5 Situations Where Your Train Ticket Refund Can Be Rejected

You may have booked a train ticket through IRCTC website or from the railway ticket counter but you later had a change of plan and decided to cancel the ticket. If you haven't received the refund, here are 10 such situations that may be the reason for rejection of refund request by IRCTC. Note that these are applicable on e-tickets or i-tickets only.

1. Tatkal ticket

Tatkal ticket provision allows passengers to book a train journey ticket just 24 hours prior to the date of the journey at a higher price. These were introduced for last minute bookings for people travelling due to various emergency reasons

However, no refund is provided to the user on cancellation of a confirmed tatkal ticket. If your ticket was on the waitlist or incase of contingent cancellation, you will get a partial refund from the department as per the prescribed rules. Partial cancellation of Tatkal e-tickets is allowed.

2. Confirmed ticket on the day of journey

You will not be receiving any refund if you cancel a confirmed ticket less than 4 hours prior to the train's scheduled departure.

If a confirmed ticket is cancelled more than 48 hrs before the scheduled departure of the train, flat cancellation charges shall be deducted at Rs.240 for AC First Class/Executive Class, Rs.200 for AC 2 Tier/First Class, Rs. 180 for AC 3 Tier/AC Chair car/ AC 3 Economy, Rs.120 for Sleeper Class and Rs.60 for Second Class. Cancellation charges are per passenger.

If a confirmed ticket is cancelled within 48 hrs and up to 12 hours before the scheduled departure of the train, cancellation charges shall be 25% of the fare subject to the minimum flat rate mentioned in the above clause.

3. RAC ticket on the day of journey

Any refund will not be given by the Indian Railways on a RAC (reservation against cancellation) e-ticket if the cancellation is not filed up to 30 minutes before the scheduled departure of the train.

4. Party tickets

In case, on a party e-ticket or a family e-ticket issued for travel of more than one passenger, some passengers have confirmed reservation and others are on RAC or waiting list, full refund of fare (minus clerkage), shall be admissible for confirmed passengers also subject to the condition that the ticket shall be cancelled online or online TDR shall be filed for all the passengers up to thirty minutes prior to the scheduled departure of the train.

5. Lost I-ticket

If you lose your ticket, make sure you inform the authorities immediately about the loss. The passenger can be issued a duplicate ticket in such a case  to be able to travel on the reservation made but a refund cannot be granted on the grounds of loss of ticket.