Traveling with an expired rail card yet paid more for the “discounted” price

[Haywain]

Once again, the ticket machine works like that on purpose. It is not an error, and I've explained why several times upthread.

You have, but that does not stop it being poor design. The Virgin 'easement' on using railcard discounted tickets no longer exists and when it did was not relevant to Anytime tickets, and there are no circumstances where there is any benefit to a 16-25 Railcard holder in paying more than the full price of any ticket. The only time there might be a case for paying more than the full price is where there is a Network Railcard AND an accompanying child. If it was so complicated to program then machines other than those produced by S&B would be doing the same thing.

 

[MotCO]

and they may say that the OP may have benefitted from the expired railcard before,

But that is only supposition; the TOC will not be able to substantiate this and should not be allowed to pursue this line.

 

[island]

You have, but that does not stop it being poor design. The Virgin 'easement' on using railcard discounted tickets no longer exists and when it did was not relevant to Anytime tickets, and there are no circumstances where there is any benefit to a 16-25 Railcard holder in paying more than the full price of any ticket. The only time there might be a case for paying more than the full price is where there is a Network Railcard AND an accompanying child. If it was so complicated to program then machines other than those produced by S&B would be doing the same thing.

There is also a use case in respect of a period return where the passenger wishes to come back before 10:00hrs.

 

[Haywain]

There is also a use case in respect of a period return where the passenger wishes to come back before 10:00hrs.

Which still would not lead to paying more than the undiscounted fare.

 

[robbeech]

Feature or not, it should not be enabled for journeys where the only benefit is to the company in overcharging its passengers contrary to the Consumer Regulations - and where it was deliberate, such as the Virgin example you suggest, the question asked should explicitly ascertain that that is the reason the passenger is making the selection of the higher-priced version of the ticket. None of the wording on the machines I've seen is satisfactory for the case where the passenger has no pre-existing idea why of they are being given the choice. But this is getting off-topic. Haywain has the right idea.

Whether it should or should not be enabled is largely immaterial. The fact is it IS enabled and the OP is facing potential prosecution for it. It's also fine to talk about consumer regulations and how the railway owes them 10p but as we come crashing back down to somewhere between Eastbourne and Brighton we have to remember that any form of regulation from the likes of the RDG, Transport Focus, the Dft, The Ombudsman, The ORR, or anyone else will likely be ignored outright, if it were ever to exist in the first place. I can count on no hands the number of cases like this where the railway has done anything about a problem of this nature where the result would be lower revenue.