Penalty Fare / No Ticket Question on FCC stations without barriers

[Mutant Lemming]

At the end of the day, you may feel like that money was wasted, but you pay for the service, anyone who chooses not to pay for getting a service is scum in my book!

I doubt many people would look upon not paying a train fare as a misdemeanour worthy of the scum epithet.... most of us would rather see anyone who wanted to avoid paying the train fare do so, if it meant the resources and effort it took up were used to reduce violent crime by even a fraction.

 

[jon0844]

I tried and failed to get a ticket excessed to use in the peak a couple of weeks ago (in fact, I was refused the excess by the lady at the station). I travelled around 5-5.15am the next morning, so there was no opportunity to get the excess on the day, or at my destination (station not staffed that early).

Given that I had tried, and to go and seek out someone later on in the day to retrospectively pay would have wasted even more of my time, I didn't bother. FCC lost £1.60, but I don't feel like that makes me scum!

 

[island]

Many will wear a lanyard too with their ID/staff pass/travel card (whatever it is), and I have no idea if they have to do that - but I guess they would as it's convenient if it also operates the gateline. Revenue also carry what looks like a police warrant card, and they often flash it in the same way (i.e. too quick for you to look at properly). I don't know how you're supposed to know if it is genuine though!

I've had that done to me by a Southern plain-clothes RPI. I politely asked to see it again, and he showed me it. No hassle.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I tried and failed to get a ticket excessed to use in the peak a couple of weeks ago (in fact, I was refused the excess by the lady at the station). I travelled around 5-5.15am the next morning, so there was no opportunity to get the excess on the day, or at my destination (station not staffed that early).

Given that I had tried, and to go and seek out someone later on in the day to retrospectively pay would have wasted even more of my time, I didn't bother. FCC lost £1.60, but I don't feel like that makes me scum!

That in itself raises an interesting question. When does the obligation to purchase a ticket cease, if you have been ready, willing, and able to purchase one at the start, middle, and end of your journey, but there has not been selling facilities for the ticket you want? I once travelled ticketless from Stone Crossing to New Eltham because the PERTIS machine at the origin was not operative and the only purchasing facility at New Eltham was a vending machine which did not sell the ticket I wanted.

 

[Greenback]

That in itself raises an interesting question. When does the obligation to purchase a ticket cease, if you have been ready, willing, and able to purchase one at the start, middle, and end of your journey, but there has not been selling facilities for the ticket you want? I once travelled ticketless from Stone Crossing to New Eltham because the PERTIS machine at the origin was not operative and the only purchasing facility at New Eltham was a vending machine which did not sell the ticket I wanted.

Yes, that is an interesting question. Take a journey from a station where the ticket office is closed, the TVM touch screen is not working properly and the guard does not come through. Your destination is unstaffed.

In these and similar circumstances I don't really see that the passenger can do any more. But should everyone so affected go on the web as soon as they can and buy their ticket?

 

[Anon Mouse]

Honesty box at unstaffed stations?

 

[SussexMan]

Honesty box at unstaffed stations?

Somebody would nick it!

 

[island]

Honesty box at unstaffed stations?

They already have them, they're red with "Permit to Travel" on

 

[clagmonster]

Yes, that is an interesting question. Take a journey from a station where the ticket office is closed, the TVM touch screen is not working properly and the guard does not come through. Your destination is unstaffed.

Funnily enough I had a similar thought recently. Even more hypothetical. My origin is an unstaffed station with no TVM. I board the train at the rear, via the nearest door to the guard who acknowledges me boarding (we exchange greatings). I then sit about as near to the back cab as possible, fare in hand ready to give to the guard. However, he did not emerge. My destination station's booking office has closed for the night, the TVMs are all locked in the booking office. In this hypothetical situation, am I in the wrong?

 

[jon0844]

My wife nearly got a PF when the only accessible TVM (at the time) had a broken screen. I had my season, but the RPI insisted she needed to buy a ticket before travel. It was only when everyone else who had boarded at the same station said the machine wasn't responding that he changed his mind.

Could have been an awkward situation otherwise.

I've asked a TM on a Heathrow Connect train if I could get an extension from BZ6 to Heathrow and he agreed (otherwise I was going to have to wait for the next one), but said he'd do it later when the train was on its way. I went through the train and sat down, but he didn't come through. In the end, I had to go and find him and he'd forgotten - but did sell me the extension!

