Currently waiting on a prosecution letter from an (according to this forum) fairly pragmatic TOC for an incident this week for intentional fare evasion (short faring). No excuse, this is disgraceful behaviour that deserves serious repercussions, I am very ashamed of myself and only fully realising the seriousness of my actions. Looking to open a thread here to find the best way of responding to them once they send me a letter, as discussed on other threads. I have read the information on posting to this forum, and I can see that all details of the incident will get the best advice, but that upon posting to this forum the threads cannot be deleted voluntarily, only if the moderators deem it fit. I understand that you can protect yourself by not giving personal information, but surely based on the details of my incident the TOC can line up and identify which incident it was? I’m worried if they see this it will reduce my chance of negotiating an out of court settlement, as my trainline history will reveal approximately 5 other times I have committed this criminal behaviour. They will find this anyway, but I am also conscious that a number of times I have bought a ticket on board and had it scanned by the ticket inspector soon afterwards, which I’m sure they can also check through trainline records of my account. Is this likely? As I will need to respond to their letter with full cooperation if they indicate they have done their own investigation and are offering to hear my version of events in order to increase chances of a settlement.
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Waiting for prosecution letter
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ikcdab
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The Railway companies have thousands of cases to deal with. The advice here is that without a case number there is no point in contacting them because they won't be able to locate your details. That being the case, I think it highly unlikely that they can marry up a post on here with a case that have. And even if they do have enough spare people to trawl this and other forums, the data they would get would only ever be a guess. We don't need exact dates and think that, on balance, it is better to be open on here which can help you with a better chance of a more positive outcome than it is to withhold info.
Welcome to the forum!
If you want some bespoke advice for your case then we need to know more details. We don’t condone fare evasion but we have some genuine experts on here and have a good track record of being able to tell people the consequences and what is likely to happen in their case.
This is only possible because people have been willing to tell us about their cases. One of the most frustrating things for me is someone who asks for advice, gets it but then seeks to delete their posts. If everyone did that we wouldn’t have a forum and be able to help anyone.
Train companies deal with thousands of cases at a time, we do ask that personal details and any case reference numbers are redacted before uploading.
I’ve not seen a case on here where someone asking for help has ended up with a worse outcome. To be blunt, if your Trainline account shows five previous cases of not purchasing the correct ticket that is minor compared to many cases we see on here.
If you want some bespoke advice for your case then we need to know more details. We don’t condone fare evasion but we have some genuine experts on here and have a good track record of being able to tell people the consequences and what is likely to happen in their case.
This is only possible because people have been willing to tell us about their cases. One of the most frustrating things for me is someone who asks for advice, gets it but then seeks to delete their posts. If everyone did that we wouldn’t have a forum and be able to help anyone.
Train companies deal with thousands of cases at a time, we do ask that personal details and any case reference numbers are redacted before uploading.
I’ve not seen a case on here where someone asking for help has ended up with a worse outcome. To be blunt, if your Trainline account shows five previous cases of not purchasing the correct ticket that is minor compared to many cases we see on here.
Understood, thank you for your replies. Hadders, I totally understand the frustration of someone wanting to ask for advice, getting it, then wanting to remove their post and thereby reduce the utility of these forums. I didn't plan to do this (planning to ask for this thread to be deleted after receiving advice), I understood that posting here meant having it open to the public eye. I was just posting first to understand the risk vs reward of posting details, which seems to be overwhelmingly positive as you outline and as I have seen on previous posts. And I'd like to thank you all kind people in advance for using your free time to help people like us trying to fix bad situations of our own making.
I took the elizabeth line from liverpool street to slough for which I didn't have a valid ticket. On arrival I tried to buy a ticket from eton&windsor to slough to get through the barriers at slough, which didn't work. The GWR employee (don't know if their role was RPI exactly) questioned me and I lied at first saying I had arrived on this eton&windsor train, which hadn't arrived at slough that morning as they highlighted to me. I then confessed that I had bought it just then to attempt to avoid the fare, because I knew the slough station was outside of oyster system and I hadn't bought a valid ticket. They asked to scan my oyster and took a picture of my recent trainline history, so I obliged to both and cooperated with taking name and address details. Received the reported for prosecution note, and discussed with them what the consequences could be (I was stupidly completely unaware of the seriousness of this). They informed me GWR usually tries to settle out of court but they couldn't guarantee this would be the case, understandably that requires a full investigation before they choose next steps as I've read on this forum.
