Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation acronym IRCTC is the subsidiary alliance of the Indian Railways, Government of India which offers online railways ticketing services has recently announced and introduced the concept of the connecting journey which let the Railways passengers to link the PNRs with one another to opt the benefit of refund in case of misconnection between the trains. There have been cases when the passengers missed their second train because of the delay caused by the first train. Keeping the interest of the passengers, Indian railways has brought this in notice and introduced the concept of the connecting trains.
The concept is simple, now you can claim for the refund in the cases when you’ve to travel in more than two trains while you take the other train or change the train in between your journey. The provisions has been made in the Rule no. 13 (3) of Indian Railways passenger meant for the cancellation of the tickets and refund of the fare as per the rule 2015.
All types of passengers are eligible for this benefit no matter whether they are carrying a reserved or unreserved ticket; conditionally, they have to link the PNRs of tickets together so that on cancellation they can enjoy the benefit of the refund. The refund could be partial or full which completely depends upon the type of journey, train delay, cancellation and reschedule etc.
What is IRCTC connecting journey?
As per rule no. 13 (3) of Railways passengers (Cancellation of tickets and refund of fare) Rule, 2015, cancellation of continued journey tickets and refund of fare in case of misconnection of subsequent trains due to late running of first train. The new provision says, “Where a passenger holding a ticket, with or without reservation, misses connection for continued journey by another train at any junction station owing to late running of the train by which he had been travelling, the fare for travelled portion shall be retained and the balance amount of ticket shall be refunded as the fare for untraveled portion, without levying any cancellation or clerkage charge, if he surrenders the ticket for such refund within three hours of the actual arrival of the train which he had travelled and the refund shall be granted at the junction station.”
For example, if you’d to travel from Delhi to Gorakhpur via Lucknow where you’ve to change the train at Lucknow and the train first travelling in which you are travelling from Delhi to Lucknow got delayed, rescheduled or cancelled; you can claim the refund under this provision. Passengers carrying unreserved ticket may get the refund from the junction station from where they have to change the train.
This rule is applicable for all types of tickets including PSR counter tickets and e-Tickets booked through IRCTC or it’s partner’s such as PayTM and other apps and website.
How to link connecting journey PNR online?
You can link PSR counter ticket as well as e-ticket booked through IRCTC or it’s partner’s website and apps from the official website of the IRCTC.
To link connecting journey PNR online:
- Go to https://www.irctc.co.in
- Click on the TRAINS option given at the menu.
- Under the TRAINS option click on Connecting journey booking.
- Search for the train for which you would like to make the booking as the connecting journey.
- Once you’ve searched for the train, click on “Book now” button of your desired train to make the booking.
- Enter the PNR of your other ticket as promoted.
- The system will automatically check for the eligibility, if the passenger is eligible for the benefit, his or her details will appear.