 

[Clip]

Some FCC staff also fail to wear name badges, or have their photo IDs (on lanyards) visible. It seems they want to remain anonymous, which they're not allowed to do.
!

I dont travel on FCC an awful lot but if thats what they do then they should be ashamed especially the managers.

Even though I have no control over our RPIs if I see one on duty without name badge then he gets told to put it on. All staff on duty should be wearing a name badge (even if not their name - but a record of fake names in use) and be presentable in wearing their uniform too.

 

[jon0844]

I only ever found out the name of the RPI that harassed me because a colleague told me! He'd never shown me any ID and only wrote a number on the PF he (incorrectly) gave me.

He must have been spoken to about that, however, after my first complaint as he made a snide joke at a later time. Of course, he still wasn't wearing a badge then either - but at least I knew his name by then!

 

[DaveNewcastle]

That in itself raises an interesting question. When does the obligation to purchase a ticket cease, if you have been ready, willing, and able to purchase one at the start, middle, and end of your journey, but there has not been selling facilities for the ticket you want?

It doesn't cease (or not until the debt is old enough to fall beyond the timescale of the Statute of Limitation or Period of Prescription).

But if there was no 'intent' to avoid payment, which could trigger several Offences, and the 'exceptions' to the Byelaw Offence applied, e.g. there were no ticket issuing facilities, then no Offence will have occured. There is just a debt for the cost of the journey. To pursue that, an Officer of the Railway would have to request the passenger to deliver up a ticket - long after the event.

It is hard to imagine any circumstance in which that might happen, perhaps excepting the investigation of something much more serious. In that unlikely event, the payment of a railway fare is hardly likely to be the significant concern - it might be during the assessment of a substantial insurance claim for an major injury caused during the ticketless journey and where the evidence of travel is being investigated.

 

[cuccir]

I'm a little confused - I always thought that it was a given that if there were no purchasing facilities at start, the guard doesn't get to you on the train, you don't change trains at all, and there are no purchasing facilities at the destination, then you're not expected to pay.

It's hypothetical at all either. As an example, all stations (obviously except for Darlington!) on the Bishop Line are unstaffed, but the distance between stops is fairly short: from Bishop Auckland-Heighington there are 4 stops in 13 minutes. On a moderately busy service, the guard often can't get through a carriage between stops, and sometimes can't get through a carriage between two stops - on busier services there are now two guards working, but still, that's a lot of free trips between Bishop Auckland and Shildon. But then, what are people to do?

 

[DaveNewcastle]

[@cuccir - I assume that there is a missing "not" in your post].

There is nothing to be done in these circumstances. The debt is unlikely to be paid after the event, because the Railway is unlikely to pursue it and the passenger is unlikely to offer it. It doesn't actually become a debt unless there is some interaction between the parties to identify the debtor - so it can be treated as abandoned. Lost revenue by the Operator and unincurred expense by the Passenger.

As I was trying to point out, the incident would be of interest only if there was some much more serious matter to investigate. I gave an example of an insurance claim.

Theoretically, historic liabilities can be introduced into proceedings where a fraud has been detected. This has been successful in recent disputes where a TOC claimed the cost of estimated, unpaid, historic journeys by regular passengers where a fraud has been identified, even on a technicality which the passenger disputed.

 

[sbt]

I find this interesting as what I do is _seek_out_ the Guard. In a number of cases they have then apologised for not being able to sell me a ticket as they had shut down their ticket machine to do paperwork prior to arrival at Waterloo, but I always try.

I do wonder if I'm the reason that Guards on SWT now tell you where they are on the train as that started very soon after I mentioned off hand to one Guard that I had walked the length of the train twice to find him. He was at the back of the train and I had guessed wrong and headed to the front first.

Trying to 'do the right thing' can be a pain at times. I once got on the wrong train at Woking and ended up at Clapham Junc. I showed my ticket at the barrier and paid for a Woking - Clapham ticket. I don't remember why I then went to the Ticket Machines for a Clapham - West Byfleet ticket, I think it was because a queue was forming behind the chap at the barrier. The TVMs then rejected my card as invalid - it was the very early days of the Banks automatically detecting fraudulent transactions and I had never been to Clapham before so they automatically disabled my card. I was very lucky that I had just sufficient cash on me to get a ticket home but then I was left with a non-working Bank Card and Credit Card (same bank issuing them, same security over-response) and no cash to hand. I survived the couple of weeks it took to get it sorted out on a loan from my parents but I do wonder what would have happened if the card had been blocked at the time I approached the chap on the Gates... Invalid ticket and no means to pay fare.

