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Powers of a person at a station

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sheff1

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Yes I did read through the terms you have linked to, and I can’t find anything to say I have to keep and produce my receipt.

Quite. You won't find anything because there is no requirement to produce your receipt. As usual, staff at Sheffield are making things up. You may have already seen this, but if not
TRAVELMASTER SMART TICKETS TO GO PAPERLESS FROM 30 JUNE
03 June 2019
CUSTOMERS
purchasing flexible and value-for-money TravelMaster tickets valid on rail services will no longer need a paper counterpart to use their ticket for train travel in South Yorkshire.

From Sunday June 30th TravelMaster’s range of smart tickets will go completely digital as Ticket Vending Machines stop issuing customers with paper counterparts for tickets that are valid on trains. Instead rail ticket inspectors will use smartphones to check the validity of a ticket on a customer’s smart card.
 
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johnnychips

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I have submitted complaints to Travelmaster (though I don’t think it is their fault) and EMR, so we will see what happens.
 

WesternLancer

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Quite. You won't find anything because there is no requirement to produce your receipt. As usual, staff at Sheffield are making things up. You may have already seen this, but if not
Great link - print a few copies of that page and hand it to staff when they ask for your receipt - "this is my receipt, take care to read it carefully"
 

robbeech

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With the risk of me sounding like a broken record.

I’m surprised the EMR staff or contractor hasn’t got these.
They cost money.

Alternatively, shouldn't whomever was responsible for rolling out the South Yorkshire travel master card product have first ensured that it was able to be validity-checked by train company revenue protection staff?
This would cost them money for no real gain.
As reported in post #11, checking equipment is out there and being used on a daily basis.
Indeed. Not really the passenger's fault in being caught up in this.
Not the passenger’s fault, but in almost 100% of cases it IS the passenger’s problem. This is how the railway operates in an increasing number of situations sadly.
In the meantime, potential conflict ensues! Would make an interesting segment for one of these ten-a-penny reality TV railway documentaries. :rolleyes:
Aren’t they funded at least in part by the operator, they’d never allow this.
I'm not sure but I know the ones in Nottingham can't read the local authority Robin Hood cards.
I’m aware of 1 person on 2 occasions having issues with staff because of this. It’s nothing short of a power trip in many instances.
Back when I was a guard (I was probably one of the few that read the retail notices) I always made sure that the technology was available to me to use. If not then I always gave the passenger the benefit of the doubt. I didn't see it as fair that the customer should have to prove validity of their smartcard when the technology wasnt available.

An example was when a certain TOC introduced smartcards but (a) none of the guards had had the required training/piece of A4 paper explaining how to scan and (b) there was no agreement in place with the union. At first we were told that the customer had to keep their receipt with them until it was pointed out that this was not in the t&c and all the customer had to do was present the card for scanning. What a farce.....
Of course, we applaud the attitude but it’s getting less and less common.
I am the OP and it happened again today. To cut a long story short, she said it was in the Terms and Conditions that I have to keep my receipt and show it. As I had not read the T and C, I could not argue with this, and she let me on asking to make sure I had a receipt in future.

I then went on Travelmaster’s T and Cs and of course I can’t find one. I rang Travelmaster but no answer then emailed their complaints (delivery failure!). So I’ll have another go at contacting them and EMR when I get home.
Anyone with the slightest bit of interest and/or consideration for their job and the members of public they interact with on a daily basis would have looked into this matter themselves by now. Clearly these staff know it’s happening but there must be an incentive to doing sod all about it. Whilst it is different with dedicated revenue staff, when we see this blatant lack of care with guards who also perform revenue duties you do have to wonder how their attitude sits with other aspects of their job.
Yes I did read through the terms you have linked to, and I can’t find anything to say I have to keep and produce my receipt.

Do you think I might have broken a NR Terms and Conditions? I have been polite during these encounters and not swore or been aggressive.
That’s because there is no such rule as others have said. There is likely an order of magnitude more made up rules than real ones and there’s a lot of real ones. I bet we couldn’t collectively name 5 made up rules that are in the passenger’s favour though.[/QUOTE]
 

johnnychips

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Go on then everybody - what should I do on Monday? I will have renewed my Travelmaster and will keep the receipt. Should I
- present my Travelmaster card with the receipt
- present my Travelmaster card, but then give the receipt when asked
- present my Travelmaster card, say I have got a receipt but say I don’t have to show it you
- just present my Travelmaster card and see what happens, having the Travelmaster T and C’s loaded on my phone

or possibly go to Sheffield station tomorrow and try to speak to someone?

