£1000 bill for travelling on Virgin Trains on a 'LM only' ticket.

[drbdrb]

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/tran...arding-the-wrong-train-to-london-9782039.html

Man given £1,000 bill for boarding the wrong train to London

A passenger “looked a little faint” when a ticket inspector charged him £1,000 for boarding the wrong train to London.

The man, 40, was travelling from Birmingham New Street to Euston with 38 family and friends.

They had all bought London Midland-only tickets but had accidentally boarded a faster Virgin Trains service. He decided to pay the bill rather than face a fine and prosecution.

A fellow passenger said: “It was a pretty heart-stopping moment. He looked a little faint. The inspector was very matter of fact about it all and I understand he was doing his job — but it was an honest mistake. I think allowances should be made when it does look like a genuine error"...

39 people on a Virgin train with London Midland only tickets.

Nice commission.

 

[SS4]

A passenger “looked a little faint” when a ticket inspector charged him £1,000 for boarding the wrong train to London.

The man, 40, was travelling from Birmingham New Street to Euston with 38 family and friends.

They had all bought London Midland-only tickets but had accidentally boarded a faster Virgin Trains service. He decided to pay the bill rather than face a fine and prosecution.

A fellow passenger said: “It was a pretty heart-stopping moment. He looked a little faint. The inspector was very matter of fact about it all and I understand he was doing his job — but it was an honest mistake. I think allowances should be made when it does look like a genuine error.”

A spokesman for Virgin Trains said: “If passengers have booked to travel with another operator their tickets are not valid on [our] services.”

At least he doesn't go on at the guard. Ultimately though how does one not spot your ticket saying London Midland Only?

1000/39 = ~£25 each so it's quite cheap per person but imagine seeing this on your bank statement!

 

[richw]

Other reports state the excess was £800 in addition to £248 paid for the existing tickets.

 

[Deerfold]

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/tran...arding-the-wrong-train-to-london-9782039.html

39 people on a Virgin train with London Midland only tickets.

Nice commission.

39 people and none of them noticed the restriction‽

 

[CC 72100]

Isn't it funny how people 'accidentally' board trains which are faster, or 'accidentally' sit in first class....

Making a mistake to get something better. Is it really a mistake?

(I'm in a cynical mood today!)

 

[Deerfold]

Other reports state the excess was £800 in addition to £248 paid for the existing tickets.

If so they were let off lightly, as usually you can't excess TOC-specific tickets.

 

[Flamingo]

Isn't it funny how people 'accidentally' board trains which are faster, or 'accidentally' sit in first class....

Making a mistake to get something better. Is it really a mistake?

(I'm in a cynical mood today!)

I occasionally find people in Std on 1st class tickets, as they either don't realise they have a 1st class ticket, or don't know there is 1st class on the train, or even think that they are already in 1st class.

However, this is nowhere near the number that are in 1st class on Std tickets and don't realise they are in 1st class...

 

[yorkie]

Little does the passenger who said "it was an honest mistake. I think allowances should be made when it does look like a genuine error" realise that this is precisely how the railway treats people who made an honest mistake in non-Penalty Fare situations and when a certain amount of discretion is shown, and an allowance was made!

 

[CC 72100]

I occasionally find people in Std on 1st class tickets, as they either don't realise they have a 1st class ticket, or don't know there is 1st class on the train, or even think that they are already in 1st class.

Saying that, I have seen people think that Coach D on FGW HSTs is 1st class due to the TV screens.

I have also seen people on the ATW Mk3 set think that the whole train was 1st class because it was all so nice

Going back to the original story - I wonder how the gentleman in question purchased the tickets. With a group of 38, surely it would make sense to go through group travel, which I can only imagine would involve contact with a human who would say that the tickets he wants to buy have a specific TOC-only restriction.

 

[Smethwickian]

The station announcements at Birmingham New Street always include operator names and those for London-bound trains usually make specific reference to "tickets marked London Midland only" not being valid on VT services and vice-versa, as do the platform departure screens.

 

[NSEFAN]

I find it hard to believe that none of the group realised what they were doing. I can't say either that it's fair to bend the rules for them considering that everyone else has paid a premium.

