Close shave in Northern land

[martinsh]

[ Mods – please move this to whichever section you think is appropriate ]

Hi there,

I thought I would share my thoughts on how today I came to be caught travelling without a valid ticket by Northern Rail !

I live in Crewe, and needed to visit a client in Blackpool today at short notice. Now I know it is cheaper to rebook at Preston than booking straight through. [ It may not be the absolute cheapest way to travel, but that is irrelevant ] I also know that there is only a 3 minute connection at Preston.

So at 4.30pm yesterday, I suddenly realised that I needed to book a Preston – Blackpool North day return in advance. I did so via the London Midland website, and picked up the tickets at Crewe station later that evening (around 6pm).

I then bought the Crewe – Preston offpeak return at Crewe this morning before travelling.

I travelled to Preston without any problems – overtaking my Blackpool train at Leyland. As usual the Virgin train arrived on platform 3 at Preston. So I got my ticket out the wallet, and showed it to the staff manning the bridge access to platforms 1 & 2, and was let on without problem.

There was a ticket check on the train. Again no problems. But arriving at Blackpool North, my ticket wouldn’t operate the barriers ! It took the staff member in charge a couple of goes, but he finally spotted that the ticket was for yesterday !!

Luckily no further questions were asked, and I was directed to a window to pay. [ The smart suit and tie probably helped ?! ]

Now I accept that this was all due to my stupidity, in booking tickets for the wrong date in the first place, and then not looking at them closely enough.

However, I have two questions. One actual and one theoretical.

1) Should not the London Midland website have had some sort of warning that I was trying to book tickets for travel on the same day ? [ I know airline sites do when you do similar unlikely things ] Particularly when I was trying to book a day return ticket at 4.30pm in the afternoon - and they advise a 2 hour delay before tickets become avialable to collect?
2) If they had made any accusations against me , would I have had any case against the staff at Preston for allowing me onto the platform with an invalid ticket ?


All the best

Martin

 

[maniacmartin]

1) Should not the London Midland website have had some sort of warning that I was trying to book tickets for travel on the same day ? [ I know airline sites do when you do similar unlikely things ] Particularly when I was trying to book a day return ticket at 4.30pm in the afternoon - and they advise a 2 hour delay before tickets become avialable to collect?

I don't necessarily think so. You might have been wanting to travel the same day. However, I sympathise, as I've nearly booked the wrong dates before.

2) If they had made any accusations against me , would I have had any case against the staff at Preston for allowing me onto the platform with an invalid ticket ?

This comes up often in threads. I don't think you would really have a good case here.

 

[martinsh]

I don't necessarily think so. You might have been wanting to travel the same day.

Not suggesting it would stop booking for travel on the same day, merely to highlight it in the same way it does if you choose to pick up your itckets from a machine at a station that is not part of the journey ititnery (e.g. pick up PReston - Blackpool tickets at Crewe)

 

[Hyphen]

Not suggesting it would stop booking for travel on the same day, merely to highlight it in the same way it does if you choose to pick up your itckets from a machine at a station that is not part of the journey ititnery (e.g. pick up PReston - Blackpool tickets at Crewe)

It's a bit like the Asian lady we saw on The Railways during the ECML episode asking why she would be sold a ticket if she was going to miss the train. The website will sell you any ticket you ask for (assuming it's valid), whether it's logical or not.

FWIW it's incredibly hard to program computer systems with "common sense" - by the time you've written enough code to cover every eventuality, the whole thing will just slow to a crawl with thousands of lines of validation. And would probably throw up more false positives than would be acceptable. And as the old saying goes - you can make something idiot-proof but eventually a bigger idiot will come along!

 

[jb]

FWIW it's incredibly hard to program computer systems with "common sense" - by the time you've written enough code to cover every eventuality, the whole thing will just slow to a crawl with thousands of lines of validation. And would probably throw up more false positives than would be acceptable. And as the old saying goes - you can make something idiot-proof but eventually a bigger idiot will come along!

Oh my goodness this. I'm currently struggling with an application where the biggest problem is even thinking of all the eventualities to give the client the flexibility it (says it) wants. The client is obviously a huge idiot btw

I liken the experience to that kiddies game where dinosaur heads appear and despite bashing them with a plastic mallet one is always popping up in another place a moment later.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

In response to both questions: it is for you, the passenger, to take responsibility for your choices and actions.
When someone else does not prevent your error being perpetrated (when seeking to prevent your error was not their duty), they cannot be made culpable for your error.