Unfortunately I have a class on Monday, rather than just doing admin, so I really can’t miss my train.

Normally I would think: well, it isn’t the employees’ fault, they are being paid crap, I don’t want to cause them hassle, but then I think:
First time - ‘well, you go on then, it’s your fault if you get into trouble’. Rather than ‘there’s obviously a problem here, I’ll let you on but I’ll speak to my manager’.
Second time - ‘but it’s in the terms and conditions’ which was a lie, but I couldn’t prove it at the time
 

Metal_gee_man

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I'd have the news article & the t&cs printed, I'd also have the ticket tucked in my wallet, but all in all I'd feel at this time a point needs to be made and a bit of scene just to shut the staff member down, the incident will hopefully be talked about at the next staff meeting or in the staff room and rectified either by your actions or by a manager.

Once is understandable, twice is ignorance, the third is unacceptable.
 

RJ

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Yes I did read through the terms you have linked to, and I can’t find anything to say I have to keep and produce my receipt.

Do you think I might have broken a NR Terms and Conditions? I have been polite during these encounters and not swore or been aggressive.

Don't worry too much about how polite you appear. The key is to communicate with people like that in a language they understand. Someone with her personality type is not going to take you seriously if you're too nice to them. Being too polite will just annoy her or make her think you're chancing it.

Someone like that might discriminate against you because of your age - and decide what you have to say isn't worth listening to, even if you're right. So what you should do is find out who she works for and feed back what has been happening to them. Keep it concise - all they need to know is what product you have and that she is misunderstood because she can't check it. Don't get any more technical than that as you'll run the risk of your feedback not being understood. Feel free to draft something and I'll happily have a look at it before you send it off.

The company can then arrange for someone she sees as an authority to train her on what to do when she is presented with one of those tickets. Then she should leave you alone.

Having to carry unnecessary paperwork and receipts is ridiculous - don't do that.
 
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RJ

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Normally I would think: well, it isn’t the employees’ fault, they are being paid crap, I don’t want to cause them hassle, but then I think:

Don't think like that. She is being paid to do a job and part of that is having competency in understanding of local ticketing products. If the way she's doing the job is negatively affecting you then you need to feed that back to her employers.

I can guarantee you she doesn't give two hoots about causing you hassle. The best thing you can do is get her employers to train her up on that product.

Personally I'd be mortified if I was working on a misunderstanding and causing problems for customers. I'd far rather be made aware and told what is correct than keep doing the wrong thing.
 
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SteveM70

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I agree. Though it's slightly provocative, if you bring along a copy of the T&Cs (preferably printed), ask them next time to point out where it says you must show the receipt.

If they say "I don't have to prove it to you" or "I don't have the time to show it to you" then they can hardy expect to be believed.

If they say "err.... I don't know" then it's clear they're making it up.

Not necessarily. It could be that they’ve been poorly trained in the first place and/or not had refresher training when the T&Cs changed. The member of staff could honestly believe what they’re saying is correct
 

ForTheLoveOf

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Not necessarily. It could be that they’ve been poorly trained in the first place and/or not had refresher training when the T&Cs changed. The member of staff could honestly believe what they’re saying is correct
But again, the point is that they can't expect the passenger to believe them if they don't even know where in the T&Cs the purported requirement to show a receipt exists.
 

PeterC

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Not necessarily. It could be that they’ve been poorly trained in the first place and/or not had refresher training when the T&Cs changed. The member of staff could honestly believe what they’re saying is correct
Many organisations that I have been involved with have had a bit of a blind spot when it comes to training on changes to existing systens as opposed to wholesale replacement. The other issue is "on the job" training where there is no reference back to the source material so A was trained by B who was trained by C and the whole thing ends up like a game of Chinese Whispers.

Having seen these issues in practice in several industries I find the idea that customer facing staff go round deliberately inventing rules laughable. The fault is invariably with management.
 

WesternLancer

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Go on then everybody - what should I do on Monday? I will have renewed my Travelmaster and will keep the receipt. Should I
- present my Travelmaster card with the receipt
- present my Travelmaster card, but then give the receipt when asked
- present my Travelmaster card, say I have got a receipt but say I don’t have to show it you
- just present my Travelmaster card and see what happens, having the Travelmaster T and C’s loaded on my phone

or possibly go to Sheffield station tomorrow and try to speak to someone?

