Paper ticket currently is not a MUST for entering your train in most railway stations in China. You can directly use your passport to board your train. But in some station especially small stations, you still need to use the paper tickets because they may have no passport-reading machine. You can get your paper ticket at once if you book it at train stations, but if you book online, you have to collect your High Speed Train Ticket after booking. Due to the language barrier and habit differences, you may feel confused about how to collect your ticket in China. Don't worry, your problems can be solved after read the below details.
To collect your train ticket, you need to bring your original passport (Copies of passports are not accepted) to the ticket counters in the railway station. English version of 12306.cn doesn't provide ticket pickup number any more. Only need to show your passport to the staff in the office. They will print ticket for you.
Documents for China High Speed Train Tickets
Once you have completed booking online, you can collect your tickets at the train station whenever you like. WeTrip highly recommends you to collect your tickets in advance.
If you Collect your Tickets on the Day of Departure, you'd better arrive at the train station about 2 hours in advance. You need to line up and wait for your turn to get tickets. It is worth noticing that lines to pick up tickets and for security check in the train station can be long, especially at peak travel times like Chinese holidays, summer and weekends. Ticket check for boarding will be closed 3~8 minutes prior to the departure time, so leave yourself enough time to catch your train.
Tickets can be collected at any working train stations in mainland China. If you book via phone, you have to collect your tickets at train station, no other selection available. No service fee is needed whether you collect it at your start station or other stations. For most large cities in China like Beijing and Shanghai have more than one train station, so you have to make sure your departure train station or else you may miss your train if you decide to pick up your tickets on the day that you depart. Actually, you can pick up your tickets at the closest train station in advance, which is recommended to do so especially at large cities or during Chinese holidays.
Most railway stations open 24 hours in a day, but there are a few ticket windows available after 11:00pm. While some small stations only opens during the daytime. Please pay attention to the operational period of the railway stations depend on the train schedules on the specific day and the size of the stations. It'd better to get your tickets during the business hour in the daytime.
You have to queue up at the ticket office, which may be in Chinese characters "售票厅" or "售票处", with your passport (or other identity document you used for booking) carried. The "售票厅" or "售票处" can be easily caught outside of the office building, and inside the office building there will be several ticket windows. You can make a ticket collection at most of the ticket windows except for the alternation windows (改签窗口) and cancellation windows (退票窗口). There may also be a separate ticket window to collect train tickets booked online, but the waiting line may not be the shortest.
Only selected staffs in metropolises like Beijing and Shanghai may speak English, so remember to queue in front of the right window or else your tickets may be canceled for the language barrier. You can also simply show the below sentences to the staff:
● English: Hello, I have booked my High Speed Train tickets online, is this correct waiting line for collection?
Chinese: 你好，我在网上订票了，是在这里取票吗？
● English: Hello, I want to collect my ticket. My passport please. Thank you!
Chinese: 你好，这是我的护照，我想取票。谢谢！
Click on the image to enlarge
Click on the image to enlarge
For Chinese, they can collect their tickets at Automatic Ticket Machine, train stations and ticket outlets, while the Automatic Ticket Machine is the most frequently used. But due to ID card is the only available certificate to get a ticket from the equipment, you cannot get any help from that.
Local ticket outlets can be found throughout cities in the mainland China, and operate generally from 9 am to 5 pm. You can pick up your train tickets at an authorized train ticket outlet (火车票代售点) if you live far away from any train station. About CNY 5 service fee per ticket is needed.
Give your passport (or other identity document) and additional service fee CNY 5 per ticket to the staffs and they will help you with collection. For the staffs of ticket outlets mostly speak in Chinese, you'd better show the below Chinese sentences to get your tickets efficiently:
● English: Hello, I want to get my train tickets booked online!
Chinese: 你好，我想取票！
Click on the image to enlarge
Warm Tip: If you haven't book any China Train Tickets before, you cannot collect your tickets at the outlets and you have to go to the train station to make identity verification First.
If you have any other problems about how to collect your train tickets, feel free to contact our professional travel expert for help.
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