Interrail questions and double booked eurostar

[OnlyGarden]

I have my pass. It's 10 days over 2 months.
I've looked at Man in Seat 61 but am still a bit confused so all help much appreciated.

Question 1
I've added the trains to Rail Planner.
Most of the trains need seat reservations.
I've gone on the relevant sites and reserved seats (and paid as necessary). I have the booking emails.
My planner is still showing that I haven't booked the seats.
That isn't an issue is it is long as I have the emails showing the reservations?

Question 2
I've accidently double booked on the eurostar train for my daughter and me. I didn't realise they had already been booked and booked again. So using 2 passports I've booked 4 seats on the same train. I've not booked the seat reservations on the second booking yet. I've emailed Eurostar. I've asked for a refund but I'm not expecting one.
Can someone reassure me double booking isn't an issue?

Question 3
What exactly do I show on the trains? Is it my pass and the seat reservation emails/print outs?

Question 4
If a train doesn't need a reservation eg a local service but is on one of my travel days, do I just add it to Rail Planner and then show my pass?

Not sure what you mean by the second booking seat reservations. If using Interrail you only pay for seat reservations (£35 ish each way) but the number of such seats available on each train are limited and you can only use the pass once each way. Do you mean you have paid for full fare tickets?

I mean last month my husband booked and reserved seat ls 42 and 43 (for example) for my daughter and I.

I have just booked and reserved seats 78 and 79 (for example) for my daughter and I on the same train.

Obviously if I did this in the UK, it wouldn't matter. But with them being linked to our passports I dont want to cause issues.

Q1:
Yes, this is fine. There is no way for the app to show the reservations if you've sourced them elsewhere. When it says "reservations required", it's not actually saying you haven't made a reservation. It's just saying that a reservation is required to travel on that service, so if you haven't already made one then you'll need to.

Q2:
Other than the fact it's cost you more money, I can't see how double-booking would be an issue.

Q3:
Be prepared to show both your pass and your seat reservations. However, in some cases ticket inspectors will only be interested in one or the other. If you encounter a ticker barrier, I would initially try scanning the seat reservation. If that doesn't work, try scanning the pass. If that doesn't work, ask someone!

Q4:
Correct.

General point:
When I first used an Interrail pass, I was a bit nervous about how it all works, but it is actually very easy once your trip is under way.

Q3: important addition.. on the day of travel you need to activate the journey to create a QR code to be scanned. You can do that on the day with a little toggle button

That's great. Thank you!
I'm hoping that once I've done it, I'll be laughing at why I was so confused and worried about it! 😂

Oh! I remember reading something about that on Man in Seat 61. Thank you for reminding me!

My first journey is from where I live which is a university city so I'm sure they are used to dealing with people who dont know how to use them! 🤣

Once you know it it's easy, but not very intuitive when you start. My friend called me at 6am on day 1 for help, and then promptly forgot on her next travel day (and didn't get checked once between Brussels and Berlin, so ended up with an extra day travel). Have a great journey

I've been Interrailing about 6 times now.

I still can't remember the "activate the pass/ activate travel day" sequence until I do it. Luckily, once you're actually doing it there are sufficient prompts.

Re: the oft- quoted "toggling": be aware that on some phones you can't pull the little slider across, you just tap it twice. Nearly had me in tears on my first trip!

What you show varies by country. On reservation- free trains it's just your pass, with the train you're on added to your travel day and "View ticket" selected, so that a QR code that includes all your tickets for that day pops up.

On most trains that you've had to book a reservation for, it's the reservations they're interested in, although sometimes they'll ask to see your pass as well, just to keep you on your toes.

I can't remember if you can get a refund for Interrail reservations on Eurostar. You can exchange them for free before I think 30 days, afterwards you have to pay a small fee. Have you booked your inbound reservations? I'm wondering if you could swap them over 🤔

IME British ticket inspectors really don't care. They all act like they've never seen an Interrail pass in their lives. Expecially the ones on the ticket barriers at Paddington, when you're fumbling around trying to show them 3 passes on one phone and there's approximately 500 people trying to get through the barrier behind you. I've never been waved through so fast.

In other countries they can be much stricter.

I actually looked it up- a great displacement activity for the things I'm actually supposed to be doing.

You can get a refund for your spare reservations, as long as it's over 7 days before you go. But you do have to pay a £10 "fee" 🙄