Traveller in Guangdong can now reserve train tickets by simply sending an SMS, on the lines of a similar service launched in Guangzhou earlier this month.

China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom personal handy phone service (PHS) users can reserve tickets using an electronic system that sends automated responses to SMS requests. The reservation numbers are 061002, 1138, and 9393 for China Mobile, China Unicom and PHS respectively.

The system will send back the ticket price, ticket window number and a unique ticket code, after users send the short message D+ Date+ departing station +arriving station +train number + type of seat + ticket number to one of the above-mentioned telephone numbers.

Users in Shenzhen

Shenzhen users have to produce their ticket codes and ID cards when picking up the tickets from windows at the Shenzhen Railway Station in Luohu.

Reservations must be made four to six days in advance and users are limited to three tickets for each train. Tickets can be reserved between 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. and picked up between 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Tickets must be collected on the same day they are reserved.

People can also book train tickets by dialing the hotline of the Shenzhen Railway Station 95105160.

The railway station does not charge extra for the new services. However, there is no English service for either SMS or telephone ticket reservation.

In a separate development, the names of the station of origin and the destination are now printed in pinyin on the train tickets for the convenience of foreigners. The new tickets became available July 10.

Editor: Wing