False/Fraudulent Delay Repay claims

[pt_mad]

Mod Note: Posts #1 - #27 originally in this thread.

The whole delay repay thing seems crazy sometimes. It's like, if you were intending on boarding an XC service from York to Edinburgh, and the infrastructure went down and the line was blocked, you could claim with either XC or LNER with an open ticket. Neither are to blame, the customer still travelled but they'll pay out the whole fare back and then have to chase it back from Network Rail. The mind boggles how it all works. Whether they just send NWR a huge bill every 3 months and Network pay it straight out I have no idea?
If it was wether related it's essentially an act of god, but whichever TOC you claim with will have to pay out,even if three journey legs were involved and all late, you could just pick one. That TOC will pay and then NWR will have to reimburse them later as it comes down to the fault of infrastructure even if an 80mph gust brought a tree down on the wires!

It's also concerning that in theory, people on open tickets such as off peak or anytime returns could claim if they knew there was disruption earlier or later in the day when they actually arrived on time themselves. There's no way of knowing whether the person was on that actual service unless they had advanced tickets surely?

 

[Starmill]

It's also concerning that in theory, people on open tickets such as off peak or anytime returns could claim if they knew there was disruption earlier or later in the day when they actually arrived on time themselves.

Why are you concerned? People are trusted not to comit fraud, because it's wrong and illegal. That's enough for almost everyone. Anyone doing this routinely will be caught out sooner or later anyway. I don't really see how it relates to genuine claims.

It's a lot like ticketless travel. There will always be somebody who manages to get away with making their journey without buying a ticket, but if they do it all the time they will get caught.

 

[pt_mad]

Why are you concerned? People are trusted not to comit fraud, because it's wrong and illegal. That's enough for almost everyone. Anyone doing this routinely will be caught out sooner or later anyway. I don't really see how it relates to genuine claims.

It's a lot like ticketless travel. There will always be somebody who manages to get away with making their journey without buying a ticket, but if they do it all the time they will get caught.

Bit of a flaw though isn't it? There's no way of proving they weren't on that service. So it appears fraud could never be proven or even suggested in these circumstances.

It's like with the storm Ali disruption, if someone travelled slightly earlier than 1200 before the trouble kicked off on an open ticket, is it only trust that is going to prevent them from claiming a full refund via delay repay or 80 quid in rail vouchers?

Trust obviously isn't enough with some of the public otherwise we wouldn't need the police. Or revenue protection.

 

[Starmill]

Bit of a flaw though isn't it?

Not really.

There's no way of proving they weren't on that service.

There's no way of proving somebody bought a ticket if they never had a ticket inspection on their journey either. Does that mean they didn't pay?

So it appears fraud could never be proven or even suggested in these circumstances.

A complete lack of evidence does not stop some train companies e.g. Northern implying that their customers are criminals in response to delay repay claims.

It's like with the storm Ali disruption, if someone travelled slightly earlier than 1200 before the trouble kicked off on an open ticket, is it only trust that is going to prevent them from claiming a full refund via delay repay or a hundred quid in rail vouchers?

But why would you even consider submitting fake claims? Any more than you would shoplifting? Lots of shops don't have security tagging. Are you equally concerned about people stealing from them? If someoe wants to do that it's a matter for them but it's clear that it's very risky doing it multiple times. There is no way there could ever be any sort of admin to prove who was on the train. What would you do get special teams onto delayed trains to give people vouchers so they can claim? It would be close to impossible. And to protect what? The value of most tickets is nothing like what could be gained through other types of white collar crime. You could abolish delay repay entirety but this is a non-starter politically. And why should genuinely delayed customers suffer because you are worried about fraud?
It's simply a non-issue.

Trust obviously isn't enough with some of the public otherwise we wouldn't need the police. Or revenue protection.

Yes, of course. But the police don't detect all crime do they, nor do revenue protection check the tickets of every single passenger who ever travels by train. This appears to be what you are suggesting is necessary with Delay Repay though, and it is plainly unworkable.

 

[pt_mad]

There is no way there could ever be any sort of admin to prove who was on the train. What would you do get special teams onto delayed trains to give people vouchers so they can claim? It would be close to impossible.

Perhaphs when the conductor/guard/TM/obs/RPI marks tickets checked onboard they could mark them simply with the train headcode or with the current hour of day eg. 12, , 13, 18(00)? Tickets not marked would still be entitled to compensation of course, but it would obviously go some way of helping to show on a vast amount of tickets what time the customer was traveling for sure.
Presumably with e tickets, when they are scanned it registers the time, so it's similar to that.

In general the delay repay system does kind of seem very admin heavy having to go through envelopes and check legs, whether it was actually the TOC in question responsible and then presumably adding it to the bill for NWR if it was infrastructure.

I suspect online claims *may* be easier for tocs to process as presumably all the data goes into their spreadsheets automatically and so presumably there's no data input needed. Only guessing there though.

On a wider note, does anyone know when the delay repay system was introduced? When did it spread to online Vs envelopes?

