Advice Only for Greater Anglia - Delay Repay Fraud

[island]

Tracsis may or may not have a lot of data, but the AGA privacy policy doesn’t obviously suggest that data collected by AGA is available to pool in Tracsis’ database for the use of other, non-Abellio, companies. More importantly, the point of AI and machine learning is not that the applications using it have a large database behind them, but that the technologies in that database are capable of learning from data as it arrives in a database, and detecting patterns in that dataset. I would be surprised to find that those patterns are especially similar between AGA and (say) EMR given the different service patterns and usage groups on the two franchises.

Tracsis seem to provide (using a subset of brands "Iblocks, exposure, TTCS") Delay Repay to operators I've not even heard of:

c2c
Thameslink
Southern railway
Transpennine Express
Great Western Railway
Avanti West Coast
Scot rail
Greater Anglia
East Midlands Trains
West Midlands Railway/London Northern Trains
Hull Trains
Southwestern Railway
Transport Wales

Maybe more.

Given a link I shared earlier talked about preventing "cross TOC fraud" - Tracsis seem to have a system that can share data even with other operators who aren't in the list above. It does caveat with "where data sharing agreements exist", which implies (to some extent) that some data sharing agreements already exist. From a legal perspective you probably don't need a data sharing agreement to share within the same "group" - as long as it is in the privacy policy like Abellio.

I did a "google" and found an actual Data Sharing Agreement for Northern and "First Group" here - and some of the companies above look like First Group companies on the face of it, although I defer to you guys on that point. It therefore seems probable that all these claims are being shared between all of the operators on a large national scale. The rationale is:



Which would tie in with people getting letters around now - as COVID seems to be the factor. Not sure whether that's people claiming now when they have stopped travelling (and now dodgy claims are standing out like a sore thumb), or it's given them a chance to slow down a bit and take some time to implement technology during the quieter period.

Bear in mind that they can share data as much as they want with any company they want, as long as it is not personal data: if they anonymize data so that no person can be identified from it, they can use the data any which way they like – and data-sharing agreements, privacy policies and GDPR are irrelevant. This includes feeding into machine learning algorithms.

 

[Wallsendmag]

I think you'd find nearly every TOC uses some form of Tracsis software.

 

[philthetube]

A lot of people posting in this thread seem concerned that they will be caught, I imagine that G A investigations go something like this.

does this person make a lot ore claims than average?
Does this person make a lot more claims than average for this route at this time?
Does this person seem to randomly change travel times?
Are delays frequently being claimed for when a good service operates with few delays?

A no to any of these questions probably takes people out of the radar, so most people should have no concerns.

 

[robbeech]

Alternatively, if Delay Repay has increased very significantly then perhaps TOCs/Network Rail could take action to reduce the number and length of delays and hence reduce the number of claims. If there were minimal delays there would be minimal opportunity to make fraudulent claims .....

It is one thing saying that you have to be at the station. It's a whole other thing saying that you have to stay there, particularly if there are little or no facilities.
If the TOCs really want to draw attention to how much compo they get when there are issues compared to the pittance that they pay out..

Of course, but back in the real world, this costs more money, and is often unrelated to TOC performance and as such isn't funded by the TOCs. From a purely financial point of view, some TOCs (historically at least) will love a good points failure as it can be more profitable than running a TOC.

I suspect you are correct around "big data".

I did some digging and found that Abellio TOC (which seems to have several operators), use third party software to process the claims, looking at the footer, the page copyright is © Copyright 2021 Tracsis Travel Compensation Services Ltd.

Now whatever product Tracsis Travel Compensation Service offer seems to have a focus on fraud, for example:

Minimise your train operator’s risk of EXPOSURE to cross-TOC fraud with TTCS | Tracsis Travel Compensation

www.tracsistcs.com

"Tracsis" presumably the parent company seem to be involved in all sorts of large rail industry data and projects but that's just from a Google.

Maybe Greater Anglia just "upgraded" their software or bought a new module etc, or perhaps the system just got smarter, possibly with AI?

Of course they're designed and setup to focus on fraud. Cutting down on fraud yields better profits. Focussing on making sure people get paid the compensation they deserve would yield greater payouts and lower profits. This system(s) will cost astronomical amounts of money for what it is i'm sure so the last thing an operator will want to do is spend money on a system that results in less profit. It's a simple business decision at this point and you can't blame them sadly.

A lot of people posting in this thread seem concerned that they will be caught, I imagine that G A investigations go something like this.

does this person make a lot ore claims than average?
Does this person make a lot more claims than average for this route at this time?
Does this person seem to randomly change travel times?
Are delays frequently being claimed for when a good service operates with few delays?

A no to any of these questions probably takes people out of the radar, so most people should have no concerns.

