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Tatkal: All tips, tricks and cards?

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SpiesCan'tCatchMe said:
Whati personally do is, visit the nearest post office and grab your tatkal ticket confirmed everytime
Click to expand...
Post office tatkal?

I do it with my local railway booking office - but only cause this is a tiny town, and booking officer is generous enough to book 5 tickets first and then return leftover money.
 
Batman said:
Post office tatkal?

I do it with my local railway booking office - but only cause this is a tiny town, and booking officer is generous enough to book 5 tickets first and then return leftover money.
Click to expand...
I don't have railway station in my town so post office is the only option orelse you're on your own
 
The post office in my hometown provides this service but there always is a long queue of agents since morning outside the post office 😁
 

nileshgr said:
I will tell you one interesting trick which I discovered to AVOID booking Tatkal. It's by no means, foolproof, and it's very likely that I got lucky. But the math seems to make sense. Don't hold me responsible if it doesn't work.

See the coach layout of your train and decide which class you want to book. See the number of seats in the said family of coach.

Now, go to indianrail website (not irctc), check availability 120 days from today by inputting the train number, source & destination.

Make a note of how many seats it shows available.

Now do the same for your required journey date and see what is the WL count and TYPE (RL/PQ/GN).

The chance of ticket confirmation priority is: (head office/defence quotas) > GNWL > RLWL > PQWL > everything else.

Head office & defence quotas are usually very small in number to make any significance.

  1. If your required-date availability enquiry is showing as RLWL, then change the source station to somewhere near the starting station of the train (may have to adjust the journey date accordingly). Keep doing this until you get GNWL.
  2. Once you arrive at a station which is giving you GNWL number, do some math as given below:
    • Total number of berths = berth per coach * number of coaches (A)
    • Berths that were confirmed-booked = number seen as available 120 days in advance for the same pair of source-destination. (B)
    • Effective number of berths which have been pushed under WL = (A) - (B) [C]
  3. WL will typically have two numbers, which says WL X/Y - where X is the max number, and Y is the current number (or the number you will get when you book).
  4. If the number Y is <= number obtained in Step 2 [C], you can take a risk & book the WL ticket, your ticket will most likely get confirmed at the time of charting. If you wish, you can consider some margin of safety in this.
I did this study on a few trains and discovered roughly 30% seats are only released for confirmed-booked status. Everything else is pushed by railways under WL, I don't know the reason behind this.

For highest possible chances - book GNWL only - it may even mean paying a bit higher fare compared to normal, but when you do that, mark the "boarding at" your station. It's very likely cheaper in comparison to Tatkal & Premium Tatkal though.

RLWLs also get confirmed, but it's a gimmick. GNWL has highest priority since AFAIK it is allocated only to full length passengers.

Based on the above math, I recently made a relative book WL 25,26 in a train having just ONE 2A coach. 2 hours before the charting time, the WL count went down to 15,16 and few minutes before charting, it was WL 8,9 and then it was confirmed.

Although for booking GNWL, the relative had to book a signifnicantly longer journey 1798 km journey vs 1048 km. Fare difference of ₹790.

Different charting time - the chart was prepared previous day at the origin station and relative boarded next day afternoon at their station which falls en route.
The extra fare difference was probably more than Tatkal, but at least significantly less uncertainty and headache compared to Tatkal.


That said, the best way to have certainty while booking Tatkal is to use a payment provider which doesn't require OTP - HDFC Credit/Debit cards can be authenticated with a static password, or you can take Axis Bank OneTouch Token (this I have used for Tatkal booking).

The milliseconds delay in payment processing is the game changer. OTP is usually the delay because too many parties involved in it (IRCTC, Bank, Telco, etc).
Click to expand...
Use confirm ticket app it gives chances of confirmation and from where u r getting confirmation irrespective of your boarding stn, this app helps most of the time, jst use this app to plan journey otherwise you can book from any app or IRCTC with IRCTC user I'd n password
 
Sourabh_13 said:
1. Using the HDFC cards would mean a need to mention the card details on the payment page, right? Or am I not aware of something? (I would very much like to use a credit card for tatkal ticket payments but don't use it due to the time-cost).

