Help! Prosecution letter's arrived

[Deerfold]

Watford Junction is not in zone 9, which only applies to Amersham and Chesham on the Met.

WFJ is outside zone 8 but effectively its own zone. Of course this doesn't change your point re. a Z1-6 not being valid there.

It's in Zone "W" all on its own. It used to be the same Zone as Amersham/Chesham back when it was zone "D".

 

[hairyhandedfool]

Some interesting views on this, however I wish to make a point here.

We know an out-boundary travelcard to be a travelcard plus a return form the named station to the boundary of zone 6 (where the travelcard takes over).

The shortest route is defined as that from the origin to tha destination, using the mileages listed in the GBNRT. I have yet to see Boundary Zone 6 appear in any of the tables so logically there is no shortest route.

By direct trains requires the train to stop at that point. I am yet to see a train call at Boundary Zone 6, so logically it is not a valid route.

As noted in the RG. Unfortunately Boundary Zone 6 does not have any routeing points, so there are no noted routes.

Therefore there are no valid routes by this line of thinking.

I note that Watford is a routeing point for St. Albans [City]. Would anyone like to suggest valid routes for St. Albans [City] to Headstone Lane (rte Any Permitted)?

 

[Clip]

Watford Junction is not in zone 9, which only applies to Amersham and Chesham on the Met.

WFJ is outside zone 8 but effectively its own zone. Of course this doesn't change your point re. a Z1-6 not being valid there.

Of which i apologised for later on in the the thread though it did used to belong to 9.

That seems fair enough - but surely the TC would then apply to Harrow & Wealdstone and the PF should only apply between that and Watford Junction if at all? The guard on the Abbey service should have merely offered to sell a new ticket in my view, as if you get on at SAA and try to travel to WFJ without a valid ticket that's what he does.

If the OP was travelling on a fast from Euston to WFJ though (ie not calling at Harrow & Wealdstone) then that argument is invalid as the Travelcard would not cover travel up to a valid zone station if the train doesn't stop there?

As has been pointed out the guard did actually sell him the 'excess' if we should call it that rather then a PF which is fair enough.

It just all seems far to sill from LM if they are selling a ticket that they claim is valid on the route the OP took and then to tell him that because of the ticket he had but bought from another TOC is not valid.

 

[Class377]

As has been pointed out the guard did actually sell him the 'excess' if we should call it that rather then a PF which is fair enough.

It just all seems far to sill from LM if they are selling a ticket that they claim is valid on the route the OP took and then to tell him that because of the ticket he had but bought from another TOC is not valid.

Surely then he shouldn't have been charged the £20 admin fee? I've known of people being paying excess fares on other routes without such a fee.

Doesn't the profits from a TC go to whoever you travel on? I thought the ticket barriers could electronically track the journey, so if, say, you ran FCC from SAC into St Pancras, the tube to Victoria, Southern to Clapham Junction, SWT back to Waterloo, SET from Waterloo East to Charing Cross, underground to Euston, LM to Harrow, London overground to West Hampstead and FCC back to SAC, wouldn't all the companies get some of the money and not just FCC where you bought it from?

 

[swt_passenger]

Doesn't the profits from a TC go to whoever you travel on? I thought the ticket barriers could electronically track the journey, so if, say, you ran FCC from SAC into St Pancras, the tube to Victoria, Southern to Clapham Junction, SWT back to Waterloo, SET from Waterloo East to Charing Cross, underground to Euston, LM to Harrow, London overground to West Hampstead and FCC back to SAC, wouldn't all the companies get some of the money and not just FCC where you bought it from?

Oyster can track journeys, but paper travelcards can't be tracked, as mag stripe readers are not online as such. I believe the revenue from 'inboundary' T/Cs is dished out based on travel surveys. 'Outboundary' T/Cs revenue is probably divided into two chunks - some for the outboundary leg according to normal orcats procedures for the probable route to London, and the rest into a pot to be divided up by ATOC/TfL in the same way as an inboundary T/C...

 

[Clip]

Surely then he shouldn't have been charged the £20 admin fee? I've known of people being paying excess fares on other routes without such a fee.

I may be wrong here but i think the £20 has been added as it was outside of the timeline to pay/appeal - from what i can gather from the letter.