Unfortunately I have a class on Monday, rather than just doing admin, so I really can’t miss my train.

Normally I would think: well, it isn’t the employees’ fault, they are being paid crap, I don’t want to cause them hassle, but then I think:
First time - ‘well, you go on then, it’s your fault if you get into trouble’. Rather than ‘there’s obviously a problem here, I’ll let you on but I’ll speak to my manager’.
Second time - ‘but it’s in the terms and conditions’ which was a lie, but I couldn’t prove it at the time
I'd have the leaflet to show them (as per link above) printed copy to leave with them ideally and as a fall back I'd have the receipt in my wallet if asked for / insisted on then make it clear that according to the leaflet "I really don't need to show you this, as it states here, and if you are unsure you need to get your manager to check with Northern Trains who represent the railways with regard to this ticket"

Do you but it from a ticket office (in which case ask them too at point of purchase) or a ticket machine (ie no one to ask)?
 

WesternLancer

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Also I guess we don't know exactly who she works for eg EMR / Agency etc - but if EMR chances are she is not being paid crap, has access to a railway pension scheme - which is still a v good scheme, priv travel etc - in which case she has probably got way better job terms than many other people you may meet on your avg journey to work...
 

sheff1

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I find the idea that customer facing staff go round deliberately inventing rules laughable.

You may find it laughable, I don't find it funny at all.

Staff at Sheffield are notorious for making their own 'ruies' up. This has been the case for 30 years at least. I have encountered it many times and there have been various instances reported on here by others. Even when shown the actual rule, written in language which a 12 year old could understand, they stick by their own invented rules.

Complaining results in a 'promise' that staff will be retrained/briefed with the correct information - I have received such letters from British Rail, Midland Mainline and East Midlands Trains. These letters are not worth the paper they are written on, either the training/briefing is not happening or the staff take no notice.
 

johnnychips

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I received a reply from Travelmaster today. Basically they said they do not consider the receipt as necessary to travel; staff should use electronic readers; if these are unavailable staff should assume the passengers are travelling validly; and they will be contacting EMR. So I can show the staff this reply on Monday.

I received a reply from EMR. They hope to get back to me within five days, but it may take longer as they have a large number of queries at the moment.
 

sheff1

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I received a reply from Travelmaster today. Basically they said they do not consider the receipt as necessary to travel; staff should use electronic readers; if these are unavailable staff should assume the passengers are travelling validly; and they will be contacting EMR. So I can show the staff this reply on Monday.

Please let us know what happens. If the staff accept the reply without quibble that would certainly be a step in the right direction.
 

LowLevel

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Many organisations that I have been involved with have had a bit of a blind spot when it comes to training on changes to existing systens as opposed to wholesale replacement. The other issue is "on the job" training where there is no reference back to the source material so A was trained by B who was trained by C and the whole thing ends up like a game of Chinese Whispers.

Having seen these issues in practice in several industries I find the idea that customer facing staff go round deliberately inventing rules laughable. The fault is invariably with management.

I am a railway ticket inspector albeit a guard rather than revenue protection. I can confirm there are some curious people employed in similar roles who would probably be an interesting mental study who very much believe that they are the law.
 

PeterC

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You may find it laughable, I don't find it funny at all.

Staff at Sheffield are notorious for making their own 'ruies' up. This has been the case for 30 years at least. I have encountered it many times and there have been various instances reported on here by others. Even when shown the actual rule, written in language which a 12 year old could understand, they stick by their own invented rules.

Complaining results in a 'promise' that staff will be retrained/briefed with the correct information - I have received such letters from British Rail, Midland Mainline and East Midlands Trains. These letters are not worth the paper they are written on, either the training/briefing is not happening or the staff take no notice.
If your allegations are accurate than that is a matter for the police or the local trading standards.
 

johnnychips

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Just for your interest, I present the reply from Travelmaster here. I haven’t redacted it as I’m sure you would have deduced my name might be John.


Thank you for getting in touch with us.

Hi John,

We're really sorry to hear you've had this experience at Sheffield Station. We will be contacting them to discuss the issues you've raised.