We don't know for sure if these are some or all of the criteria for kicking off an investigation into an individual but it certainly swings right back around to one of the points i've made too many times in this and other threads. You are made to feel guilty and this DOES (proven several times in this thread alone) cause people to either not claim in the first place, or no appeal a wrongful rejection, or when something like this happens, give up and pay up even if your claim was valid. It's nothing shy of bullying and they know it, but this thread has shown that the majority (i think, i have lost count) of people affected by this run that have commented here were guilty of claiming when no claim was due so whilst it's difficult to determine how well the system works from this data alone, first impressions are that despite them being known for their questionable ways regarding acceptance of delay repay, THIS part of the system appears to be working quite well and i'm fully behind a system that works effectively on cutting down fraud (or genuine mistakes) appropriately providing it is not at the expense of genuine claims.

 

[LAX54]

i have received the same letter today and i'm worried sick i have replied explaining i used a website called Delay Repay Genie which i paid a subscription to they would then email me delays i could claim on as i have a season ticket - now i'm worried that i was doing the wrong thing. can this go to court and i end up with criminal record?

That just sounds awfully 'iffy' you pay a Company to send you delays based on you Season Ticket locations, and you don't even have to have travelled on that train ot even day ?

 

[ashkeba]

That just sounds awfully 'iffy' you pay a Company to send you delays based on you Season Ticket locations, and you don't even have to have travelled on that train ot even day ?

Because fishing out the official delay for a train is a nuisance and submitting your own timing of the delay is usually answered by a claim rejection. If I traveled a route with more delays, I think I might sign up for such a service and simply ignore the days where I was not delayed.

TOCs encouraged services like that by not automating delay repays for smartcard and eticket and by rejecting so many claims for things like small differences of timings filling out the form.

 

[Andrew S]

That just sounds awfully 'iffy' you pay a Company to send you delays based on you Season Ticket locations, and you don't even have to have travelled on that train ot even day ?

I agree. It perhaps is useful in highlighting exact timings of trains which were delayed, but that information can be found on realtimetrains easily and free.

I think this genie website is dubious, it "promised" me savings of roughly £50 a month in delay repay claims, yet I know I'm very rarely delayed at all, and at least not to that extent. I've only had to claim about three times in over two years, and received roughly £8 in total. I think anyone claiming for every single delay it lists is being knowingly dishonest, or very gullible.

 

[SteveM70]

I’ve just had a look at the delay repay genie website for the first time and I’m absolutely stunned at how misleading it is.

On the front page a statement a clear statement “we only send you valid claims” which actually means “we send you the details of every delayed train on your route”, and then a worked example where having input your journey and season ticket cost/duration it tells you the money you could earn.

No wonder people have made claims they shouldn’t have.

 

[Wallsendmag]

Because fishing out the official delay for a train is a nuisance and submitting your own timing of the delay is usually answered by a claim rejection. If I traveled a route with more delays, I think I might sign up for such a service and simply ignore the days where I was not delayed.

TOCs encouraged services like that by not automating delay repays for smartcard and eticket and by rejecting so many claims for things like small differences of timings filling out the form.

We now have a one click Delay Repay rolled out in pilot for tickets bought through our site. If the train you were booked on is delayed you get a nudge to ckick and claim.

 

[Hadders]

I don't understand why TOCs don't refuse to accept delay repay claims made via 3rd party websites. I seem to remember GTR having this policy, not sure if it is still the case.

 

[Watershed]

I don't understand why TOCs don't refuse to accept delay repay claims made via 3rd party websites. I seem to remember GTR having this policy, not sure if it is still the case.

The sites act as your agent and therefore it's questionable whether they are entitled to refuse claims from them.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

An interesting aspect of this Genie site is that also appears to be run and provided by Tracsis.

I wonder whether it is a honeytrap.

Arguably it's very useful and probably prior to automatic compensation, would have been an excellent tool. Anything that encourages customers to claim is surely positive.

I would be also interested to know whether the Genie product is actually provided on behalf of (some) operators, using the Genie brand instead of their own individual brands.

 

[swt_passenger]

We now have a one click Delay Repay rolled out in pilot for tickets bought through our site. If the train you were booked on is delayed you get a nudge to ckick and claim.

Surely that’s of little relevance to normal season ticket usage?

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

Surely that’s of little relevance to normal season ticket usage?

Can the tap in and out data (for certain routes and stations) from barcode and smartcard tickets not be used to calculate what train somebody caught, and whether it was delayed?

As long as you tap in and tap out, it must be fairly straightforward to calculate what train somebody almost certainly caught, and offer an automated alert to claim compensation. If an inspector scanned it on board, you'd have a 100% match to a service.

 

[swt_passenger]

Can the tap in and out data (for certain routes and stations) from barcode and smartcard tickets not be used to calculate what train somebody caught, and whether it was delayed?

