Advice on prosecution (16-25 railcard)

[will105]

Hi,

In May I purchased a train ticket to London Waterloo using my 16-25 railcard. Upon arriving at Waterloo I was unable to present my railcard due to it not being on my new phone. My details were taken down by the officer who notified they’d be in touch.

2 months later, I received an email asking me to explain the offence. Regrettably, I did not see this email and didn’t respond.

Around 1.5 months later I received a prosecution letter in the post with a fine of just over £1000. They stated the fine was made up of around £850 fare avoided and £200 in operational costs, however they didn’t explain how the fine was calculated etc.

I emailed the prosecutions department acknowledging that I was not able to present a railcard on 6th May which I admit, however I wanted an explanation for the large fine.

Around 2 weeks later they emailed back with a spreadsheet of over 40 train journeys I’d made apparently without a railcard (hence the £850 fine, which was calculated at the cost of fare avoided).

I then responded with evidence of my railcard purchase through emails, highlighting that I had held one on all of these journeys.

It has been around 2 weeks since I sent that email and I just received in the post today a court summons stating that they are taking me to court, stating ‘that you on Monday 6th May 2024 at London Waterloo did travel on a railway without having previously paid the fare of £28.10 and with intend to avoid payment there of. Contrary to s.5(3)(a) of the regulation of railways act 1889.

They are also fining me an additional £180 towards prosecutions cost.

I am now very confused and distressed as:

A) I purchased a ticket for this journey and have since provided evidence of holding a 16-25 railcard.

B) They have not acknowledged the £1000+ fine they initially issued me, causing significant confusion and stress from my end.

I have a court summon date for 15th October.

Please can anyone provide some advice on what I should do? The letters they have issued me are very distressing and don’t provide much clarity.

Thank you so much in advance.

Will

 

[Gloster]

Please post all the correspondance that you received in this thread. Please obscure your name, address and any other identifying details, such as reference numbers.

 

[will105]

Hi, please find attached.

 

[Hadders]

Welcome to the forum!

I just want to confirm the timeline. Can you confirm this is what happened:

• 6th May - you were stopped travelling with a railcard discounted ticket but were unable to present the railcard. Your details were taken for further investigation.
• 2 months later SWR emailed you, presemably asking for your version of events, you say you did not see this email and did not respond.
• 20th August - SWR write to you offering you an out of court settlement for £1,045
• You contacted them asking for a breakdown of this large sum. They responded with a breakdown showing 40 journeys between December 2022 and May 2024 which they believe you made when you didn't have a railcard (they've made a typo as they've said it was 1 16-15 railcard)
• You replied with evidence of your railcard
• SWR have sent you a court summons for the single offence on 6th May when you were caught

Also, can you confirm:

• Exactly what railcard do you hold. Is it a 16-25 railcard and have you held one that covers all the joureys made between December 2022 and May 2024?
• Did you apply a 16-17 railcard or a 16-25 railcard discount to the tickets you purchased. I suggest you check your ticket purchasing history in your Trainline account to confirm this.

Travelling with a railcard discounted ticket when you are unable to show the railcard makes the ticket invalid which is a criminal offence. Normally, if you forget your railcard train companies will allow you to send a copy of it in to them and drop any case against you. They allow this concession once a year. The problem here is you didn't reply to their original emai, if you had then that would've been the end of the matter.

If you can show that you held a valid railcard and the correct railcard discount was applied then I think there is a chance you can get SWR to withdraw the case against you but it's going to be harder to persuade them to do so than if you were dealing with this back in May. A grovelling letter will be required to have any chance....

If you can answer the questions above then we can advise next steps.

 

[will105]

Hi,

Thanks for your response. Yes, everything you summarised is an accurate description of the events and I can confirm that I applied a 16-25 railcard to all of those journeys and I held a valid 16-25 railcard (it was a 3 year railcard which I bought in October 2021 and expires tomorrow).

Will

 

[Elecman]

I think you might be able to persuade the train company to drop the prosecution but i suspect they will insist n you paying thier incurred costs to date

 

[Hadders]

Hi,

Thanks for your response. Yes, everything you summarised is an accurate description of the events and I can confirm that I applied a 16-25 railcard to all of those journeys and I held a valid 16-25 railcard (it was a 3 year railcard which I bought in October 2021 and expires tomorrow).

Will

Thanks for confirming.

My view is you should write a short, concise letter to SWR Prosecutions Office mentioning the following points:

- That you were unable to present your railcard when you were stopped on 6th May
- You didn't see the initial email they sent to you which is why you didn't reply
- The out of court settlement figure assumed you did not possess a valid railcard. You sent a copy of the railcard to SWR.
- You were surprised to be issued with a court summons given that you sent them details of your railcard
- Tell them that you have enclosed a copy of your railcard that covers the period from December 2022 to May 2024
- Apologise for the situation and ask if SWR will withdraw the case

I suggest you post a draft of your proposed letter in this thread so that forum members can proof read it and suggest amendments as it is important to get the wording right.

