Gender neutrality on Rail Europe

On Rail Europe we’re making an effort to improve the way we ask for information about gender. Our aim is to make our product easy to use for people of any gender, and as far as possible to be gender-neutral.

There are currently a few places on our site where we require information on gender. We ask for customers’ title (i.e. Mr, Mrs, Miss, or Ms) when making seat reservations and during payment. We also sometimes ask for information about gender when booking sleeper trains (which may have separate compartments for men and women).

Unfortunately, right now we can’t simply stop asking for this information, because some of our partners require it when we make a booking with them on your behalf. For example, some train operators print passengers’ titles on their tickets. Even more challenging, some operators assign passengers to a mixed-sex or single-sex sleeper compartment based on their title.

We are working on a multi-stage plan:

• In the short-term, we’re adding explainers to our website and apps where we ask for info on gender, to explain why and point users towards this article.
• In the medium-term, we’ll investigate which of our partners require information on gender, and when. This should allow us to stop asking for information when it isn’t required.
• Our long-term goal is to set out to our partners the results of our investigation, so they can ask for passenger information in a more inclusive way.