Guess this goes on all the time. Got off a 707 Windsor service at Staines this afternoon and while walking along the platform noticed a group of 3 or 4 youths climbing over a high fence to get outside. Obvious why they were doing it and the train guard was standing on the platform right in front of them - who didn't seem to notice... Daylight robbery.
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Daylight fare evasion
- Thread starter davews
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Nova1
Member
Most staff can't really do anything except report it when they've got a chance.
P Binnersley
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I wouldn't expect the train to intervene. Best to report. If it is a regular event hopefully one day they will find BTP waiting the other side of the fence.
Honest question- what would you expect the guard to do? Stop them somehow? Phone the police?
You're right it probably happens reasonably regularly. The guard is working their train and would end up delaying it. He can't exactly chase after them whilst they are on duty and besides they'll be off station property in mere seconds. By the time its been reported to the BTP or Revenue Protection the culprits are probably long gone. Some routes are known for being worse than others.
The answer is better revenue protection on trains (which can be contentious with the DOO debate and guards required to dispatch) and on stations (fully staffed gatelines) but these may come with additional costs and logistical challenges. Even then its not foolproof and people will barge through gatelines or run off and hide etc. It's just about trying to reduce ticketless travel as much as possible and that requires a staff presence and enforcing a culture that revenue protection is active at all times of day.
The answer is better revenue protection on trains (which can be contentious with the DOO debate and guards required to dispatch) and on stations (fully staffed gatelines) but these may come with additional costs and logistical challenges. Even then its not foolproof and people will barge through gatelines or run off and hide etc. It's just about trying to reduce ticketless travel as much as possible and that requires a staff presence and enforcing a culture that revenue protection is active at all times of day.
MP393
Member
Are the guards on that line of route even commercial? If not, then there really is literally nothing they can do but report it. Even if if they are commercial, it’s not worth getting into a conflict situation with somebody who clearly isn’t going to pay!
Reading guards are, at any rate.
MP393
Member
Thanks for clarifying, wasn’t too sure. Too far south for me
Most staff cannot generally physically prevent someone from leaving, even if they are committing an offence. Any police officer could do so, if they were present, or a security guard trained to enforce the railway byelaws using reasonable force. Similarly to how a cashier in a stop is unlikely to try to physically prevent a shoplifter from getting away, even if they could theoretically do so lawfully.
Kite159
Veteran Member
I've seen it happen at other stations, Reading (wall near to platform 1) and Salisbury (fence near to the staff entrance gate near the former platform 5).
They are the sort of passengers who will probably attack anybody who challenges them
They are the sort of passengers who will probably attack anybody who challenges them
capitalconnect
Member
This happens all the time all over the UK. Ever since they installed ticket barriers at Fratton there are always big groups of youths climbing over the fence between the car park and platform one. This is just one of the many examples i have seen. There is nothing that can be done unless they install higher fencing with barbed wire on it i suppose. But even then you get plenty of fare evaders that will just force the ticket barriers open or climb over or under them. So this sort of thing is really impossible to stop.
Dougal2345
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I remember visiting a huge "flea market" in Marseille a few years ago, a fairly down at heel affair but enormously busy.
Goings on at the métro station when I headed back had to be seen to be believed... The gate line was active but no-one was monitoring it as far as I could see. It was like the Olympics, with trials of strength (forcing open the gates) and agility (climbing over them whilst carrying big flat screen TVs). Spent a few minutes watching it with a mixture of amusement and despair.
Goings on at the métro station when I headed back had to be seen to be believed... The gate line was active but no-one was monitoring it as far as I could see. It was like the Olympics, with trials of strength (forcing open the gates) and agility (climbing over them whilst carrying big flat screen TVs). Spent a few minutes watching it with a mixture of amusement and despair.
There is no such SWR depot. The train will have been worked by a Staines, Strawberry Hill, Waterloo or Wimbledon non-commercial guard.
capitalconnect
Member
That sounds normal for France to me. Go to any Metro or RER or Transilien station in Paris or its suburbs and you will see huge amounts of people climbing under or over the barriers or forcing them open or going through with other people. There is a much larger problem with Fare Evasion in France than what we have over here in the UK.
Dr_Intoxicated
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I think that the poster meant guards on Reading trains. I have seen guards on the Windsor lines selling tickets
bb21
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They'll be a mixture of commercial and non-commercial ones.
name_required
Member
From the point of view of a train operating company, dealing with fare evasion is an economic question: while they want people to pay up, there is little point in spending more on preventing fare evasion than the extra revenue they would gain. So they will put in place measures that have a good return on investment (such as staffed ticket gates at major stations) but not measures that cost more than they bring in. This means that some fare evasion is priced in where it‘s uneconomic to prevent it. In such circumstances an employee would be a fool to put themselves at risk to prevent fraud that their employer has decided is not worth stopping.
