Is it possible that a ticket barrier is erasing my paper season ticket?

[causton]

No encode exchanges can be done anywhere that can sell the same type of ticket

Encode exchanges can be done anywhere as stated above - but I think some stations have a real issue with doing it if the ticket is not on their Season Ticket Database. I say this because someone asked for an encode from their Trainline-issued company bought season and they brought in 5 pages of instructions from the Trainline for me to follow saying "YES YOU ARE ALLOWED TO DO THIS NO IT IS NOT BREAKING THE LAW CHECK THE NRCOC" but to be fair they had already filled out the encode form so I just needed to fill out the new ticket number, stamp it and send it off to go back to them!

All stations should at least have Encode Exchange forms, which they then fax off (or send via their accounts department) to the relevant TOC or original issuer, if it is not on their STDB. Whether they use them or make up an excuse, on the other hand...

And yes, all encodes are checked. I staple the old ones of mine to a sheet of what new ones I have issued at the end of my shift, so any discrepancies would become apparent easily!

 

[kieron]

Would that lose the validity down to East Grinstead and Uckfield, as mentioned in the interavailability document?

NRE and the like don't seem to feel a need to describe what a travelcard with dual route available entitles you to do.

Until someone says differently, I'd assume that it allows you to do whatever (in this case) a Crawley-Zone 2-6 travelcard would, or whatever a Haywards Heath-Zone 2-6 travelcard would.

Both of these tickets allow travel to East Grinstead or Uckfield, so you should be fine with a dual availability travelcard.

 

[Deepgreen]

I sympathise with the OP. My annual season from Dorking (all stations) to London terminals allows me to go via Redhill or Epsom. Both these routes can include Clapham Junction, but I rarely exit the station there. When I occasionally do, however, for two years now my ticket has not worked the gates at Clapham Junction. I complain to SWT (operator at CJ) and Southern (ticket issuer) every time it happens, and every time I am promised the coding will be corrected. It has not been so far! Last time, SWT came back to me to say that my ticket was valid at all intermediate stations but NOT FOR EXITING except at Waterloo or Vauxhall. When I told them that this was both wrong and nonsensical, they apologised and told me they had been mis-informed (!).

I have lost count of the number of times I have discovered coding/validity errors with various tickets over the years - it makes me despair of the thoroughness of the coding/routeing checking regime.

 

[Shempz]

I've had a problem with replacement season tickets from Southern quite a lot. As I use my ticket at least 6 - 8 times a day, the writing has often gone after 6mths. I've then got a replacement ticket, and some of these have only lasted a week or so, and some only a few days before it get the "seek assistance" message. The last time I got a replacement at East Croydon (about 9 months ago), without prompting, the person in the ticket booth actually said he was not sure if the ticket would work, as they had a lot of problems with them.

 

[bicbasher]

The OP is unlucky that both his home and work station are managed by LOROL where NR ticket sales isn't their highest priority.

I'd like to hope whoever takes over the London Overground concession from LOROL will improve those ticket sales as there have been numerous complaints about their lack of knowledge.

 

[ronmanager]

Update, finally a professional person contacted me from TFL. Just been in to SPB again where I met him and he went through it all with me in the ticket office. Their system did issue my new ticket with a Gold Card discount applied as if I'd purchased the ticket at a discount and this was making the ticket act like an off peak ticket even though such a thing does not exist. The ticket machine should not be able to do this and the person who issued it should not have selected this as an option either - so I was very unlucky.

In any case, to get round it they entered me as a new customer, new Photocard required and they cut the picture out of my old one. Then issued a backdated new ticket but as a duplicate and they waived the £10 admin fee that it automatically charges.

Result = complete new ticket, new Photocard and fingers crossed come Monday morning it will go through the barriers no probs.

7 times I had to go in including today and after an hour reading these forums I was better trained than all but one of the customer service staff I encountered during this.

So thanks to everyone for the advice and info - really appreciate it.