likely cost of fine?

[Taylor19]

a couple of weeks ago i travelled from Lancaster to Manchester oxford rd, I was rushing so I didn't have time to get my ticket at the ticket office so I had intended on buying my ticket on the train but with it being so early in the morning and being so busy I guess the ticket officer didn't make it down all the carriages, so when I got to oxford rd I went to the ticket office to pay for my ticket but a guy pulled me up and explained that you could no longer do it that way and that he would have to fine me.

I gave him my details told him where I came in from, my address etc, he printed my ticket which was £20 I was surprised because that was cheaper than what my ticket usually costs, there was a misunderstanding he thought I was coming in from Salford crescent, I corrected him but he just let me through and said I would receive a letter, I receive it a couple of days ago it was asking me to fill in what I'd already told the guy and just a few words about what happened, so I filled it in and sent it off yesterday so just waiting to hear back.

What I'm wondering is why didn't he just write me up a new fine there and then ? the letter I received was titled something like debt collectors and prosecutions.... which sounds worrying to me and does anyone have any idea how much my fine is likely to be ?

thanks

 

[cuccir]

Hmm, it's a little confusing that he thought you were coming from Salford Crescent. Are you confident you didn't say anything to give him that impression? What ticket did you buy for £20 - was this a Penalty Fare? It would be an appropriate Penalty Fare from Salford Crescent.

If they've written to you it means that they're considering prosecuting, and the letter is a way of attempting to get evidence, as well as giving you a chance to explain what happened. Do you still have the letter they sent you - does it mention any legislation?

I think they're writing because they think you lied about the station your started from: that you said Salford Crescent instead of Lancaster to avoid your fare. Northern often offer to settle cases out of court for £80 for people who have no prior offences, but they may be less keen to do so if they think you lied about your origin station.

There's probably not much to do now that you've replied to them, other than wait to see what their response is.

 

[Taylor19]

that's were the confusion came from I was explaining to him that I originally wanted to get off at Salford crescent but the train didn't stop there so I got off at oxford rd.

I didn't buy a ticket for £20 that was the fine he was giving me until I corrected him (Lancaster to MCR not Salford to MCR), the letter they sent me was only a one side one piece of paper they wanted my name, address, the journey to and from etc.

 

[mikeg]

MCO is the correct code for Oxford road by the way...

Which TOC did you travel with? Maybe a bit of a red herring now they're going down the prosecution route but a penalty fare would only be chargeable if you travelled with Northern.

 

[Taylor19]

MCO is the correct code for Oxford road by the way...

Which TOC did you travel with? Maybe a bit of a red herring now they're going down the prosecution route but a penalty fare would only be chargeable if you travelled with Northern.

pretty sure it was transpennine

 

[Taylor19]

CUCCIR said the letter was a way of gathering evidence but what evidence is there to get ? isn't it just his version of events against mine ? obviously they'll side with him ?

 

[mikeg]

Depends who the 'they' Is as to whether they'll side with him. The case is theirs to prove if it's the court we're talking about. Quite possibly the prosecutions department will side with him though.

Either way it looks like you've broken the bylaws as no doubt Lancaster had adequate ticketing facilities available when boarding.

 

[najaB]

obviously they'll side with him ?

They have to "side with" the facts.

 

[cuccir]

This might all make a bit more sense with a little context. Note I'm not commenting here on whether the following is fair or sensible, but it is the situation

It is (in most circumstances) illegal to board a train without a ticket, if there were facilities to buy a ticket where you boarded. This is made illegal by the railway bylaws, and it doesn't matter whether not buying a ticket was deliberate, or if you intended to buy a ticket later on. And yes, many companies sell tickets on trains anyway. The Bylaws are punished by relatively low fines, and after they're spent leave no criminal record.

A further law - the Regulation of the Railways Act - makes it illegal to intentionally avoid paying for your fare. It carries a higher fine than the Bylaws and will be found on DBS checks. To convict, they need to prove beyond reasonable doubt that you intended to evade your fare.

