An even cheaper option - unless you are a great museum goer (because over 500 museums are covered by the STP) - is to get the Half Fare Card and then buy Saver Day Passes for those days where you have a lot of travel - Wengen to Zermatt, Luzern to St Moritz, St. M. back to Zürich. For the rest buy point to point tickets at the Half Fare price. These Saver Day Passes go on sale 60 days out. Price starts low and rises as date of travel nears. so buy ASAP.

Thanks for the info. about the Saver Day Passes.

For now, I'm scheduled to do one long train ride per day, so ZRH to Wengen, Wengen to Zermatt on another day, Zermatt to Luzern on another day, Luzern to St. Moritz on another day.

The lowest Saver Day Passes I'm seeing is 49 CHF in August, with the HFC, 2nd class.

At 49 CHF, it's already higher than all the fares I've seen for the trips I plan to take except for one, Zermatt-Luzern, which comes up 117 CHF full-fare. So I would save about 10 CHF on that fare.

I'm looking at the SBB Mobile app. on my iPhone. Unfortunately, it's using my location and saying no offers, though it does show the Day Pass button there.

Thing is I was planning to get the HFC when I arrived. I wonder how much they would charge to send it to the US and whether it would get here before I leave on 6 August.

Buy the HFC online and it's delivered to your email address. You don't even have to print it out. Just show the conductor the HFC, SDP or any train tickets with the QR code using your device.

Do download them as a PDF so you can pull them up when offline.

They don't charge a fee of any kind for delivery, even electronic delivery?

They may well charge you if they have to courier it to you or post it to you but online purchase with print at home - no fee for delivery. Just get it online.

However some Americans report difficulty in paying with a US Visa or Mastercard online with the SBB because the SBB site has an additional level of security for credit card payments which apparently has not reached the US yet -- it is very common here. AMEX doesn't need this and that should work. Try it. If you have aproblem then wait till you get here. But get that SDP for the Zermatt/Luzern trip now IF you can.

Hambagahle- are you saying that if we can't purchase the HFC on line with a U.S. credit card, we can still we purchase on line SDP and regular half fare tickets even though we dont have the HFC yet? That means we need it for the conductor on board and not before- correct? We can buy the HFC when we arrive in Switzerland.

The reason I said "IF you can.." re the SDP is that if you cannot buy the HFC online because your CC won't work on the SBB site you will not be able to buy the SDP either.

BUT IF you can buy the SDP online you do not have to already have the Half Fare Card. You simply check the box that says you will have the HFC. And then can get it at the station on arrival. But ALL depends if you can use your CC on the SBB site. If it works for the HFC it will work for the SDP and vice versa.

It is a bit of a "loop" I am afraid. See if you can get both at once online. If not forget the SDP and just buy the HFC on arrival at the airport station.

HFC can be purchased on-the-spot if necessary. The cost is the same.

SDP can be purchased online before you possess and HFC. The conductor only cares that you can present both (with validity) at the same time upon request. However, if you are buying HFC priced SDP and other train tickets online in advance, you might as well purchase your HFC online, too.

Sammy - you are correct but please do read previous posts. Everything you say I said above! Plus - It is entirely possible that the OP won't be able to use her US CC on the SBB site at all!