That's a general problem, by the way. I have had three other 'automatic block on card' for 'unusual transaction' (use in a usual place followed soon after by use at a distant location) situations so far when I have been travelling by rail away from my usual haunts. There was a recent fourth but they did at least take the trouble to phone me up before leaving me cashless. The flip side is they did recently protect me from the consequences of a 'cloned' card that was being used in the US.

 

[Bakerbloke]

I've had problems like this at Foxton. Once the FCC ticket machine was totally failed and had an engineer on site - I was told to get on the train and get my ticket at the other end. Of course the barrier staff didn't know about this but I stood my ground but was then ushered to the ticket office queue - a very long queue and it took me 20 minutes to get that ticket. Had it been entirely up to me I would have gone to a machine and bought the reverse way return and saved 15 minutes.

On another occasion I had, for once, a pile of change to use for purchasing my fare and bizarrely did not take my credit card that day. I turned up to find that it was rejecting all coins and had to miss my train to go back to get my credit card as I knew that I would have hassle later on proving my innocence.

On a third day the machine swallowed my money but it was not registering on the display - unable to retrieve the money I immediately rang FCC and was promised a refund only to find out later that the phone call had cost me a pound! Bring back ticket offices!

 

[DaveNewcastle]

I've had problems like this at Foxton. Once the FCC ticket machine was totally failed and had an engineer on site - I was told to get on the train and get my ticket at the other end. Of course the barrier staff didn't know about this but . . . . .

Not directed at you in particular, Bakerbloke, but when circumstances arise which lead to someone giving an authorisation or advice such as this, the people taking the advice really should equip themselves with some sort of evidence.

There is no end of tales from pasengers claiming that "the man on the platform said it would be okay" (or similar) but with no means of distinguishing themselves from any arbitrary chancer who will say something like that whenever challenged (and of course with no intention of ever paying a fare unless challenged).

Even a simple note of a contractor's employer, place and time, or a TOC's employee's name, place and time, perhaps even a mobile phone picture. If people could just think ahead a little more, then they will realise that the oral 'authorisation' they have just been given may just need some substantiation when they are further down the line.

To travel without a ticket on the wink that it will be okay, is comparable to telling someone that 'the cheque is in the post'. A little evidence makes the claim so much more credible!

 

[jon0844]

Bring back ticket offices!

TVMs are pretty poor (bad software, limited ticketing facilities - although some TOCs appear to be trying to improve them) but I think that with the combination of poorly trained, or downright lazy, staff and agency staff that don't really care about the damage they may do, the days of the manned ticket office are numbered.

Besides asking for very simple tickets (one day travelcard, return to London etc), I regularly find myself struggling to get what I want. I've had staff refuse to sell a ticket I got only a few weeks before, or get told that a ticket doesn't exist - until I go onto my phone and show a photo of the ticket I had and they then sigh, and ultimately find the ticket does exist and make up some silly excuse.

Everytime I travel now and have to ask for ticket that is a tiny bit out of the ordinary, I feel like I'm taking a gamble and always wish I'd gone online and bought the ticket(s) there, which of course is another reason ticket staff will soon become obsolete.

I totally agree about getting some evidence though when something goes wrong. Photograph the TVM(s) saying 'out of service' if you can, although you might still be told it could have been taken at any time!!

 

[34D]

I'm a little confused - I always thought that it was a given that if there were no purchasing facilities at start, the guard doesn't get to you on the train, you don't change trains at all, and there are no purchasing facilities at the destination, then you're not expected to pay.

Past consideration is no consideration?

On a practical level I agree with you. For the strictly correct legal position I refer to the earlier answer from Mr. DaveNewcastle

Had it been entirely up to me I would have gone to a machine and bought the reverse way return and saved 15 minutes.

Please will people stop suggesting to "buy a ticket the reverse way round". This is NOT the correct thing to do nor is it what would ever be expected. If you arrive at your destination, immediately buy a 'reverse way round' ticket then return from your destination to home station several hours later, you may well cause other problems for yourself (example, based on an assumption that the ticket was bought for immediate departure hence must have already been used) not forgetting that you'd have effectively used the return before the outward.