To complicate matters, only some train companies issue Penalty Fares. Northern do, but TransPennineExpress don't. Technically, Norrhern can't issue a Penalty Fare for your journey - but they can prosecute you.

So the evidence that they're looking for is to see if you were deliberately trying to avoid paying for your ticket, to see if they could try and prosecute you under the harsher laws. In terms of believing you: well, you're not contradicting the Inspector as such, only saying that he must have misheard you. If - and we're jumping ahead of ourselves a bit here - you were prosecuted under the Regulation of the Railways Act and you pleaded Not Guilty in court, it would be up to a Magistrate to decide if your story was believable or not. It'd be irresponsible for anyone other than a lawyer to speculate as to what a Magistrate might believe. But we're not at that point yet.

Sorry for the long post but hopefully that makes it all a bit clearer!

 

[some bloke]

If you upload their letter and your reply with identifying details removed, that might help people on here to help.

At some stage it may be useful if you can provide evidence and/or a convincing account involving the appropriateness of using Salford Crescent, to support your contention that he misunderstood and that you only mentioned that station because you meant to get off there. For example, if you had a meeting to go to that was much more convenient to get to from that station than Oxford Road.

 

[Bertie the bus]

I would say the fact not a single service from Lancaster calls at Salford Crescent also complicates matters so why was Salford Crescent brought up in the conversation? It isn’t as though it is OK to travel to Salford Crescent without buying a ticket but not for Manchester Oxford Road.

 

[cuccir]

I would say the fact not a single service from Lancaster calls at Salford Crescent also complicates matters so why was Salford Crescent brought up in the conversation? It isn’t as though it is OK to travel to Salford Crescent without buying a ticket but not for Manchester Oxford Road.

This has already been explained

I was explaining to him that I originally wanted to get off at Salford crescent but the train didn't stop there so I got off at oxford rd.

While there aren't any current services from Lancaster that call at Salford Crescent, there were several until fairly recently - I think they disappeared among the electrification works of the mid 2010s but that's a pretty recent change. I can't find a very recent timetable to check but TimetableWorld shows that they were hourly in 2007 and I'm very confident that they lasted until much more recently than that.

 

[Bertie the bus]

Some trains once calling at Salford Crescent until 10 years ago explains why Salford Crescent was brought up in the conversation? OK.

The point I was making is - I wanted to get off at Salford Crescent is a strange response to the question where have you travelled from? The RPI heard Salford Crescent as the OP's origin and the OP will probably need to come up with a better reason why the RPI heard that than trains used to stop a decade ago.

 

[cuccir]

Some trains once calling at Salford Crescent until 10 years ago explains why Salford Crescent was brought up in the conversation? OK.

The point I was making is - I wanted to get off at Salford Crescent is a strange response to the question where have you travelled from? The RPI heard Salford Crescent as the OP's origin and the OP will probably need to come up with a better reason why the RPI heard that than trains used to stop a decade ago.

I'm not going get dragged into a discussion which takes this thread off course, so I'll not respond to this claim further than this post, other than to state that: this post relies on assumptions about the format of the conversation between the OP and the inspector that have not been reported here; it shows little evidence of having engaged in the point that I made in post 12; and starts to speculate about the outcomes of a claim without seeing what evidence Northern Rail have, or with sufficient detail from the OP, and to that end I don't think it is particularly helpful.

 

[Darandio]

While there aren't any current services from Lancaster that call at Salford Crescent, there were several until fairly recently - I think they disappeared among the electrification works of the mid 2010s but that's a pretty recent change. I can't find a very recent timetable to check but TimetableWorld shows that they were hourly in 2007 and I'm very confident that they lasted until much more recently than that.

I cannot see the relevance either, but you are welcome to trawl through this lot and see if it did run more recently. https://dpsimulation.org.uk/timetables-northern-rail.html

The only thing i'm unsure about is whether the correct timetables are even in there.