2. What is this Axis OneTouch token? Is it also for an Axis bank credit/debit card?
Click to expand...

Yes, you need to be fast at filling payment info. The HDFC feature I'm referring to is this - HDFC NetSafe: https://netsafe.hdfcbank.com/ACSWeb/enrolljsp/HDFCValidate.jsp?try=1

Once you set a 3D Secure password for your card there, on the payment page you will get the option of inputting password instead of OTP.

Axis OneTouch is a hardware OTP generator for Net banking transactions. AFAIK, Axis is the only bank which offers this hardware OTP token for retail customers.

It's more prevalent in corporate sector.

My previous thread on Axis OneTouch https://www.technofino.in/community/threads/anyone-using-axis-onetouch-device.20117/

2024 said:
Use confirm ticket app it gives chances of confirmation and from where u r getting confirmation irrespective of your boarding stn, this app helps most of the time, jst use this app to plan journey otherwise you can book from any app or IRCTC with IRCTC user I'd n password
Click to expand...

These apps are mostly useless. The trend doesn't tell you anything. For my waitlisted tickets I've seen worse prediction numbers but it got confirmed because of the math logic I shared earlier.

Mostly they predict the trend on the basis of WL X/Y, where X is the total waitlist counter and Y is the current number. A high difference X - Y indicates a lot of tickets being cancelled so chances of confirmation is high. It's nonsense.
 
nileshgr said:
I will tell you one interesting trick which I discovered to AVOID booking Tatkal. It's by no means, foolproof, and it's very likely that I got lucky. But the math seems to make sense. Don't hold me responsible if it doesn't work.

See the coach layout of your train and decide which class you want to book. See the number of seats in the said family of coach.

Now, go to indianrail website (not irctc), check availability 120 days from today by inputting the train number, source & destination.

Make a note of how many seats it shows available.

Now do the same for your required journey date and see what is the WL count and TYPE (RL/PQ/GN).

The chance of ticket confirmation priority is: (head office/defence quotas) > GNWL > RLWL > PQWL > everything else.

Head office & defence quotas are usually very small in number to make any significance.

  1. If your required-date availability enquiry is showing as RLWL, then change the source station to somewhere near the starting station of the train (may have to adjust the journey date accordingly). Keep doing this until you get GNWL.
  2. Once you arrive at a station which is giving you GNWL number, do some math as given below:
    • Total number of berths = berth per coach * number of coaches (A)
    • Berths that were confirmed-booked = number seen as available 120 days in advance for the same pair of source-destination. (B)
    • Effective number of berths which have been pushed under WL = (A) - (B) [C]
  3. WL will typically have two numbers, which says WL X/Y - where X is the max number, and Y is the current number (or the number you will get when you book).
  4. If the number Y is <= number obtained in Step 2 [C], you can take a risk & book the WL ticket, your ticket will most likely get confirmed at the time of charting. If you wish, you can consider some margin of safety in this.
I did this study on a few trains and discovered roughly 30% seats are only released for confirmed-booked status. Everything else is pushed by railways under WL, I don't know the reason behind this.

For highest possible chances - book GNWL only - it may even mean paying a bit higher fare compared to normal, but when you do that, mark the "boarding at" your station. It's very likely cheaper in comparison to Tatkal & Premium Tatkal though.

RLWLs also get confirmed, but it's a gimmick. GNWL has highest priority since AFAIK it is allocated only to full length passengers.

Based on the above math, I recently made a relative book WL 25,26 in a train having just ONE 2A coach. 2 hours before the charting time, the WL count went down to 15,16 and few minutes before charting, it was WL 8,9 and then it was confirmed.

Although for booking GNWL, the relative had to book a signifnicantly longer journey 1798 km journey vs 1048 km. Fare difference of ₹790.