It is a great system for passengers and it does seem quite generous for long distance fares in that if you get stuck in a traffic jam by road, you can't claim a thing in damages. Two hours by rail and you can have the whole fare back even if it didn't impact your plans and some may even welcome the free travel Vs being a couple of hours late over a 100 or 200 mile journey.

 

[Wombat]

I've often wondered whether delay repay is applicable in the following scenario:

I arrive at Station A with the intention of catching the 18:00 to Station B. Due to some sort of problem the trains are running late, so I hop aboard the delayed 17:30 which departs at 18:00, arriving at station B at my original anticipated time. I haven't suffered any delay whatsoever but the service upon which I travelled was half an hour late. Can I claim delay repay? In reality I don't because it seems unreasonable, but it's not an especially rare situation and I'm curious to know what the official line is.

On a different note, it would be very interesting to read or watch an account of the decision-making process during, let's say, "routine disruption". Not the sort of Lewisham nightmare scenario where everything goes wrong, just the stuff that happens on a typical day like the situation described in the original post. From a passenger's point of view it's pretty much a mystical black box, and perhaps it would help us better understand why a faulty train at X causes problems 100 miles away at Y.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

It's also concerning that in theory, people on open tickets such as off peak or anytime returns could claim if they knew there was disruption earlier or later in the day when they actually arrived on time themselves. There's no way of knowing whether the person was on that actual service unless they had advanced tickets surely?

You can't even be sure with advance tickets: A friend of mine recently bought an advance ticket for a VTWC journey. In the event, she missed the train (through her own fault) so never actually used the ticket (She ended up buying another ticket so she could travel on a later train). But, as it happened, the train she had originally been booked to travel on got delayed by over 30 minutes - and this triggered the automatic delay repay mechanism for advance tickets bought online. So as far as I'm aware, she got a 50% refund, even though she didn't actually claim and hadn't even been on that train!

 

[yorkie]

I arrive at Station A with the intention of catching the 18:00 to Station B. Due to some sort of problem the trains are running late, so I hop aboard the delayed 17:30 which departs at 18:00, arriving at station B at my original anticipated time. I haven't suffered any delay whatsoever but the service upon which I travelled was half an hour late. Can I claim delay repay? .

You can't legitimately claim Delay Repay for arriving on time on a train that was delayed, no.

 

[HH]

In a few years it will all be automatic. Sensors on the train will be able to recognise the smart cards carried by passengers and work out exactly how late they are. Obviously the number of legitimate claims will go up, but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

 

[pt_mad]

In a few years it will all be automatic. Sensors on the train will be able to recognise the smart cards carried by passengers and work out exactly how late they are. Obviously the number of legitimate claims will go up, but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

I'm glad someone put a stat on it rather than suggesting trust alone stops false claims...according to that figure it may not.

 

[HowardGWR]

I'm glad someone put a stat on it rather than suggesting trust alone stops false claims...according to that figure it may not.

You call guesswork 'a stat'?

 

[LowLevel]

In a few years it will all be automatic. Sensors on the train will be able to recognise the smart cards carried by passengers and work out exactly how late they are. Obviously the number of legitimate claims will go up, but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

The number of m tickets I see increases each week. Every time I scan it it logs the train and inspector thus removing any possibility of fraud (in theory though I could think of a few options - to catch a thief you have to think like a thief ).

 

[AlterEgo]

In a few years it will all be automatic. Sensors on the train will be able to recognise the smart cards carried by passengers and work out exactly how late they are. Obviously the number of legitimate claims will go up, but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

Who in the industry has said that, out of interest?

 

[Llanigraham]

In a few years it will all be automatic. Sensors on the train will be able to recognise the smart cards carried by passengers and work out exactly how late they are. Obviously the number of legitimate claims will go up, but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

And do you really believe that?
Whilst it might work in your urban centres I really cannot see a way of it working for rural areas or for long distance travel using several operators.

 

[HH]

Who in the industry has said that, out of interest?

I'm afraid it's not attributable. I can say with certainty that several TOCs reject around 15% of claims; it seems to be the going rate. In addition, they are aware that many passengers make use of "sniper" and the like to make claims based on trains they did not use; checking for such abuse is in its infancy, but new tools are on the way.

 

[takno]

I'm afraid it's not attributable. I can say with certainty that several TOCs reject around 15% of claims; it seems to be the going rate. In addition, they are aware that many passengers make use of "sniper" and the like to make claims based on trains they did not use; checking for such abuse is in its infancy, but new tools are on the way.

I think all the claims I've made in the last 2 years were initially rejected based on meaningless grounds like non-delay of the train on a completely different day. All were legit. I wouldn't tl ascribe any value at all to numbers coming from the deliberately undertrained teams processing the claims

 

[Starmill]

I'm afraid it's not attributable

Sounds like it's also not true.

 

[Starmill]

I'm glad someone put a stat on it rather than suggesting trust alone stops false claims...according to that figure it may not.

If, by this you mean that HH thought of a number at random and posted it just to make themselves sound clever, which is clearly what happened, then yes you're right.

False claims are a non-issue. And anyone thinking they're involved in train running decisions is deluded.