As long as you tap in and tap out, it must be fairly straightforward to calculate what train somebody almost certainly caught, and offer an automated alert to claim compensation. If an inspector scanned it on board, you'd have a 100% match to a service.

I was only suggesting normal GA season ticket holders won’t be making use of the reservation system...

 

[AlterEgo]

Surely that’s of little relevance to normal season ticket usage?

Delay Repay really oughtn't apply to season tickets - discounts upon renewal were much easier to administer.

 

[SteveM70]

Delay Repay really oughtn't apply to season tickets - discounts upon renewal were much easier to administer.

Until the customer doesn’t want to renew

Can the tap in and out data (for certain routes and stations) from barcode and smartcard tickets not be used to calculate what train somebody caught, and whether it was delayed?

As long as you tap in and tap out, it must be fairly straightforward to calculate what train somebody almost certainly caught, and offer an automated alert to claim compensation. If an inspector scanned it on board, you'd have a 100% match to a service.

Yes, but it wouldn’t be infallible. The train someone catches is often not the reason for the delay repay claim

 

[Watershed]

Can the tap in and out data (for certain routes and stations) from barcode and smartcard tickets not be used to calculate what train somebody caught, and whether it was delayed?

As long as you tap in and tap out, it must be fairly straightforward to calculate what train somebody almost certainly caught, and offer an automated alert to claim compensation. If an inspector scanned it on board, you'd have a 100% match to a service.

C2C do this with their smartcard system and in fact pay a limited amount of compensation for delays as little as 2 minutes, and standard DR for 15+ min delays.

Of course their self-contained, fully barriered network lends itself far more to that kind of system compared to GA's network.

Delay Repay really oughtn't apply to season tickets - discounts upon renewal were much easier to administer.

Perhaps easier to administer, but it also meant there were plenty of people who got no recompense whatsoever for shocking service, and others who got a discount even though they enjoyed a perfectly decent service.

 

[All Line Rover]

An interesting aspect of this Genie site is that also appears to be run and provided by Tracsis.

I wonder whether it is a honeytrap.

Arguably it's very useful and probably prior to automatic compensation, would have been an excellent tool. Anything that encourages customers to claim is surely positive.

I would be also interested to know whether the Genie product is actually provided on behalf of (some) operators, using the Genie brand instead of their own individual brands.

Quite. It's very, very interesting that a site which is clearly designed to encourage fraudulent claims is owned by the very company that sells software to TOCs to identify fraudulent claims. Why did Tracsis acquire Genie to begin with? It doesn't seem to fit in with their B2B business model.

Perhaps easier to administer, but it also meant there were plenty of people who got no recompense whatsoever for shocking service, and others who got a discount even though they enjoyed a perfectly decent service.

Agreed. There's nothing wrong with Delay Repay for season tickets; it's a fair system. The only problem is the difficulty of claiming it when eligible.

 

[AlterEgo]

Agreed. There's nothing wrong with Delay Repay for season tickets; it's a fair system. The only problem is the difficulty of claiming it when eligible.

It’s not a fair system if it’s more difficult and laborious to make a claim.

 

[All Line Rover]

It’s not a fair system if it’s more difficult and laborious to make a claim.

In my view, it's more difficult and laborious because Delay Repay does more fairly compensate season ticket holders, so TOCs have made the claim process as difficult and laborious as possible in order to minimise their exposure to this.

This isn't a fault of Delay Repay. Any unfairness lies with the claim process, which doesn't need to be so complicated.

 

[AlterEgo]

In my view, it's more difficult and laborious because Delay Repay does more fairly compensate season ticket holders, so TOCs have made the claim process as difficult and laborious as possible in order to minimise their exposure to this.

This isn't a fault of Delay Repay. Any unfairness lies with the claim process, which doesn't need to be so complicated.

How would you make it easier, bearing in mind the abuse and fraud we’ve seen detailed in this thread?

 

[All Line Rover]

How would you make it easier, bearing in mind the abuse and fraud we’ve seen detailed in this thread?

Making sure TOCs' claims portals/websites actually work, and beta products aren't released until fully functional (case in point, the latest version of WMT/LNR's Tracsis-powered website, which still doesn't work properly and replaces an earlier version which never worked properly on smartphones) would be a good start.

Not requiring passengers to register separate accounts on every TOC website, which is impractical for leisure travellers who make the occasional journey with a variety of TOCs, would be another improvement.

Not requiring passengers to manually copy out details from their e-tickets, but instead reading these details automatically from the ticket's barcode, would be yet another improvement.

I could go on. Nothing to do with fraud-prevention measures.

 

[MikeWh]

How would you make it easier, bearing in mind the abuse and fraud we’ve seen detailed in this thread?

