Breakdown of Я спросил у агента, входит ли страховка в цену билета.
Questions & Answers about Я спросил у агента, входит ли страховка в цену билета.
In Russian, спросить (to ask) is very often used with the preposition у plus the genitive case to show who you asked:
- спросить у кого? – to ask from whom / of whom
So:
- Я спросил у агента… – literally: I asked (from) the agent…
Here агента is in the genitive singular after у.
This pattern спросить у + genitive is extremely common and completely natural in Russian, especially in everyday speech.
You can say Я спросил агента, … and Russians will understand you. Grammatically it is possible: спросить кого? (accusative) is a standard pattern.
However, in actual modern usage:
- спросить у кого is more neutral and common in everyday speech.
- спросить кого (without у) can sound a bit more formal, bookish, or is used more in set phrases like спросить преподавателя, спросить специалиста.
So:
- Я спросил у агента… – the most typical conversational way.
- Я спросил агента… – grammatically fine, just slightly less colloquial in tone.
Both are acceptable; your sentence is perfectly natural with у агента.
The verbs:
- спрашивать – imperfective (ongoing, repeated, process)
- спросить – perfective (one complete action, result)
Using спросил here presents the action as a single, completed event:
- Я спросил у агента… – I asked the agent (once, got the question out).
If you said:
- Я спрашивал у агента, входит ли страховка в цену билета.
it would suggest something like I was asking / I used to ask the agent…, with a focus on the process, not on the fact that the question was completed.
In this context, where you simply report that you asked a question, the perfective спросил is the natural choice.
Yes. Russian past tense forms agree in gender and number with the subject.
- Male speaker: Я спросил у агента…
- Female speaker: Я спросила у агента…
Plural:
- Мы спросили у агента… – we asked the agent…
So you must adjust the ending:
- -л (masc.), -ла (fem.), -ли (pl.).
Ли is a particle that turns a clause into an indirect yes/no question (like whether/if in English).
Direct question:
- Страховка входит в цену билета? – Does the insurance come included in the ticket price?
Indirect (reported) question:
- Я спросил у агента, входит ли страховка в цену билета.
– I asked the agent whether the insurance is included in the ticket price.
So ли is roughly equivalent to whether / if after ask / wonder / know in English.
In indirect yes/no questions, ли usually comes right after the first stressed element of the clause, often the verb:
- входит ли страховка в цену билета
The structure is:
- [verb] + ли
- [subject] + [rest]
You cannot normally put ли at the very beginning or at the very end of the clause in modern standard Russian. For example:
- страховка входит ли в цену билета – sounds wrong in modern speech.
- ли страховка входит в цену билета – also wrong.
So the normal patterns are things like:
- Он спросил, придёт ли она.
- Я не знаю, будет ли дождь.
Because this is a complex sentence with a main clause and a subordinate clause (an indirect question):
- Main clause: Я спросил у агента – I asked the agent
- Subordinate clause: входит ли страховка в цену билета – whether the insurance is included in the ticket price
In Russian, subordinate clauses are separated from the main clause by a comma. So the comma before входит is required by punctuation rules.
There are two separate grammatical things here:
в цену – в
- accusative
- в with the accusative often expresses direction or inclusion:
входить в что? – to go into / to be included in something. - So входит в цену literally: enters into / is included in the price.
- цена (nom.) → цену (acc.) after в.
цена билета – price of the ticket
- Russian uses the genitive case to show possession or association:
цена чего? билета – the price of what? of the ticket. - билет (nom.) → билета (gen.).
- Russian uses the genitive case to show possession or association:
So the structure is:
- в (что?) цену (чего?) билета
– into the price of the ticket.
Literally, входить в цену is to go into the price, but idiomatically it means:
- to be included in the price / to be part of the price
It is a very common phrase in Russian when talking about things being included:
- Завтрак входит в цену номера. – Breakfast is included in the room price.
- Налоги входят в цену. – Taxes are included in the price.
So in your sentence:
- входит ли страховка в цену билета
– whether the insurance is included in the ticket price.
Both are related to insurance, but they’re used differently:
страховка
- colloquial, everyday word
- usually means the insurance policy / coverage itself
- what you as a customer “have” or “buy”
- natural in your sentence
страхование
- more formal, abstract, often used in legal, business contexts
- refers to the process / system of insurance
- appears in terms like медицинское страхование (medical insurance), автострахование (car insurance)
In your sentence, страховка is exactly right; страхование would sound too formal and abstract.
Yes, that is also correct and very natural:
- входит ли страховка в цену билета
- включена ли страховка в цену билета
Both mean essentially the same: whether insurance is included in the ticket price.
Nuance:
- входит в цену – literally “goes into the price,” slightly more neutral/idiomatic.
- включена в цену – literally “is included in the price,” focuses more explicitly on the result (it has been included).
In everyday speech, they are largely interchangeable here.
Direct question to the agent:
- Страховка входит в цену билета?
– Is the insurance included in the ticket price?
So the direct version uses normal question word order and no ли.
The full direct-speech construction could be:
- Я спросил у агента: Страховка входит в цену билета?
– I asked the agent, “Is the insurance included in the ticket price?”
When you turn it into reported speech (indirect question), you change the word order and add ли:
- Я спросил у агента, входит ли страховка в цену билета.