Why not?
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DfT travel survey on TPE
- Thread starter alistairlees
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Why not?
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RailUK Forums
Sounds like standard TADA practise
styles
Member
Oh absolutely.
I saw a video a couple of months back of a TfL ticketless surveyor (I think working for Serco, but I could be wrong on that). In the video, a passenger (the one filming) refuses to tap their Oyster/contactless card, which frankly I think is a perfectly reasonable thing to refuse - if somebody comes to me on a train and asks me to tap my payment card they can swivel, uniform/ID or not. The surveyor was not happy about it at all. Their customer service skills were shocking, especially given that if you go round asking to scan people's payment cards, even with a TfL-branded hi-viz on, you should expect a non-insigificant number of passengers to refuse to do so. In fact I'm probably quite concerned by the number of people who do scan their cards. You should record them as some variation of 'not compliant with request', smile, and leave them alone.
DynamicSpirit
Established Member
So, person who's travelling without a ticket makes excuse to refuse to show it. The survey people just take a note and move on. The ticketless person and everyone on the surrounding seats (ordinary people who cannot tell the difference between a guard and a random survey person) see this and get the message that, if you're travelling without a ticket, the guard just takes a note and moves on, so nothing is going to happen to you. Great idea, huh!
Why not just ask the guard to log the data when he/she is doing the normal ticket checks? You'd get the same information without employing extra people, and with the bonus of actually catching people travelling without a ticket.
Haywain
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That's been explained above.
Seems typical UK wishywashiness on trains with conductor/guard/train manager that a surveyor empowered to identify and record ticketless travel is not expected to flag up any possible payment evader to the member of train staff to investigate.
I would suggest that you do not use the contactless facility to pay for your journey then. You need to use a paper ticket or Oyster / Itso card. Otherwise, you'll likely receive a Penalty Fare.
If you’re using contactless and do that during a ticket inspection you’d probably end up starting your own thread in Disputes & Prosecutions….
styles
Member
No I'll continue to use contactless, thanks. If somebody wants me to prove my journey they can join me on a walk to a yellow card reader. If people are willing to give their bank card over to people with an easily-faked flimsy plastic ID or a hi-viz, they're setting themselves up as targets for larger scams.
Falcon1200
Established Member
I was surveyed today on a GWR service; The staff were polite, wore identifying tabards and lanyards, and just wanted to see my ticket and know my origin and destination.
You're obligated to show your ticket when asked, and that includes bank cards if you have made your own free choice to use that method of payment. If you respond with the above nonsense when asked by an authorised person you would be committing an offence for which you have no defence. If you want to do that, that's absolutely fine and not a problem long as only you face the consequences - but please don't imply that you're right or giving good advice to others that could get them into hot water. If you're concerned about the possibility of being scammed, use an Oyster card or paper ticket. For whatever reason you're deciding not to do that.
childwallblues
Established Member
I worked for Tracsis and its predecessors from 2008 to 2022 doing both on train and on platform survey. We carried both identity cards and authority from either DfT or the appropriate TOC to undertake the various surveys.
It's always a good laugh when a defendant's own arguments are quite persuasive of their guilt!
styles
Member
No, I'm not.
I'm obliged to show my ticket to an 'authorised person' (Bylaws 17). A surveyor working for a survey company is not an authorised person in legislation.
There's no 'nonsense' in what I've said. You might be willing to tap your bank card to people willy-nilly, but I am not, and in fact I would highly discourage people from doing so. Encouraging it is encouraging people into potentailly harmful behaviours.
You would not be committing an offence (see Bylaws 17).
What you're saying is complete rubbish. You've simply copied a racist on tiktok who was fabricating outrage in order to stir up hate against British Pakistanis.
I don't see how these surveyors wouldn't be authorised persons seeing as they'll be doing so with permission of the relevant operator?
styles
Member
Sure, if they happen to carry some ID from the actual operator. But they don't. At least, in the TfL case they didn't.
I could create a market research company today called Styles Consultancy Ltd, print a card, and start asking passengers for their payments cards. You would be naive to comply.
I'm aware it's a strict liability offence, but I suspect if it went to court (which it wouldn't), even a judge would make a similar determination to the Northern Rail case.
Firstly, you said:
So it's pretty clear this does include the people who are employed by the operator, such as MTR, Arriva Rail London or LU revenue.
However, regardless of that, the Byelaw doesn't say that it's an only an employee who can check tickets does it? TfW use TIL to issue Penalty Fares and reports for prosecution. If you refused to show them your contactless card you'd be swiftly disabused of these arguments.
In addition, you would fairly obviously mark yourself out as a fare evader if you tried to say this during an onboard ticket inspection. It would be immediately identified as a diversion tactic.
styles
Member
What? lol. If somebody carries ID to confirm they're working for TfL, grand, my point was that in the most recent example I've seen, they didn't. Even then, you'd be allowed some time to verify this as anybody can print a letter saying they work for operator X and start scanning people's bank cards.
Of course. I haven't at any point advocated non-compliance with people who are clearly authorised to issue penalty fares etc. You're making up scenarios now for things I haven't described. Please don't.
Ah the old, "guilty until proven innocent". If a surveyor wants to have an argument with me about ticket acceptance, in which they have precisely zero authority to penalise me, crack on, but I won't engage.
What are you struggling with about showing your bank card being an ordinary, everyday part of ticket inspection in South Wales, Greater London, Manchester and other areas? This kind of check is the done thing by uniformed and non-uniformed revenue staff in these areas. I've had these checks myself on many, many occasions by both. Why are you, but apparently nobody else, finding this difficult? Is it because you saw a racist on tiktok making a fuss over nothing just so he could abuse someone whose skin is darker?
You did and I've just quoted your post.
TIL do issue these, and clearly do have the authority in their case, as per the many threads started by people who've been charged over their journey on a TfW service as a result. It's not hard to grasp this concept that the authorised person isn't restricted to an employee.
I wouldn't tap my bank card against some unidentified person's card reader, and I can happily understand why many others wouldn't... I don't see how this makes someone racist.
It doesn't. The video they watched was filmed and created by someone else, not them, who was using racist slurs and tropes.
Card readers aren't unidentified. They're carried by staff with ID. As has already been pointed out umpteen times in this and other threads.
styles
Member
Giving over your bank card is obviously not to be taken lightly. I;m baffled that I actually have to say this.
I have known a small handful of people to have this interaction with TfL surveyors when I lived in London. None complied. I'm not some massive anti-establishmentarianist, but I quite sensibly, as do my pals, not hand over my bank card to randos.
I have literally no idea where the racism element comes into this. In fact on this basis alone I'm going to stop engaging with you as I believe you're not engaging in good faith. Have a good week.
It's an obligation to have your card scanned if you're using it to pay as you go. It's as simple as that.
It's an obligation to hand it over if that's how you paid for your journey, and as has already been explained quite a few times, the people in question who have the revenue inspection devices have ID.
On a slightly different but similar note are TPE guards / the unions still in some sort of deadlock regarding the scanning of tickets?
On the majority of journeys recently I seem to recall the guard coming down the train but only doing a visual inspection (quite common for revenue inspection to then board at some point and do a full works inspection including additional railcard checks and the like) although I'm fairly sure one guard recently did scan tickets
On the majority of journeys recently I seem to recall the guard coming down the train but only doing a visual inspection (quite common for revenue inspection to then board at some point and do a full works inspection including additional railcard checks and the like) although I'm fairly sure one guard recently did scan tickets
I believe their hardware is perfectly capable of reading barcodes and Itso yes. So it's purely down to if that individual wishes to hold the line of the technology payment / revenue incentive payment or not.
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