How would you make the old system fairer given the observation earlier that some people would get compensation when they'd enjoyed a good service because another line in the service group didn't, or vice versa, people didn't get compensation for a terrible service because the rest of the service group made up the numbers?

You could make service groups into small sections of line I suppose, but that would make it more complicated to administer.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

Making sure TOCs' claims portals/websites actually work, and beta products aren't released until fully functional (case in point, the latest version of WMT/LNR's Tracsis-powered website, which still doesn't work properly and replaces an earlier version which never worked properly on smartphones) would be a good start.

Not requiring passengers to register separate accounts on every TOC website, which is impractical for leisure travellers who make the occasional journey with a variety of TOCs, would be another improvement.

Not requiring passengers to manually copy out details from their e-tickets, but instead reading these details automatically from the ticket's barcode, would be yet another improvement.

I could go on. Nothing to do with fraud-prevention measures.

When I claim on East Midlands and upload my eticket, the long barcode number which seems to be called "UTN" is automatically populated on the web form.

 

[AlterEgo]

Making sure TOCs' claims portals/websites actually work, and beta products aren't released until fully functional (case in point, the latest version of WMT/LNR's Tracsis-powered website, which still doesn't work properly and replaces an earlier version which never worked properly on smartphones) would be a good start.

Not requiring passengers to register separate accounts on every TOC website, which is impractical for leisure travellers who make the occasional journey with a variety of TOCs, would be another improvement.

Not requiring passengers to manually copy out details from their e-tickets, but instead reading these details automatically from the ticket's barcode, would be yet another improvement.

I could go on. Nothing to do with fraud-prevention measures.

What’s any of that got to do with the claim process for season tickets?

How would you make the old system fairer given the observation earlier that some people would get compensation when they'd enjoyed a good service because another line in the service group didn't, or vice versa, people didn't get compensation for a terrible service because the rest of the service group made up the numbers?

You could make service groups into small sections of line I suppose, but that would make it more complicated to administer.

There’s unfairness with both methods of compensating people. A season ticket holder might experience 30-40 claimable delays a year, each of which take 5-10 minutes to claim for. That’s a disincentive in itself. It’s also ripe for abuse, as we can see.
There’s no perfectly fair and equitable way of compensating all the customers of the railway and each system has its pros and cons. I think I prefer a system where no effort is required on the part of the passenger and which protects the company from fraud.

 

[arb]

Making sure TOCs' claims portals/websites actually work, and beta products aren't released until fully functional (case in point, the latest version of WMT/LNR's Tracsis-powered website, which still doesn't work properly and replaces an earlier version which never worked properly on smartphones) would be a good start.

Not requiring passengers to register separate accounts on every TOC website, which is impractical for leisure travellers who make the occasional journey with a variety of TOCs, would be another improvement.

Not requiring passengers to manually copy out details from their e-tickets, but instead reading these details automatically from the ticket's barcode, would be yet another improvement.

Every TOC that I've ever claimed Delay Repay from has claim system that:

• works everywhere, regardless of which phone you have, and is not in beta
• does not require an account on their website
• does not require manual copying of huge amounts of data from tickets into the claim form

It's their old-fashioned paper-based claim form. They are always *so* much quicker and simpler to fill in than any online Delay Repay system I've ever used

(But if they didn't have freepost addresses for sending the forms then I admit I'd fight the online system instead!)

 

[35B]

Delay Repay really oughtn't apply to season tickets - discounts upon renewal were much easier to administer.

This season ticket holder much preferred Delay Repay - it was related to my experience, not an average that didn't reflect my own experience. And as my use of seasons isn't completely consistent, the discount was often unavailable to me anyway.

I've also never had much trouble submitting Delay Repay with any of the operators I've had cause to claim from.

 

[_toommm_]

Every TOC that I've ever claimed Delay Repay from has claim system that:

• works everywhere, regardless of which phone you have, and is not in beta
• does not require an account on their website
• does not require manual copying of huge amounts of data from tickets into the claim form

It's their old-fashioned paper-based claim form. They are always *so* much quicker and simpler to fill in than any online Delay Repay system I've ever used

(But if they didn't have freepost addresses for sending the forms then I admit I'd fight the online system instead!)

Some companies now require you to have an account. I’ve not really travelled with anyone but TPE or Northern since the first lockdown on March 2020 but TPE definitely force you to have an account now.

 

[AlterEgo]

This season ticket holder much preferred Delay Repay - it was related to my experience, not an average that didn't reflect my own experience. And as my use of seasons isn't completely consistent, the discount was often unavailable to me anyway.

I've also never had much trouble submitting Delay Repay with any of the operators I've had cause to claim from.

The problem with this forum - and especially this area - is it self-selects enthusiasts and people who are very engaged with their rail experience; a sort of survivorship bias.