 

[island]

They got off very lightly. The correct charge would have been £3,198.

 

[bnm]

One group leader perhaps holding all the tickets, and perhaps someone of high social standing in said group, the rest meekly following his lead? Many were children in the group also.

Easy to understand then how they all boarded the wrong train without anyone in the group questioning the tickets.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

They got off very lightly. The correct charge would have been £3,198.

We can't be sure of the 'correct' charge. An unspecified number of the group were children.

The 'correct' charge is whatever the TM decided, using his discretion.

 

[Abpj17]

The red of Virgin trains is very distinctive too...

 

[yorkie]

The red of Virgin trains is very distinctive too...

are restrictions set by livery now?

 

[SS4]

Isn't it funny how people 'accidentally' board trains which are faster, or 'accidentally' sit in first class....

Making a mistake to get something better. Is it really a mistake?

(I'm in a cynical mood today!)

Yet the opposite is rarely the case

 

[Clip]

Little does the passenger who said "it was an honest mistake. I think allowances should be made when it does look like a genuine error" realise that this is precisely how the railway treats people who made an honest mistake in non-Penalty Fare situations and when a certain amount of discretion is shown, and an allowance was made!

Really? You really think this was an honest mistake? Im sorry but I simply do not agree with you. Not a chance.

What happenned is the group leader wanted to get the cheapest tickets available and when they got to the station they got hampered into getting the first train there or thought they would take the chance.

I simply struggle to believe that they did not know what they were buying or what they were going to travel on.

 

[GatwickDepress]

are restrictions set by livery now?

According to some staff at Gatwick Airport, yes.

 

[yorkie]

Really? You really think this was an honest mistake? Im sorry but I simply do not agree with you. Not a chance.

I made no comment on whether I thought it was an honest mistake or not.

The witness quoted stated it was an honest mistake and appeared to suggest that the person should have been treated as such and an allowance made. I was pointing out that the person was treated not only as having made an honest mistake but with an allowance for the original tickets held being made.

For the record, I couldn't possibly comment on whether it was an honest mistake or not. The amount charged may be perceived by some as too high, but it is - by a strict interpretation of the rules - too low. However I believe that a proportionate and sensible amount was charged, based on the (limited) information available.

 

[Clip]

Apologies I misread what you said.

But I still say it never was.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

The railway industry has to take some responsibility for making train travel so complicated. Would anyone board a train knowing that they were in line for a £1,000 fine? It's a pretty reckless action.

A few weeks ago, I got surcharged £150 on a Virgin train from London to Liverpool and it WAS an honest mistake - I genuinely thought the 15.07 was an off-peak service but it wasn't. No barrier check at Euston so I got on oblivious.

Needless to say I wasn't best pleased and, partly in a spirit of revenge, the next time I did the journey I tried the London Midland service. I saved about £40, got a nice table seat so I could get some work done and, best of all, can take my bike with me without pesky reservations. I'll probably never go back to Virgin and as I make the journey about a dozen times a year, Mr Branson has just lost £1,000.

 

[yorkie]

Apologies I misread what you said.

No worries!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

The railway industry has to take some responsibility for making train travel so complicated. Would anyone board a train knowing that they were in line for a £1,000 fine? It's a pretty reckless action.

It wasn't a fine. It was a charge made up of the difference between the fare paid, and the fare due. As mentioned earlier in the thread, this is more lenient than the rules allow for.

A few weeks ago, I got surcharged £150 on a Virgin train from London to Liverpool and it WAS an honest mistake - I genuinely thought the 15.07 was an off-peak service but it wasn't. No barrier check at Euston so I got on oblivious.

This would be best posted in a new thread, but it sounds to me, based on very limited information, that you held an Off Peak Return, and were instead of being excessed to an Anytime Return, charged a new Anytime Single because that was cheaper, leaving you to use the return portion of your Off Peak Return on a subsequent trip (if you wished to make another trip within the validity period).

