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Crossed posts, Baza. Neither I nor Kenjonbro are actually advocating fare dodging but, as I'm sure you'll be the first to agree (given that you used to chase fare dodgers for a living!) it is NOT an offence to travel without payment on a train when you've genuinely not been offered any facility to pay your fare. So if you travel from one unstaffed station (with no...
00:46 Sun 18th Oct 2015
The railway byelaws require you to be in possession of a valid ticket before boarding any train except when you're unable to buy a ticket at the station where you commence your journey.
If there's no facility to buy a ticket (or, for example, there's a ticket machine that you can't use because you've not got enough notes or change) then, where there's a machine offering you a 'permit to travel' you must use it. (You pay as much as you can toward your fare and then pay the rest either on the train or, more usually, at the 'excess fares' desk at the end of your journey).
If there are no ticket-selling facilities and no 'permit to travel' machine then you can buy your ticket on the train. (The full range of tickets that you could have bought at a staffed station will then be available to you. However if you boarded a train without a ticket when you could have purchased one, you can only buy 'full fare' tickets on the train; you might also have to pay a 'penalty fare').
However if you can complete your journey without being offered the opportunity to buy a ticket (e.g. because the stations at both ends of your journey are unstaffed and no conductor comes round on the train) you won't be committing an offence by travelling without a ticket.
If there's no facility to buy a ticket (or, for example, there's a ticket machine that you can't use because you've not got enough notes or change) then, where there's a machine offering you a 'permit to travel' you must use it. (You pay as much as you can toward your fare and then pay the rest either on the train or, more usually, at the 'excess fares' desk at the end of your journey).
If there are no ticket-selling facilities and no 'permit to travel' machine then you can buy your ticket on the train. (The full range of tickets that you could have bought at a staffed station will then be available to you. However if you boarded a train without a ticket when you could have purchased one, you can only buy 'full fare' tickets on the train; you might also have to pay a 'penalty fare').
However if you can complete your journey without being offered the opportunity to buy a ticket (e.g. because the stations at both ends of your journey are unstaffed and no conductor comes round on the train) you won't be committing an offence by travelling without a ticket.
I have no intention of avoiding tickets - as my employer pays - but it seems entirely possible to travel to from one small station to the next small station without buying a ticket because there simply is no facility to buy one.No machines, no conductors
Thing is if you arrive at a station with pay facilities -the charge will be the same from that station as it would be from the earlier small stations
Thing is if you arrive at a station with pay facilities -the charge will be the same from that station as it would be from the earlier small stations
Around here (in Suffolk) the majority of stations are unstaffed but all of the rural lines have conductors on the trains. (Some mainline services are 'driver only' trains but all of the stations they serve have ticket facilities). It is, of course, fairly easy to do a 'short hop' before the conductor comes round (even if you're not trying to avoid paying your fare) but the train company must have calculated that the cost of putting ticket machines in at the small stations (and then servicing them) would be greater than the additional revenue that they'd bring in.
In practice, most passengers make return journeys and will see the conductor on at least one leg of their journey. Since the return fare is often only slightly more than the single one, the loss to the rail company (from only receiving payment in one direction) is actually fairly minimal. For example, when I go to the pub on a Sunday evening I should pay £2.85 return. I often don't see the conductor on the outbound journey (so I don't have to pay) but it still costs me £2.60 to get home again, so the loss to the rail company is only 25p.
The National Fares Manual (which is the 'bible' for rail ticket sales) groups stations together for longer journeys. So, for example, if you were travelling from a rural station near to Swansea to a rural station near to Ipswich, you'd be charged the Swansea to Ipswich fare. However local journeys have their own fare tables, so you should be charged different fares for different journeys within a local area.
In practice, most passengers make return journeys and will see the conductor on at least one leg of their journey. Since the return fare is often only slightly more than the single one, the loss to the rail company (from only receiving payment in one direction) is actually fairly minimal. For example, when I go to the pub on a Sunday evening I should pay £2.85 return. I often don't see the conductor on the outbound journey (so I don't have to pay) but it still costs me £2.60 to get home again, so the loss to the rail company is only 25p.
The National Fares Manual (which is the 'bible' for rail ticket sales) groups stations together for longer journeys. So, for example, if you were travelling from a rural station near to Swansea to a rural station near to Ipswich, you'd be charged the Swansea to Ipswich fare. However local journeys have their own fare tables, so you should be charged different fares for different journeys within a local area.
Crossed posts, Baza.
Neither I nor Kenjonbro are actually advocating fare dodging but, as I'm sure you'll be the first to agree (given that you used to chase fare dodgers for a living!) it is NOT an offence to travel without payment on a train when you've genuinely not been offered any facility to pay your fare.
So if you travel from one unstaffed station (with no ticket machine or permit-to-travel machine) to another similar station, without seeing a conductor (or revenue protection officer) and without changing at a station where you could have purchased a ticket, you haven't done anything wrong.
Neither I nor Kenjonbro are actually advocating fare dodging but, as I'm sure you'll be the first to agree (given that you used to chase fare dodgers for a living!) it is NOT an offence to travel without payment on a train when you've genuinely not been offered any facility to pay your fare.
So if you travel from one unstaffed station (with no ticket machine or permit-to-travel machine) to another similar station, without seeing a conductor (or revenue protection officer) and without changing at a station where you could have purchased a ticket, you haven't done anything wrong.
at an unstaffed local station near where i live, between 40 and 50 students board the train to travel one stop to the town where their college is located. only a handful ever buy a ticket. when the train arrives, the door indicators announce the location of the conductor (his position light "flashes" before the doors open), the students then join the part of the train furthest from him; he rarely if ever gets to them before they alight, those he does catch have their fares shared amongst the group.
>"It's all about the service providers unwilling to pay to provide the service they are supposed to and happy to cut corners and make folk feel uncomfortable instead. It's the modern way. Blow the public, the saving is justified by our accountants and that's all that matters."
Or it could be that it's keeping costs and fares down. Although it may be that the staff savings are outweighed by money lost through additional evasion
Or it could be that it's keeping costs and fares down. Although it may be that the staff savings are outweighed by money lost through additional evasion
(On DLR) "how would they know if you had used a contactless card? "
They wouldn't know immediately, but scroll down on this link http:// diamond geezer. blogspo t.co.uk /2014/0 9/conta ctless- fare-ev asion.h tml to see how you could be caught out.
They wouldn't know immediately, but scroll down on this link http://