How to Book Tatkal Train Tickets Quickly in IRCTC ? Many of us do search helpful tips to book tatkal train tickets at great ease.Here is another post on IRCTC. IRCTC  Tatkal Tickets are available one day prior to the journey according to the latest rules. For instance on 23rd May 2012 you can book tickets of the 24rd May 2012 scheduled train.

Some times the advanced reservation period may be 2 days instead of 1 day because it is calculated from originating station departure time. So at first find out the originating time of your train. Do refer Tatkal Ticket booking timing revised.

I recommend you to have a trail one day before the booking date, so that you can have overall idea regarding at what time exactly the tatkal quota is being booked totally. For example if you want to book IRCTC ticket on 23rd, then log in on 22nd 10 AM to check details. Of course this will be applicable only for daily trains.

If any train tatkal quota is totally booked at sharp 10:05 AM then technically it is not possible to book ticket via IRCTC. Because by the time you select class and click on Book link and going through all the subsequent pages, the time will be already 5 minutes over. Moreover the website becomes dead slow after 8 AM, no matter even you are having 10 Mbps net connection. So you will end up booking wait listed ticket even though confirmed seat is available at the time of clicking Book link.

The below tips may be useful for successful ticket booking via IRCTC.

In tatkal ticket booking you can book up to four passengers. If you want to book ticket only for one person then entering details may not take much time. But some times entering details for four persons may take lot of time which reduces successful ticket booking chances.

So what to do?

Magic Autofill form developed by Amit Agarwal (owner of the well known tech blog www.labnol.org) is a good solution I will suggest to you. The procedure is clearly mentioned in the above page link itself. Actually here you are filling the form details in advance so that time can be saved.

Tips to improve your chances of booking tatkal tickets quickly:

Some times while you are on IRCTC website you may get the page like Service Unavailable. Just refresh the page, the problem will be solved. Unless you do some action the message Service Unavailable will be there. That’s the reason why I recommend to refresh page.

Don’t click on any option unless the page is fully loaded. Many people in hurry will try to click on the payment Gateway bank during page loading itself. Later you cannot proceed further and not even able to click on the same gateway option because the system thinks that the gateway is already selected. You can do nothing at this stage. The only option left is to log in again and start from the scratch. So wait still the page is fully loaded.

Be familiar with the Captcha image by having a trail. Since it is always in capital letter, you can turn CAPS LOCK on when entering this field. A wrong entry of captcha can lead to a wait listed ticket.

Always try to log in before 10 a.m. (logging in at 09:45 a.m. is recommended). Also try to keep the session active by performing some activity. Otherwise session will get expired (session expiration means if the screen is idle for some time, then you will be automatically logged out and you have to log in again for booking tickets).

While the page is being processing , never click refresh or try to click once again on the same link. This will lead to session expiration. Of course many people know it very well.

While entering source and destination stations, it’s always recommended to enter station codes instead of full station name for quicker booking. So keep your source and destination station codes handy and if possible remember them.

Booking can be possible via Plan My Travel link only because Quick Book is not allowed between 08:00 AM to 12:00 PM.

If your payment is via ATM card then keep your card number and name already stored in a notepad file and just copy paste them. By this way some time can be saved. I think booking via net banking account is quick as compared to ATM payment.

Other way to book Tatkal Tickets:

One more quick way to book Tatkal ticket is booking via IMPS payment gateway. The advantage here is you just need to enter mobile number, MMID and OTP. Also the charge for IMPS is just Rs.5/- for ticket up to Rs.5000/- and Rs.10/- for any ticket amount exceeding Rs.5000/-. A saving of Rs.5/- as compared to booking via net banking or debit card :) . I strongly recommend you to generate OTP (one time password) at least 15 minutes before the transaction so that you can feel cool at the time of entering data on IMPS PG page. OTP will be valid for 1 hour only and that too for only one transaction. Whether the transaction is success or failure the same OTP cannot be used again.

Final Important Tip:While entering input in Plan my Travel enter source, destination codes and select date, ticket type, quota and click on Find Trains button before 10 a.m.. I recommend to do this at sharp 9:58 a.m. (if you do this more before this time then remember to keep the session active). Your desired train will be displayed under List of trains. But never try to click on the class option button like 2A, 3A, or SL before 10 a.m. If you do this and click on Book button, even after 10 AM you will get a message like INTERNET incoming day booking not allowed before 8 AM Tatkal ARP Booking not allowed before 10 AM.

What I want to say is you can click on Find Trains before 10 a.m. but you should click on class of travel (3AC or SL or any other) only after sharp 10 a.m. Hope you got this. I recommend you to experience it practically by having a trail.