They are likely to suspect ~8 previous instances of short faring, with fraudulent refunds applied, mostly on GWR but one on another TOC and one more on another TOC. These are quite sporadic but over a few years of trainline history since 2021 which is probably an aggravating factor. However, one of these is actually a legitimate one where I replaced the journey with a coach ticket which doesn't show in the trainline records, but if I'm lucky enough to get a settlement offer I don't imagine trying to dispute this makes much sense.
Does anyone have an estimate on how long the GWR letter (if I'm luck enough to get the "give us your version of events" letter and not an immediate court summons notice) usually gives to reply to them? I'm supposed to go away from 7-12th April so I wonder if I will have to cancel this, although it's probably unlikely to arrive on Sunday 7th, that would put me 5 days away from the mailbox, only able to check it on the evening of the 12th. However, I can definitely get my flatmate to check our shared mailbox for me but that's obviously less than ideal having to involve him in my personal issues. Also curious to know whether they will be able to see trainline booking transaction times and see when they were scanned, I'm assuming they can.
I took the elizabeth line from liverpool street to slough for which I didn't have a valid ticket. On arrival I tried to buy a ticket from eton&windsor to slough to get through the barriers at slough, which didn't work. The GWR employee (don't know if their role was RPI exactly) questioned me and I lied at first saying I had arrived on this eton&windsor train, which hadn't arrived at slough that morning as they highlighted to me. I then confessed that I had bought it just then to attempt to avoid the fare, because I knew the slough station was outside of oyster system and I hadn't bought a valid ticket. They asked to scan my oyster and took a picture of my recent trainline history, so I obliged to both and cooperated with taking name and address details. Received the reported for prosecution note, and discussed with them what the consequences could be (I was stupidly completely unaware of the seriousness of this). They informed me GWR usually tries to settle out of court but they couldn't guarantee this would be the case, understandably that requires a full investigation before they choose next steps as I've read on this forum.
They are likely to suspect ~8 previous instances of short faring, with fraudulent refunds applied, mostly on GWR but one on another TOC and one more on another TOC. These are quite sporadic but over a few years of trainline history since 2021 which is probably an aggravating factor. However, one of these is actually a legitimate one where I replaced the journey with a coach ticket which doesn't show in the trainline records, but if I'm lucky enough to get a settlement offer I don't imagine trying to dispute this makes much sense.
Does anyone have an estimate on how long the GWR letter (if I'm luck enough to get the "give us your version of events" letter and not an immediate court summons notice) usually gives to reply to them? I'm supposed to go away from 7-12th April so I wonder if I will have to cancel this, although it's probably unlikely to arrive on Sunday 7th, that would put me 5 days away from the mailbox, only able to check it on the evening of the 12th. However, I can definitely get my flatmate to check our shared mailbox for me but that's obviously less than ideal having to involve him in my personal issues. Also curious to know whether they will be able to see trainline booking transaction times and see when they were scanned, I'm assuming they can.
WesternLancer
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I would say it is almost certain that you will get the letter from GWR (not straight to prosecution) - and GWR appear to be one of the more reasonable forms to deal with - so your chances of negotiating a settlement are quite strong. But it is vital you get and respond to this letter.
Not sure how long it will take for them to write to you.
If you are away 7-12 April you could consider setting up a Royal Mail redirection to a trusted family member if you would prefer your flat mate not to know your business (see Royal Mal website) - you do need to do this some days ahead of your departure though so you might want to look into this now to see if it is helpful or more complication that i tis worth
They will see all your on line purchases and refunds if they look (and I would assume they will).
You may find it helpful for now to have a look at the GWR revenue protection policy pdf document on their website - this also makes it clear that they seek to settle if this is appropriate.
Deafdoggie
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Redirection isn't a temporary thing. It has a 3 month minimum term.
The service for that is Keepsafe. But then they don't deliver the mail at all and simply deliver it all once you're back (12th April) so this might not be ideal.
WesternLancer
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Thanks for clarifying
A 5-day delay in replying is something and nothing - given the state of the postal service, even missing a deadline by a day or two is unlikely to matter; failing to reply at all is.
WesternLancer
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Seem to recall often cases on here with ppl saying they are waiting for GWR to reply so maybe slowly. @RPI may have an idea.
The team employed by GWR to investigate ticketing irregularities won't be filling a large office block. They'll be looking at your situation in turn, which, depending how busy they are, could be months from now. Best you keep an eagle eye on your post.
I'm not sure, but it is likely to be 14 days minimum, possibly 21.
RPI
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As far as I'm aware, there isn't much of a backlog at the moment.
@MikeWh just to confirm, you mean that's your estimate of how long they give you to reply to their letter asking for my side of the story? And do you know whether GWR let's you reply via email or whether this has to be done by post? Thanks