 

[MikeWh]

Please will people stop suggesting to "buy a ticket the reverse way round". This is NOT the correct thing to do nor is it what would ever be expected. If you arrive at your destination, immediately buy a 'reverse way round' ticket then return from your destination to home station several hours later, you may well cause other problems for yourself (example, based on an assumption that the ticket was bought for immediate departure hence must have already been used) not forgetting that you'd have effectively used the return before the outward.

I quite often buy tickets while the ticket office is open to avoid having problems later on if it closes early. I've never been questioned as to why I didn't use the ticket straight away. At most TVMs you have no choice but to buy the reverse ticket because you can only buy tickets from that station. Whilst you have effectively used the return half first, that's only in your conscience. The ticket hasn't been used and no RPI would be able to prove otherwise.

 

[sheff1]

Please will people stop suggesting to "buy a ticket the reverse way round". This is NOT the correct thing to do nor is it what would ever be expected. If you arrive at your destination, immediately buy a 'reverse way round' ticket then return from your destination to home station several hours later, you may well cause other problems for yourself (example, based on an assumption that the ticket was bought for immediate departure hence must have already been used) not forgetting that you'd have effectively used the return before the outward.

Why should anyone make such an assumption ? There is absolutely no requirement to use a ticket immediately.

 

[jon0844]

Indeed.. but the time the ticket was issued could be useful for revenue inspectors (as well as how it was paid for - as I reckon most people don't know what the codes mean) in certain circumstances.

 

[clagmonster]

I suppose seeing a ticket issued earlier could lead to questions being asked and further checks made, eg checking the return portion, swiping both portions through an Avantix. I suppose a byelway prosecution could ensue if the tickets were purchased the wrong way round and this could be proved, however I suspect the more serious fare evasion would be harder unless there was a difference in fares.

As a matter of interest, I once had a situation in which I didn't have an opportunity to puchase on my outward journey (both booking offices closed, TVM at origin locked in booking office, TVM at destination unable to issue remote origin tickets). I asked the guard on the return from a right way round ticket, but was sold one the wrong way round.

 

[Bakerbloke]

In the future we might all just have oyster cards - or ticketless travel recorded on your mobile.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I realise some companies do this already.

 

[Deerfold]

Please will people stop suggesting to "buy a ticket the reverse way round". This is NOT the correct thing to do nor is it what would ever be expected. If you arrive at your destination, immediately buy a 'reverse way round' ticket then return from your destination to home station several hours later, you may well cause other problems for yourself (example, based on an assumption that the ticket was bought for immediate departure hence must have already been used) not forgetting that you'd have effectively used the return before the outward.

So long as you do not subsequently use the outward portion that shouldn't be a problem. There's nothing stopping you using the return portion of a ticket without using the outward part.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

In the future we might all just have oyster cards - or ticketless travel recorded on your mobile.

We just need to sort out how it handles a journey with only one end touched in - and the missed one potentially anywhere on the network.

 

[island]

So long as you do not subsequently use the outward portion that shouldn't be a problem. There's nothing stopping you using the return portion of a ticket without using the outward part.

Some staff members have been reported to make an issue of people using the return part of a ticket in circumstances when it could not have been possible to use the outbound part, taking the time printed into consideration.

 

[Deerfold]

Some staff members have been reported to make an issue of people using the return part of a ticket in circumstances when it could not have been possible to use the outbound part, taking the time printed into consideration.

Some staff members make a problem out of all sorts of things (including splitting tickets).

Is there anything to say you cannot do this?

I did say "shouldn't" be a problem.

 

[John @ home]

Some staff members have been reported to make an issue of people using the return part of a ticket in circumstances when it could not have been possible to use the outbound part, taking the time printed into consideration.

Some staff members make a problem out of all sorts of things ...

Is there anything to say you cannot do this?

My understanding is that ticket examiners used to be instructed to refuse to accept the return portion of a return ticket if the date and time shown on the ticket indicated that the outward journey could not have been physically and legitimately completed, or part completed, taking into account any applicable general or break of journey restrictions. I don't know whether it is a current instruction.

The requirement to use (at least part of) the outward portion of a return ticket before using the return portion does not normally appear to form part of the contract between the passenger and the train companies, but the above may explain why some staff react in that way.