my top-up ticket in Brussels meaning missing the hourly international intercity to Amsterdam, as it almost did last time.