Meanings
plural booking offices
- UKA place where tickets are sold, e.g. at a railway station or theatre.
The NYMR [North Yorkshire Moors Railway] runs the booking office in Whitby, selling national rail tickets alongside those for the steam services.
2019 October, James Abbott, “Esk Valley revival”, in Modern Railways, page 781 more example
Traditionally, 'ticket office' seems to have been the preferred term in America, with Britain using the term 'booking office' (as an 1881 edition of The Railway Age Monthly and Railway Service Magazine explains). Today, the two are often used interchangeably (as the recent 'Save our ticket offices' campaign shows), with the term 'ticketing' perhaps capturing more of the point-of-sale transaction and issuing of tickets within stations.
2024 March 6, Dr Joseph Brennan, “England's booking offices of distinction”, in RAIL, number 1004, page 56Synonyms: ticket office
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA place where tickets are sold, e.g. at a railway station or theatre.
Cite this entry
booking office. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/booking%20office
“booking office.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/booking%20office. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “booking office,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/booking%20office.
Source: booking office on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.