That is the correct charge for a mistake, where the excess would cost more than a new ticket. The problem is not the actions of the staff, but the cost of the fares in the first place - and that high fare will be charged to anyone who used that train (and didn't already have an Advance or pass) - irrespective of whether or not a mistake was made.

Needless to say I wasn't best pleased and, partly in a spirit of revenge, the next time I did the journey I tried the London Midland service. I saved about £40, got a nice table seat so I could get some work done and, best of all, can take my bike with me without pesky reservations. I'll probably never go back to Virgin and as I make the journey about a dozen times a year, Mr Branson has just lost £1,000.

Well next time you made the journey, if it had been within a month, you'd have only needed a single to London. If after a month, then it's understandable you'd use a much cheaper operator, and I agree that if Virgin's fares are considered too high, people will understandably boycott them, which is your right and I'll support you in that.

However the charge in the case described in the article was - in my opinion - fair, proportional, and less than the theoretical 'correct' fare.

 

[LateThanNever]

Little does the passenger who said "it was an honest mistake. I think allowances should be made when it does look like a genuine error" realise that this is precisely how the railway treats people who made an honest mistake in non-Penalty Fare situations and when a certain amount of discretion is shown, and an allowance was made!

Quite!
In the end it really does show that rail ticketing needs a thorough overhaul - but in the privatised world there seems to be little chance...

 

[snail]

I doubt the person buying the tickets even knew they were LM only. They will have compared the price to the 'full' price and gone for the cheaper option.

But they should have questioned what 'London Midland only' meant when they received the tickets.

 

[68000]

The railway industry has to take some responsibility for making train travel so complicated. Would anyone board a train knowing that they were in line for a £1,000 fine? It's a pretty reckless action. .

It was not a fine and it is not anyone, it is a group of 39 folk charged the correct fare for the journey they took which worked out at £25 each if they were all adults

 

[bnm]

Apologies I misread what you said.

But I still say it never was.

You were there were you? Or do you have the ability to read the mind of the group leader?

 

[Mag_seven]

A few weeks ago, I got surcharged £150 on a Virgin train from London to Liverpool and it WAS an honest mistake - I genuinely thought the 15.07 was an off-peak service but it wasn't. No barrier check at Euston so I got on oblivious.

Are you therefore implying that because it was as you put it "an honest mistake" that you should NOT have been excessed to the correct fare for the 15.07?

 

[SussexMan]

It is so easy to say "they must have known". However, life has told me that many people fail to understand what seems to me as obvious. Of course a ticket saying London Midland Trains only means I can only travel on trains run by London Midland - but then I say "of course" because I know! However, there will be thousands of people out there who have no idea which TOCs operate services between London and Birmingham, who have no idea that more than one TOC could possibly operate on the same route, or who just wonder why Network Rail/Railtrack/British Rail paint trains in different colours! For some people, a ticket saying London Midland Trains only means they can only use trains that go between London and the Midlands. And to them, that's obviously what it means.

And with a group that size I would expect that 37 people in the group had never seen their ticket but they had been bought by one person and the others had no idea that they were on a restricted ticket.

 

[185143]

Isn't it funny how people 'accidentally' board trains which are faster, or 'accidentally' sit in first class....

Making a mistake to get something better. Is it really a mistake?

(I'm in a cynical mood today!)

I occasionally find people in Std on 1st class tickets, as they either don't realise they have a 1st class ticket, or don't know there is 1st class on the train, or even think that they are already in 1st class.

However, this is nowhere near the number that are in 1st class on Std tickets and don't realise they are in 1st class...

I have seen this only once. It was on an LM 350 from Birmingham to Liverpool, passenger had lits of luggage and couldn't be bothered to go to FC. She had an advance. Take the 20:07 or 21:07 from Manchester back towards Liverpool on a Saturday. Whenever I am on that train I have a first class ticket. Unsurprisingly, most of the compartment don't, and get moved on by the conductor!

 

[tony6499]

Everyone will read the newspaper, immediately see the £1000 figures and go on about jobs worth railwaymen etc without looking that the £1000 was spread amongst 38 people. There is probably a lot more to do with this story but that wouldn't make the headlines so sensational.