 

[furlong]

Normally the evidence would mention all the correspondence between the two parties as it is obviously of relevance.

SWR isn't known for being sloppy but we also have another current thread where they appear not to know basic railway geography! Are standards slipping?

 

[pedr]

Is it a defence to an RoRA charge to show that the passenger paid the correct fare? It’s not a ticket offence, as written, so having paid a fare but not being able to prove eligibility for that fare on the train is not the same as not paying the fare and intending to avoid it, surely?

Unless there’s authority suggesting that the correct fare for a person not in possession of a railcard is the undiscounted fare, which I think would be an uncharitable interpretation of “his fare”.

 

[furlong]

There's also an inconsistency in that they are asking for a higher amount of costs out-of-court than than in court - it should be the other way around. Plus, if it goes through court, they don't indicate what they are going to do about payment for all the remaining journeys they've identified. That should be covered clearly in the letter too. E.g. stating that they'll write them off or that they'll pursue that debt through the civil courts in addition to the criminal case.

 

[SussexMan]

2 months later, I received an email asking me to explain the offence. Regrettably, I did not see this email and didn’t respond.

Did that email give you an opportunity to upload an image of your valid railcard? If not, is there a missing communication from SWR (either not sent or not received) giving you an opportunity to evidence that you had a valid railcard at the time you were stopped?

 

[will105]

Did that email give you an opportunity to upload an image of your valid railcard? If not, is there a missing communication from SWR (either not sent or not received) giving you an opportunity to evidence that you had a valid railcard at the time you were stopped?

Hi,

All I received was the letter posted on the thread, which asked for my name, address, account etc. In the body of the email from the fraud investigator, it just stated 'please read the attached letter form SWR'.

Thanks
Will

Thanks for confirming.

My view is you should write a short, concise letter to SWR Prosecutions Office mentioning the following points:

- That you were unable to present your railcard when you were stopped on 6th May
- You didn't see the initial email they sent to you which is why you didn't reply
- The out of court settlement figure assumed you did not possess a valid railcard. You sent a copy of the railcard to SWR.
- You were surprised to be issued with a court summons given that you sent them details of your railcard
- Tell them that you have enclosed a copy of your railcard that covers the period from December 2022 to May 2024
- Apologise for the situation and ask if SWR will withdraw the case

I suggest you post a draft of your proposed letter in this thread so that forum members can proof read it and suggest amendments as it is important to get the wording right.

Hi,

Thank you for the advice. The issue is that I already responded to the lady from SWR issuing me these letters via email before I posted this thread. I have pasted my response below which I sent her last night:

'I’ve just received a court summons in the post and I’m very confused by it. It is stating that I tried to avoid a train fare of £28.10 on 6th May 2024.

However, there is also a letter with a screenshot of my phone screen attached which clearly shows the ticket I purchased on 6th May from Haslemere to Waterloo. I have also highlighted to you in recent emails that I held a valid 16-25 railcard during this time.

I would also note that I was sent through an incorrect fine of £1045.50 and you still haven’t acknowledged this situation. These letters are now starting to cause considerable stress to me and affecting my mental health significantly as there is very little clarity provided around what I am being prosecuted for.

Please can you respond to this email with some clarity as soon as possible as I am becoming extremely distressed here.'

Not sure if it's worth following up on?

Thanks
Will

 

[Haywain]

I have also highlighted to you in recent emails that I held a valid 16-25 railcard during this time.

Have you actually sent them an image of your railcard (photo or screenshot)? They are not just going to take your word for it that you hold one.

 

[will105]

Hi, yes I sent this through to them.

 

[some bloke]

There shouldn't be a problem. Your email is clear, and if they fail to respond sensibly you can keep trying.

If that were to fail for some reason, you can go to the court building early, ask staff where the prosecutor is and have a friendly chat.

And if that doesn't work, the company will look silly in front of the magistrates, especially when you show the correspondence.

When/if you write next, you can ask for confirmation by the end of the day that they will act to end the prosecution.

 

[Haywain]

Hi, yes I sent this through to them.

I think it would have been better top send an image of the railcard itself.

 

[will105]

I think it would have been better top send an image of the railcard itself.

I thought this would suffice, they have tried to issue me a huge fine through the apparent 'lack of railcard' attached to my account which has that email address linked to it.

So I assumed that providing a clear receipt of the purchase of said railcard, clearly highlighting that it was sent through to the same email address that I have connected to my Trainline account, would make it black & white obvious to them that they have made a mistake here.