For what it’s worth, TfL takes a different approach by putting in place measures (e.g. ticket gates at almost every LU station) that don’t pay their way in preventing fare evasion but which they believe help prevent more-serious crime. They relied heavily on this approach when creating London Overground from Silverlink Metro, paying for high levels of revenue inspection and for expensive station remodelling to install ticket gates. The results were extremely good in terms of crime rates and passenger perceptions of security.
For what it’s worth, TfL takes a different approach by putting in place measures (e.g. ticket gates at almost every LU station) that don’t pay their way in preventing fare evasion but which they believe help prevent more-serious crime. They relied heavily on this approach when creating London Overground from Silverlink Metro, paying for high levels of revenue inspection and for expensive station remodelling to install ticket gates. The results were extremely good in terms of crime rates and passenger perceptions of security.
When I used to work on a gateline, we were instructed to not try and physically prevent somebody from busting through the gates or jumping over. Even when it came to them forcing their way in, we could do little more than attempt to hold a train. At the end of the day, it wasn't worth getting assaulted over £3.70.
Gates predominantly exist to encourage passengers to purchase tickets prior to travel. We would make far more money putting the gates on of an evening in the TVMs than we would trying to penalty fare somebody who was intent on running off. Unless backed up by a police presence there was simply no point in trying.
jamesst
Member
Someone climbing a wall/fence to avoid paying a fare isn't going to be stopped by a barrier line, open or closed
Yes, I did, thank you. And I have been sold excesses on Reading-Waterloo before, so clearly at least some such trains carry commercial guards.
OK, it seems far more common than I suspected and you are right the guard and other platform staff really can't do anything about it. I was astounded how blatant it was, crowded platform and straight faced leaping over a pretty high fence in front of everybody. I suspect this was not the first time they had used that place. Maybe even conveniently out of range of the cameras there. Simple measures such as barbed wire or sticky paint may help but they would no doubt find somewhere else.
Paul Jones 88
Member
Just hope that the little bugggers fall off the fence.
LNW-GW Joint
Veteran Member
At the ticket barrier to the Kyiv Metro at the main station, while I was trying to navigate the gateline, a man broke through the gates and aimed for the escalator.
He was a rugby back-4 type.
The unfazed (female, equally burly) attendant immediately ran after him, wrestled him to the ground and forced him back outside the gateline.
There was a lot of shouting involved on both sides, and cheers from the onlookers. I was just shocked.
Maybe the metro staff have more enforcement powers than their UK equivalents, and are prepared to use them!
At my local station a couple of years ago some scrote attempted to scale the fence to get out. He snapped his ankle when it got caught and spent some time hooked into the fence behind the cycle hub until someone heard his screams and called BTP and an ambulance.
kentrailman
Member
Numerous times I have been on a train , a guard has discovered someone has no ticket or the wrong ticket and nothing has been done.
Examples that stand out in my mind include a 20 ish year old man who when asked simply said " I ain`t got one, what are you going to do about it" and the guard just walked on and continued checking other people`s tickets ( South Eastern) ; or on the other extreme, an attractive young lady who was on a peak hour train with an off peak ticket despite numerous announcements that it was a peak time train on the platform and the train. ( GWR) " Oh, I didn`t realise" whilst giving the male guard a sweet innocent cute sort of look and she was simply let off and not charged an excess fare. Having spent £30 more than her buying a peak ticket just to get that train instead of one that was £30 cheaper 20 minutes later ( I had to arrive at a specific time ) and being an unattractive old bloke, I cheekily asked the guard " would you have let me off if I had not had a peak ticket? " He didn`t reply.
I was actully much more annoyed by the second of those incidents than the first as perhaps I could more understand the guard feeling intimidated in the first one. For the second one, there were numerous loudspeaker announcements on the platform and train before departure that off peak tickets were not valid.
Examples that stand out in my mind include a 20 ish year old man who when asked simply said " I ain`t got one, what are you going to do about it" and the guard just walked on and continued checking other people`s tickets ( South Eastern) ; or on the other extreme, an attractive young lady who was on a peak hour train with an off peak ticket despite numerous announcements that it was a peak time train on the platform and the train. ( GWR) " Oh, I didn`t realise" whilst giving the male guard a sweet innocent cute sort of look and she was simply let off and not charged an excess fare. Having spent £30 more than her buying a peak ticket just to get that train instead of one that was £30 cheaper 20 minutes later ( I had to arrive at a specific time ) and being an unattractive old bloke, I cheekily asked the guard " would you have let me off if I had not had a peak ticket? " He didn`t reply.
I was actully much more annoyed by the second of those incidents than the first as perhaps I could more understand the guard feeling intimidated in the first one. For the second one, there were numerous loudspeaker announcements on the platform and train before departure that off peak tickets were not valid.
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