To confirm/clarify -

  • We do not mandate the issuance of receipts at our points of sale, and they are not used as proof of purchase/used for travel in such situations.
  • Counterparts were withdrawn last year and all local rail operators agreed for their conductors to use their own apps/scanners to scan TravelMaster smartcards for the products contained on them.
  • Any checking of a customer's smartcard must be done with an app/smartcard reader that is configured to read our cards.
  • In the event the conductors did not have relevant equipment, customers were not to be penalised. This is outlined in the guides that we issue bi-annually to drivers and conductors in the county. This information/direction can also been found in the support section of our website: http://support.sytravelmaster.com/support/solutions/articles/36000229458-onboard-etms-general-info.
We will contact you again once we've had communications with the operator in question.

I really do need to compliment Travelmaster on the speed of their response, and I will be telling them this.
 

WesternLancer

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Just for your interest, I present the reply from Travelmaster here. I haven’t redacted it as I’m sure you would have deduced my name might be John.


Thank you for getting in touch with us.

Hi John,

We're really sorry to hear you've had this experience at Sheffield Station. We will be contacting them to discuss the issues you've raised.

To confirm/clarify -


  • We do not mandate the issuance of receipts at our points of sale, and they are not used as proof of purchase/used for travel in such situations.
  • Counterparts were withdrawn last year and all local rail operators agreed for their conductors to use their own apps/scanners to scan TravelMaster smartcards for the products contained on them.
  • Any checking of a customer's smartcard must be done with an app/smartcard reader that is configured to read our cards.
  • In the event the conductors did not have relevant equipment, customers were not to be penalised. This is outlined in the guides that we issue bi-annually to drivers and conductors in the county. This information/direction can also been found in the support section of our website: http://support.sytravelmaster.com/support/solutions/articles/36000229458-onboard-etms-general-info.
We will contact you again once we've had communications with the operator in question.

I really do need to compliment Travelmaster on the speed of their response, and I will be telling them this.
Not just speedy, but clear and unambiguous too!
 

PG

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Not necessarily. It could be that they’ve been poorly trained in the first place and/or not had refresher training when the T&Cs changed. The member of staff could honestly believe what they’re saying is correct
Having seen these issues in practice in several industries I find the idea that customer facing staff go round deliberately inventing rules laughable. The fault is invariably with management.
Complaining results in a 'promise' that staff will be retrained/briefed with the correct information - I have received such letters from British Rail, Midland Mainline and East Midlands Trains. These letters are not worth the paper they are written on, either the training/briefing is not happening or the staff take no notice.
As said above, The fault is invariably with management. Either not realising some staff have invented their own version of the rules which have then grown arms and legs or simply not given proper training to staff in the first place!

Promises of rectification often result in a barely legible notice with poor use of language pinned to a cluttered noticeboard or a round-robin email with an attachment with some vague unintelligible instructions. Ticks the box but doesn't actually do anything out on the ground!

An organisation I worked for suffered a tragic own goal after it changed the supplier of a commonly used item. A potential issue was recognised and an email (with attachment) circulated, though most staff already recognised the subtle difference in the operation of the new item. A while later someone died directly related to the consequences, and somewhat belatedly proper hands-on training was eventually arranged to cover the entire workforce.
 

robbeech

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Not necessarily. It could be that they’ve been poorly trained in the first place and/or not had refresher training when the T&Cs changed. The member of staff could honestly believe what they’re saying is correct
I don’t think this matters as such with multiple identical instances. If you truly believe a rule and someone questions it you can stand by this rule, but when they really start to question this multiple times, or in many cases, multiple people question it in the exact same way then anyone with any reasonable skill and common sense (and no motive for increasing revenue/target numbers for their employer and possibly themselves) would question themselves as to WHY it is happening. Even if I was absolutely sure on a rule about something based on what I have been told, I’d stop and think about it if multiple people questioned it because I am human, just as they are.
Many organisations that I have been involved with have had a bit of a blind spot when it comes to training on changes to existing systens as opposed to wholesale replacement. The other issue is "on the job" training where there is no reference back to the source material so A was trained by B who was trained by C and the whole thing ends up like a game of Chinese Whispers.
I agree with the concept of whispers here, which proves to me beyond doubt that there’s a serious lack of training to start with.
However, that said..
......... I find the idea that customer facing staff go round deliberately inventing rules laughable. The fault is invariably with management............
The trouble is, there are 2 real groups split further. There’s staff with a keen interest in the rules, they know them for the most part and if they don’t they’re anxious to learn them, often when they’re at home in their own time because of their interest. Many of these staff will be on this forum as their interest in the railway drives them to be the best they can be in their job. Then you’ve got the ones who may or may not enjoy their job but don’t really have an interest in it as a whole, it doesn’t make them less good at it although they might find restrictions in their knowledge because training is so appalling in some areas. Some of these people do like the sense of power and authority and whilst the vast majority don’t abuse it, a good number cannot bring themselves to come across as lacking in knowledge about their job. It is here where the problem starts, if they don’t know a rule, those with a keen interest will find it out, those just there to do the job and get paid will either listen to another staff member or will make it up. Where there is a revenue difference (particularly if it includes commission) then you can see why there might be a bias towards an outcome that involves selling a new ticket, even if it’s wrong.
I know for a FACT that EMT (so likely EMR) didn’t always (if at all) question staff who had charged new tickets incorrectly based on lack of training, nor were they trained further, the person who had had to pay an extra couple of quid per day for over a month got their money back and the guard was never told they’d done anything wrong. I suspect that even a few years on they still believe they are correct and likely still charge the wrong price. And it all comes neatly back around to revenue. Unless forced, No operator in their right mind is going to spend time and money providing training for staff if the result is lower revenue.