 

[some bloke]

We might think the appropriate thing to do if they thought the receipt wasn't enough, would be to request a photo of the Railcard rather than prosecute without further warning, even though you didn't respond earlier.

You can also tackle this by other means - for example writing to the head of the company or Transport Focus, or by social media.

They have put a different offence on the sheet labelled "Statement of Facts", with the option to plead guilty to that, from the offence on the summons.

You could write,

"In case the Railcard receipt with the relevant email address and reference number was not enough, I attach an image of the Railcard itself".

To be clear, their specifying a different offence on the "Statement of Facts" sheet is an error, not something that's a legitimate option for you to plead guilty to - see (3):

Magistrates’ Courts Act 1980

An Act to consolidate certain enactments relating to the jurisdiction of, and the practice and procedure before, magistrates’ courts and the functions of justices’ clerks, and to matters connected therewith, with amendments to give effect to recommendations of the Law Commission.

www.legislation.gov.uk

It may be that one or more of your emails didn't reach the right person or "file", so you could send those emails again.

On the £1045, keep in mind that they seem to have no evidence that you travelled without carrying a railcard on any previous occasion, and so don't seem to have a viable claim that you owe anything for those.

 

[30907]

They have put a different offence on the sheet labelled "Statement of Facts", with the option to plead guilty to that, from the offence on the summons.

This is worth emphasising, as the charge there is a Byelaw 18(1) offence whereas the Summons is RoRA 5(3).

That said, the evidence of the actual Railcard should suffice to resolve this.

 

[will105]

We might think the appropriate thing to do if they thought the receipt wasn't enough, would be to request a photo of the Railcard rather than prosecute without further warning, even though you didn't respond earlier.

You can also tackle this by other means - for example writing to the head of the company or Transport Focus, or by social media.

They have put a different offence on the sheet labelled "Statement of Facts", with the option to plead guilty to that, from the offence on the summons.

You could write,

"In case the Railcard receipt with the relevant email address and reference number was not enough, I attach an image of the Railcard itself".

To be clear, their specifying a different offence on the "Statement of Facts" sheet is an error, not something that's a legitimate option for you to plead guilty to - see (3):

Magistrates’ Courts Act 1980

An Act to consolidate certain enactments relating to the jurisdiction of, and the practice and procedure before, magistrates’ courts and the functions of justices’ clerks, and to matters connected therewith, with amendments to give effect to recommendations of the Law Commission.

www.legislation.gov.uk

It may be that one or more of your emails didn't reach the right person or "file", so you could send those emails again.

On the £1045, keep in mind that they seem to have no evidence that you travelled without carrying a railcard on any previous occasion, and so don't seem to have a viable claim that you owe anything for those.

Thank you for this.

I am unable to send a photo of my actual 16-25 railcard now, as it expired today and I have since purchased a 26-30 railcard which is now linked to my Railcard app.

I'm not sure what to do next.. I have emailed the Fraud Manager from SWR last night but she generally takes a while to respond.

I guess I might just need to wait to see what they respond to my email with. However I'm conscious that I now have this court date on the 15th October which will be very difficult for me to attend with work commitments, so I don't want to leave it too late to respond to the letter they sent out..

 

[some bloke]

Subject lines can be effective in getting people's attention, and you can try a variety.

"Please withdraw prosecution - valid railcard held"

is one possibility. (In fact they would apply to the court, which decides whether the case can be withdrawn.)

As the receipt is dated 6 October, does the railcard not have some days left?

Can you get proof of it some other way, such as from the retailer?

Is the reference number on the receipt the same as a railcard number, or is there a way of finding a railcard number you can send?

You could tell/show them what evidence you have, and what you've tried to get.

A "reasonable" reason for writing again is to resend emails in case they didn't get to the right person, especially if points in the emails weren't answered.

If you put drafts on here, people can comment.

If you have or can get a phone number, that could be useful at some stage if emailing doesn't work.

 

[Hadders]

Thank you for this.

I am unable to send a photo of my actual 16-25 railcard now, as it expired today and I have since purchased a 26-30 railcard which is now linked to my Railcard app.

I'm not sure what to do next.. I have emailed the Fraud Manager from SWR last night but she generally takes a while to respond.

I guess I might just need to wait to see what they respond to my email with. However I'm conscious that I now have this court date on the 15th October which will be very difficult for me to attend with work commitments, so I don't want to leave it too late to respond to the letter they sent out..

I think you'll have to wait for the Fraud Manager to respond to you. It's a shame you didn't take a copy of the railcard itself, not just the receipt.

If the issue is not resolved before 15th October then forget work - you're going to have to go to court. Getting this resolved is more important.