Here is a summary of the events.
- My son planned to travel at 0900 on Sunday from Totnes to London
- I booked & paid for a ticket for him on trainline.com
- The funds were debited from my card and I received the booking code to collect the ticket at one of the ticket machines
- I took him to the station at 0830 where my intent was to collect the ticket using my card and put him on the train
- The ticket machine was not working and it had a printed notice on it saying to contact the on board staff (file attached)
- Tbh we did not look to see if the ticket office was open but on GWR's website it says opening time on a sunday is 1050
- So he boarded the train with a copy of the booking code and a picture of the vending machine with the notice
- On the train he was issued with an Unpaid Fare Notice
- We appealed the notice and GWR have agreed not to pursue it but have still issued him with a warning.
- My view is that we did nothing wrong, the fault was with GWR's equipment and there should be zero consequences for him
- So the questions are, what could we have done differently to avoid getting into this position and what entitles GWR to issue a warning to him ?