TC was answered above

 

[MikeWh]

I note that Watford is a routeing point for St. Albans [City]. Would anyone like to suggest valid routes for St. Albans [City] to Headstone Lane (rte Any Permitted)?

Headstone Lane is in zone 5, Hatch End is in zone 6 and is the last station before the mythical boundary zone 6. Routeing points for both are Willesden Junction and Watford Junction. Routeing point in common - ding! Valid route is walk to St Albans Abbey, train to common routeing point (Watford Junction) then train to destination.

As Barrykas pointed out, the distance to Hatch End is just over 3 miles further than the distance to Elstree & Borehamwood which might rule that out. But, the description of the out boundary day travelcard on NRE is a return to London plus unlimited travel within the zones. That suggests valid routes to London.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

Headstone Lane is in zone 5, Hatch End is in zone 6 and is the last station before the mythical boundary zone 6....

It appears my map in the office has Headstone Lane and Hatch End marked the wrong way round:roll:

 

[swt_passenger]

Of which i apologised for later on in the the thread though it did used to belong to 9.

AIUI from TfL's online 'board papers' for Dec 2007, when the outer zones in the north west were changed from letters to numbers in Jan 2008 Watford Junction definitely stayed outside. Not only was it never in Zone D (as someone posted earlier), it was never in Zone 9 either. It may have looked as though it was in Zone 9 on certain maps, but IMHO that was only because the maps were poorly drawn.

'Pseudo zone' W (which is Watford Jn only) was introduced in advance in November 2007 specifically so that the Overground could introduce PAYG to WJ. For about the first week or two there were various issues because LM weren't doing PAYG and it was only valid on SN and LO services.

 

[Clip]

AIUI from TfL's online 'board papers' for Dec 2007, when the outer zones in the north west were changed from letters to numbers in Jan 2008 Watford Junction definitely stayed outside. Not only was it never in Zone D (as someone posted earlier), it was never in Zone 9 either. It may have looked as though it was in Zone 9 on certain maps, but IMHO that was only because the maps were poorly drawn.

'Pseudo zone' W (which is Watford Jn only) was introduced in advance in November 2007 specifically so that the Overground could introduce PAYG to WJ. For about the first week or two there were various issues because LM weren't doing PAYG and it was only valid on SN and LO services.

I see. They should never try and confuse people with it as i always thought it was 9 but im probably thinking about the tube stop instead.

 

[Deerfold]

AIUI from TfL's online 'board papers' for Dec 2007, when the outer zones in the north west were changed from letters to numbers in Jan 2008 Watford Junction definitely stayed outside. Not only was it never in Zone D (as someone posted earlier), it was never in Zone 9 either. It may have looked as though it was in Zone 9 on certain maps, but IMHO that was only because the maps were poorly drawn.

Apologies, I think I was getting confused with Watford Met station (which wasn't in D either but was in the zones)

 

[bb21]

Apologies, I think I was getting confused with Watford Met station (which wasn't in D either but was in the zones)

Watford Met was originally in Zone B, and then reallocated to Zone A, and finally to Zone 7 when the numeral zones came in.

 

[Royston Vasey]

Of which i apologised for later on in the the thread though it did used to belong to 9.

So you did, apologies.

 

[robertbishop]

I think there should be no argument whether this ticket is valid or not, shown by the screenshot here. If this isn't concrete evidence, I don't know what is. Picture credit to MikeWh, from page 4.

 

[yorkie]

Unfortunately I don't live anywhere near St Albans, so am unable to test this. I am in London on Saturday but have other plans. But if anyone is able to purchase such a ticket, I would advise buying online (from LM website so they can't blame it on "another company"), bring the itinerary and if challenged refuse to pay anything there and then and obtain an Unpaid Fare Notice, which can be robustly challenged. I would also suggest anyone asked for any more money on a ticket with a clearly defined itinerary that you are following considers threatening LM with going to the media. LM are keen to have good - rather than bad - publicity so this might work. This has to be done soon, in case they get the validity on the website changed.

A robust letter is being sent by the OP, and if anyone from LM is reading this, all I will say is: ignore this at your peril. You will regret it.