 

[HH]

I think all the claims I've made in the last 2 years were initially rejected based on meaningless grounds like non-delay of the train on a completely different day. All were legit. I wouldn't tl ascribe any value at all to numbers coming from the deliberately undertrained teams processing the claims

Oh, I agree that valid claims are also being rejected, although obviously TOCs are not admitting this. I'd be interested who you were rejected by, because no two TOCs follow the exact same process. Some use internal staff, some external and some rely mainly on algorithms.

 

[HH]

You don’t need a claim form. You just send in an email.

Most are moving to online form. The next development is likely to be an app. c2c pay automatically and Northern will start to do that on Advance Purchase bought on mobile. Things are moving quite quickly (well in rail terms).

Sounds like it's also not true.

It's true; it's just confidential.

 

[yorkie]

...but some in the industry reckon that over 30% of the claims they do get are fraudulent.

Would that figure include claims which a train company has deemed fraudulent but is actually a valid claim?

(there are some recent examples on this forum; if you are struggling to find one I will post an example)

 

[Starmill]

It's true; it's just confidential.

It may be true that they think that 30% of claims are wrong, but they're probably wrong themselves. Without furher information it seems you simply made it up to make yourself sound like you're well-connected.

 

[HH]

Would that figure include claims which a train company has deemed fraudulent but is actually a valid claim?

(there are some recent examples on this forum; if you are struggling to find one I will post an example)

No, as I just said I know they will get some wrong. However, I have been shown some passenger's claim histories. Either there are some very, very unlucky people out there, or they are telling porkies about which trains they were actually on. And if one such person makes 10 claims, then they would make the % right, even if 20 people made one valid claim - the rate does not mean that 30% of people are making fraudulent claims.

 

[yorkie]

No

No? That figure does not include claims which a train company has deemed fraudulent but is actually a valid claim?!

Did you definitely mean to say no, as I was expecting the answer to be yes, as how can you differentiate?

as I just said I know they will get some wrong. However, I have been shown some passenger's claim histories.

Yes some people do make suspicious claims e.g. commuters who always travel at different times, and those times always coincide with delays.

And I have seen some TOCs claims too, which are equally false.

There is bad behaviour on both sides.

 

[HH]

Because a claim is refused doesn't mean the TOC thinks it's fraudulent.

 

[tsr]

False claims are a non-issue.

This is absolutely not true. In fact, at certain commuter TOCs, it’s really quite a big problem.

And anyone thinking they're involved in train running decisions is deluded.

This is true when it comes to Delay Repay itself. However, for example, there are sometimes aims of specific timescales which are applied to decisions made about clearing the line during incidents. Often these are somewhere around the 15 minute marker (or at other specific intervals), so it is not hard to see why somebody might think there’s some sort of fictional compensation avoidance scheme if they see that faulty trains are delayed by 10-14ish minutes due to “a fault... which has now been rectified...”.

 

[Deafdoggie]

I have often wondered about my claims. I do seem to have a run where I am claiming daily, but then go months with no claim. But how do the train company know how many journeys I make? I once went to Birmingham twice in one day (long story!) which may seem to be a lot of journeys and claims if they were both delayed. But if neither delayed they don't know I made them. so don't know how many journeys to compare to to see if I have a low percentage of journeys delayed, or a high percentage.
In fairness, I probably have quite a high percentage, as I often travel to/from Longport (free parking!), so a small delay somewhere can result in a lost connection and an hours delay repay as a result. It doesn't mean I am making false claims, it doesn't even mean I am particularly unlucky, just that is the train service provided!

 

[Clip]

I have often wondered about my claims. I do seem to have a run where I am claiming daily, but then go months with no claim. But how do the train company know how many journeys I make?

They simply dont but your season ticket allows you to do so many journeys in a day and they have to trust you and others to claim when you are truly delayed and not try and get money back on services you dont take.

 

[Deafdoggie]

They simply dont but your season ticket allows you to do so many journeys in a day and they have to trust you and others to claim when you are truly delayed and not try and get money back on services you dont take.

I don’t have a season ticket. My travel is irregular. I guess I feel I put in a lot of claims sometimes, but it might be nothing compared to other people. Equally, because my journeys differ, so do the operators & therefore the companies I claim from. I can’t imagine the railways are joined up enough to have a central file on everyone. But I imagine they share information on suspected fraudsters.

 

[Starmill]

This is absolutely not true. In fact, at certain commuter TOCs, it’s really quite a big problem.

Right, which TOCs, exactly and how big of a problem? Now relate the problem quantitaiavely to ticketless travel, to wider fare evasion and also to unpaid car parking charges?

Given that the latter is totally ubiquitous and even ticketless travel is relatively common, just how many people by comparison have the wherewithal to even try submitting fake claims, let alone the methods?

This sounds like a storm in a teacup. It's crazy to suggest that this problem is so big that more admin time on the part of on-train staff should be frittered away dealing with delay repay, as is the subject of this thread.

There will always be at least some illigitimate claims paid out on, just as there will always be at least some ticketless travel. Perfection is not a reasonable target. In the rare cases where serial offenders make fake claims again and again and again, they will be easily spotted with minimal effort. Why on earth this is a big issue that some members are upset about the lack of action on is totally and utterly beyond me.