Different charting time - the chart was prepared previous day at the origin station and relative boarded next day afternoon at their station which falls en route.
The extra fare difference was probably more than Tatkal, but at least significantly less uncertainty and headache compared to Tatkal.


That said, the best way to have certainty while booking Tatkal is to use a payment provider which doesn't require OTP - HDFC Credit/Debit cards can be authenticated with a static password, or you can take Axis Bank OneTouch Token (this I have used for Tatkal booking).

The milliseconds delay in payment processing is the game changer. OTP is usually the delay because too many parties involved in it (IRCTC, Bank, Telco, etc).
Click to expand...
All this to book a train ticket and even if we are ready to pay extra.

This has been happening since 20 years, no improvement.
 
sm9811911 said:
All this to book a train ticket and even if we are ready to pay extra.

This has been happening since 20 years, no improvement.
Click to expand...

This system of quotas exist because a lot of tickets do get cancelled at the last moment. WL is just a way of overbooking to ensure that the train doesn't run empty due to last minute cancellations.

If you are 'ready to pay more', just pay for the extra km and get higher chances of confirmed ticket.

If train runs from A to C via B, then maximum seats will be allocated to the stations near A.

Some small number of seats are allocated on next priority basis to important station B, which comes under "Remote Location" quota. The RLWL will confirm only if there are no bookings in the section longer than that.

Even smaller number of seats are allocated for the other stations which fall en route.

It's such a complicated system! But I guess it exists for a reason.
 
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nileshgr said:
This system of quotas exist because a lot of tickets do get cancelled at the last moment. WL is just a way of overbooking to ensure that the train doesn't run empty due to last minute cancellations.

If you are 'ready to pay more', just pay for the extra km and get higher chances of confirmed ticket.

If train runs from A to C via B, then maximum seats will be allocated to the stations near A.

Some small number of seats are allocated on next priority basis to important station B, which comes under "Remote Location" quota. The RLWL will confirm only if there are no bookings in the section longer than that.

Even smaller number of seats are allocated for the other stations which fall en route.

It's such a complicated system! But I guess it exists for a reason.
Click to expand...
This is not about quota. That all is ok

Just disappointed at current state of railways. How difficult is it to book a confirmed train ticket. You see the pics of the crowded trains and just feel sad. And how these issues haven’t been resolved even after so many years of independence.
 
sm9811911 said:
This is not about quota. That all is ok

Just disappointed at current state of railways. How difficult is it to book a confirmed train ticket. You see the pics of the crowded trains and just feel sad. And how these issues haven’t been resolved even after so many years of independence.
Click to expand...
Bro...Indian Railways (IR) is serving over 2.4Cr passengers every day (+ goods). IR runs over 13K trains across the country. The running track length is more than 1L Km covering around 68K Km distance. Look at the scale and stress on the system. What they are doing is not at all an easy job.

One can rightfully feel sad looking at the crowded trains but don't put the blame only on the IR and governments. I am not saying the both have been managing everything the best way possible (of course the politics and corruption is there but these things are not IR specific), but be also conscious about the tough environment they are working in.

Even if railways are managed the best way without any politics and curruption, we (the country) simply do not have enough resources to quickly further scale railways to solve the crowded-trains problem. Other transportation modes too need to be made better and there has to a good integration of all these transportation modes. IR alone can't cater to the need of all travellers of the country.

Also, I see IR improving continuously at least in some departments. Electrification of the tracks, double-lines have brought significant improvements in reducing the travel times and delays that used to happen due to unavailability of the track. On the route I frequently travel on, now trains are usually 15-30 mins late at my deboarding station as opposed to 1-3 hours late which used to happen till some 8-10 years back.

I had to go to a train station or post office to book train tickets and stand in a queue but now I book even the tatkal tickets from my home. For me, this is a 'problem-resolved-to-a-great-degree'.

Earlier, train bogies and toilets used to be dirty, taps used to be broken or out of water, caterers and train staff didn't use to follow any rules and there weren't any consequences for that, we had to pay extra money for water bottles and shitty food, etc. In recent years, I have been able to get any such complaints resolved within around 30 minutes by simply tweeting. This is a 'problem-pretty-much-solved' for me.

