Xenophon PCDGS
Veteran Member
My sister-in-law (aged 76) who lives in Handforth had to make an emergency visit to Poulton le Fylde to visit her sister on family business and got a lift to Heald Green station, as First TPE run a direct service to Poulton le Fylde from there.
However, there was no-one in the booking office, during the 20 minutes she was waiting for the 1133 train to arrive, which worried her as the ticket office is normally open then and being a regular user of a Senior Citizen Railcard, knows that "railcard discounted price" tickets purchased with this railcard are not normally issued on a train, when a booking office is open. However, she had to board the train without a ticket and expected to pay the fare on the train. However, it was very full and she says that no-one came either to issue a ticket or to check on existing ones all the time that she was on the train.
When she arrived at Poulton le Fylde, there was no-one there to check passengers disembarking from the train. By this time she was very worried that she had not paid for the journey...through no fault of her own. She descended the stairs to the platform where she says there is a café/sweet shop and made enquiries to the counter staff there. It was then that a male member of the train staff who was in the café (not in the upstairs booking office) said that he was in charge and both of them went up the stairs where, after being told of the events leading to this situation, issued her a rail ticket for this single journey, as she will be taken home to Handforth sometime towards the end of next week by a family friend in his car. He said that she had been very honest and that 99 out of 100 people faced with the situation at Poulton le Fylde would have just left the station area without paying.
Is this situation as described, something that you would expect mid-day on a Saturday on this route ?
However, there was no-one in the booking office, during the 20 minutes she was waiting for the 1133 train to arrive, which worried her as the ticket office is normally open then and being a regular user of a Senior Citizen Railcard, knows that "railcard discounted price" tickets purchased with this railcard are not normally issued on a train, when a booking office is open. However, she had to board the train without a ticket and expected to pay the fare on the train. However, it was very full and she says that no-one came either to issue a ticket or to check on existing ones all the time that she was on the train.
When she arrived at Poulton le Fylde, there was no-one there to check passengers disembarking from the train. By this time she was very worried that she had not paid for the journey...through no fault of her own. She descended the stairs to the platform where she says there is a café/sweet shop and made enquiries to the counter staff there. It was then that a male member of the train staff who was in the café (not in the upstairs booking office) said that he was in charge and both of them went up the stairs where, after being told of the events leading to this situation, issued her a rail ticket for this single journey, as she will be taken home to Handforth sometime towards the end of next week by a family friend in his car. He said that she had been very honest and that 99 out of 100 people faced with the situation at Poulton le Fylde would have just left the station area without paying.
Is this situation as described, something that you would expect mid-day on a Saturday on this route ?