Finally...
If your allegations are accurate than that is a matter for the police or the local trading standards.
Meanwhile back in the real world, neither will be able to or be willing to even look into this. This is the railway we are talking about, it’s IS the law.



What is the proposed outcome of this member of staff’s request at Sheffield?
Do they want to sell you a new ticket? Would they earn commission for this?
do they want to issue a penalty fare? Would they earn commission and/or a tick in the targets box (if EMR have them like others) for it?
Do they want to issue another form of prosecution? (Same question about commission / targets). ?
Or do they just want to continue on their power trip? Or something else entirely.
 
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MotCO

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and the guard was never told they’d done anything wrong.

I think that this is probably the key part. It is a vital part of the 'feedback loop'. Somehow any reimbursements to passengers should be flagged back to the member of staff who incorrectly issued the ticket, not in an accusatory way, but for information and improvement.
 

SteveM70

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I don’t think this matters as such with multiple identical instances. If you truly believe a rule and someone questions it you can stand by this rule, but when they really start to question this multiple times, or in many cases, multiple people question it in the exact same way then anyone with any reasonable skill and common sense (and no motive for increasing revenue/target numbers for their employer and possibly themselves) would question themselves as to WHY it is happening. Even if I was absolutely sure on a rule about something based on what I have been told, I’d stop and think about it if multiple people questioned it because I am human, just as they are.

You may be significantly overestimating the staff members level of engagement, or as Boycie used to say, whether or not they give a monkey’s toss
 

packermac

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Telling her she doesn't need to see the receipt seems needlessly antagonistic, although you're quite entitled to say it. It might cause less conflict to say that you were not issued with a receipt and that it is the card itself that is the thing that is valid.
Not sure I can see anything antagonistic in that remark. I assume you have never worked in an airline terminal where you would to hear things that are really antagonistic, down right rude and ignorant from passengers.
 

SteveM70

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Not sure I can see anything antagonistic in that remark. I assume you have never worked in an airline terminal where you would to hear things that are really antagonistic, down right rude and ignorant from passengers.

You don’t need to see the receipt = you don’t know how to do your job

There is no receipt = your move
 

ForTheLoveOf

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Not sure I can see anything antagonistic in that remark. I assume you have never worked in an airline terminal where you would to hear things that are really antagonistic, down right rude and ignorant from passengers.
Nope, not had the pleasure ;)

You just want to avoid the situation where the staff member does stuff that does the OP no favours (i.e. calling BTP, claiming verbal assault, walking off the job etc.).
 

DDB

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In the two years plus I have had a robinhood season ticket and used it every working day to travel by train to and from Nottingham, it has been checked once by a guard who I think used their personal mobile phone and the freely available app. It can't be read by the station barriers.
 

LowLevel

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In the two years plus I have had a robinhood season ticket and used it every working day to travel by train to and from Nottingham, it has been checked once by a guard who I think used their personal mobile phone and the freely available app. It can't be read by the station barriers.

There aren't many duff ones out there. Once in a while I have a splurge and check them all on a train and have never come across one (it may have been me who checked you but there are a few people who do it and I can very rarely be bothered). A lot of RH season tickets are provided by company travel schemes. The main chancers are the daft ones who produce RH pay as you go cards and claim that as if by magic not touching in or out will still deduct something from their balance despite them never having been valid on trains. The Council periodically send someone to Nottingham station with a reader to scan RH seasons and I believe the stats consistently show zero or at most one/two duff cards.
 
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