IRCTC ticket reservation: Tatkal new rules you must know about

Indian Railways is working hard, relentlessly by introducing new things to make lives easy for travellers and one such thing is introduction of latest Tatkal ticket booking rules. This is one of the best facilities provided for end moment booking of tickets. As per records, around 13 lakh people book tatkal tickets from IRCTC portal every day and to make things more traveller-friendly IRCTC has modified a few tatkal rules. These steps are being taken to strengthen the IRCTC ticket reservation system.
Read More: ​ Tatkal ticket booking rules 2018: everything you wanted to know

Let’s have a look at new Tatkal rules:
1) One can book only six tickets in a month from a single user ID. But 12 tickets can be booked by Aadhaar verified user. And during opening hours i.e. between 8 AM to 10 AM, one person can only book two tickets.

2) Between 8 AM and 12 in the noon, single page/quickbook services will not be available. At a time, single user can only have one log-in session. Captcha will be available at login, along with passenger detail, and payment pages.

3) There’s an additional level of security in the new rules wherein user will be required to answer a question after filling up personal information like user name, mobile number, among others.

4) Agents will only be allowed to book tickets between 8 AM to 8:30 AM, 10 AM to 10.30 AM, and 11 AM to 11:30 AM, while authorised travel agents cannot book tatkal tickets during the first 30 minutes of opening.


5) Now the tatkal online ticket booking is time sensitive and the standard time to fill up passenger details is 25 seconds while minimum input time for Captcha on details and payment pages is 5 seconds only.

6) Users will be given only ten seconds for making the payment, and one-time password (OTP) is mandatory for payments.

7) Online berth reservation for air-conditioned (AC) coaches will start at 10 AM while for sleeper class is 11 AM.

8) If a train does not depart in three hours of its scheduled departure time, then passengers are eligible for complete refund of train fare and tatkal charges, only.

9) If train’s route is diverted and a passenger doesn’t wishes to travel, then he/she can claim a full refund.

10) Full refund can be claimed by a passenger if shifted to any lower class, and he/she doesn't want to travel in the changed class. And if he/she decides to travel in the lower class, he/she will get the difference paid.