IR has been improving itself pretty much when it comes to using tech (again, I am not saying it is the best, of course, there are problems). I know we (Indians) are habitual of criticizing everything (especially if the gov is somehow involved in it) but we should also consider the tough conditions in which these services are running.
 
Last edited:
Sourabh_13 said:
Bro...Indian Railways (IR) is serving over 2.4Cr passengers every day (+ goods). IR runs over 13K trains across the country. The running track length is more than 1L Km covering around 68K Km distance. Look at the scale and stress on the system. What they are doing is not at all an easy job.

One can rightfully feel sad looking at the crowded trains but don't put the blame only on the IR and governments. I am not saying the both have been managing everything the best way possible (of course the politics and corruption is there but these things are not IR specific), but be also conscious about the tough environment they are working in.

Even if railways are managed the best way without any politics and curruption, we (the country) simply do not have enough resources to quickly further scale railways to solve the crowded-trains problem. Other transportation modes too need to be made better and there has to a good integration of all these transportation modes. IR alone can't cater the need of all travellers of the country.

Also, I see IR improving continuously at least in some departments. Electrification of the tracks, double-lines have brought significant improvements in reducing the travel times and delays that used to happen due to unavailability of the track. On the route I frequently travel on, now trains are usually 15-30 mins late at my deboarding station as opposed to 1-3 hours late which used to happen till some 8-10 years back.

I had to go to a train station or post office to book train tickets and stand in a queue but now I book even the tatkal tickets from my home. For me, this is a 'problem-resolved-to-a-great-degree'.

Earlier, train bogies and toilets used to be dirty, taps used to broken or out of water, caterers and train staff didn't used to follow any rules, we had to pay extra money for water bottles and shitty food, etc. In recent years, I have been able to get any such complaints resolved within around 30 minutes by simply twitting. This is a 'problem-pretty-much-solved' for me.

IR have been improving themselves pretty much when it comes to using tech (again, I am not saying it is the best, of course, there are problems). I know we (Indians) are habitual of criticizing everything (especially if the gov is somehow involved in it) but we should also consider the tough conditions in which these services are running.
Click to expand...
yes you’re right. I am wrong. Thank you
 
We Are Not Able to Get Confirmed Tatkal Tickets Because of These Software. They Are Using Some Loopholes and Hacks to Get Confirm Tickets in Just 20 Seconds.

Look at These videos carefully.



 
Have you tried booking premium tatkal they also open at the same time and the same price but I guess you can get the ticket atleast by paying some premium. P. S. This was suggested by a friend I haven't verified this myself
 
Rahul098 said:
Have you tried booking premium tatkal they also open at the same time and the same price but I guess you can get the ticket atleast by paying some premium. P. S. This was suggested by a friend I haven't verified this myself
Click to expand...
Dynamic pricing 📈
 
Batman said:
I booked a tatkal ticket ~3 years ago. It was thrilling, but easy.
I tried to book tatkal 3 days ago. I failed consistently.

So, here I am, looking for all tips and tricks to book a tatkal ticket - AC or sleeper.

Note that tickets go out in 2 minutes (10.02 or 11.02) in the route on which I travel. So I need all tips relevant to that.
Click to expand...
Do a dry run, one day in advance. Keep names and particulars saved in master list.
 
At 9:55-9:57 log in. By 9:59, you must have searched for the train you want and click on the Sleeper section to keep it active. Once its 10, then click on 3AC and the Book Now option would be enabled. A minute to fill the details, reach the payment gateway page and then choose as you please. I usually pay it off with Amex since I get the OTP via mail /SMS. UPI might be faster as others say but I will stick with my good luck charm. By 10:02 I would have made the payment and should get ticket confirmation by 10:03. If your route has tickets available much longer, then you're in a lucky route. For Non AC tatkal, same process by 1055. The fastest confirmation I got was by 10:01. Also I use only laptop or PC for this, mobile I don't trust or hasn't been that lucky.
 
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