Passengers normally travel with their phones charged, as many can't seem to function without them. A rash of passengers suddenly traveling with dead phones just because they still can have their tickets checked by the guard just does not seem likely at all.
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Paid for e-ticket - phone died, penalty fare issued, first appeal unsuccessful.
- Thread starter MaxM
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Llanigraham
On Moderation
Do you realise just how many different ticket sellers there are, and the amount of time it would take to intergate them all? And you expect that to happen whilst they are on the train?
Brissle Girl
Established Member
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It’s just human nature - if people know that there’s a workaround if they don’t have their ticket then they will be less careful - and over a period of time what starts as an exception would become more commonplace.
Peter Sarf
Established Member
Thing is they are not going to be fined several multiples of the value of the tickets they had bought.
The information could all be on one database
At the moment, it isn’t. How much more would you be willing to pay for your ticket to provide resource for the database you are proposing to be commissioned and maintained?
IMHO letting a phone battery run down when your ticket is on the phone shows greater culpability than losing a paper ticket (or your phone).
I have had this happen at the end of a day when trains were cancelled for 2hrs at connection point. Had 35% battery which was fine for the journey in question but not when you incorporated a 2hr delay at a station with no facilities where there was nothing to do other than look at your phone.
In respect to the reuse of tickets issue, scans are recorded - if a ticket is later presented which hasn't been scanned or refunded and was purchased by the passenger in question then that's a good indication that it's a legitimate mistake.
It would solve a lot of problems if the TOC's scanning device had a couple of pull-out fly leads (USB-C & Lightning) that would enable it to power-up customers' phones for a ticket check. The "my battery's flat" excuse would disappear overnight.
The scanners would run out of battery!
There has to be wide-scale reform of the whole ticketing system to benefit both passengers and the railway. That's a topic for another thread. I'll just finish by saying that the railway is in a mess with its digital transformation and the current balkanised set-up is totally incapable of sorting it out to everyone's satisfaction.
Peter Sarf
Established Member
In summing up - no standards (both moral/procedural or technical).
But here we go drifting off topic ?.
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It very nearly happened to me once when en route from Penrith to Euston. The power points on the train weren't working (I forget now what the issue was) and the phone I had at the time was getting a bit moody about holding a charge. I'd (stupidly) assumed I'd be able to charge it up on the train. I just (but only just) had sufficient charge. I was getting really anxious about it.
On a number of occasions I have been on trains where the power points weren't working. Apparently, though, it is the passenger caught out by this who is cuplable not the company who failed to provide the advertised facility.
Mcr Warrior
Veteran Member
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As with many other railway-related issues / problems, there do sometimes seem to be asymmetric consequences for (i) passengers, (ii) "the railway", on those occasions when things don't go quite right.
Llanigraham
On Moderation
And they had two options:
Buy 2 new tickets with no refund available for the unused e-tickets.
Go home and miss the concert.
and the railway seems to have quite a knack for producing all this new cost saving technology, some of it quite deficient (many threads on "digital railcards"), but they refuse to update the rules to account for when the deficiencies arise.
if they want passengers to use etickets, and in my experience they seem to push them quite hard during the online purchase process, the reality is that people will have phones that may not be working throughout both legs of their journey and benefit of the doubt or other workarounds need to be put in place. it isn't acceptable to suggest the passenger should have prepared for the industry's failings.
it is why I hope smartcards remain in the mix - it is entirely their problem and nothing to do with anything I own
Peter Sarf
Established Member
If half way through the concert there was a check of tickets and their phone had died do you think they would get fined ?.
Concert/event ticket fraud is a real and serious thing, but not something for this forum, methinks.
Peter Sarf
Established Member
But the point is I doubt the people holding legitimate eTickets but no longer able to show those tickets once they had started to watch the concert would get fined. Whereas on the railway it is OK to slap a £100 fine on someone with a flat mobile battery. Not very customer friendly.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Being unable to board a flight due to your phone battery is a potential issue I suppose - I've had that nearly happen once but fortunately with British Airways you can go to the airside customer service desk and they just print you one out. Were it Ryanair I'd have lost the flight.
But I still wouldn't have been dragged to court over it, and I'd have had the option to buy a new flight or just not go.
I suppose to be fair this like many things would be solved (mostly) by removing the strict liability Byelaw offences for rail ticketing. In that case all it should be is a Penalty Fare, which is a chunk of money but otherwise inconsequential. If I'm fined £50+fare once or twice in my life I can cope with that for the massive convenience factor of electronic ticketing (if you add the time saved up over my lifetime that's probably easily worth £100), but I don't want a criminal record, even a minor one, ever, nor are £150 settlements even remotely reasonable for this sort of situation.
Peter Sarf
Established Member
Your right. There seems likely to be more effort made to help the customer in many cases. Furthermore it is a large fine especially when considered in relation to the original fare.
Ryanair will happily print out your boarding pass. https://www.ryanair.com/gb/en/useful-info/help-centre/fees
Of course the big difference between flights and concerts, and rail, is that on a train you're already using the ticket you can't access, whereas the others can just not let you use any of the service.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
At check-in, not airside. The difference with BA was that they did it airside. If I'd had to go back out through arrivals or be escorted out as required at some airports, I'd have missed the flight. As it was I went to the desk airside and they printed it straight away so I didn't miss it.
While missing the flight would not have resulted in a criminal record, it would have resulted in a cost for a new flight of roughly the same magnitude as a settlement typically is for this sort of thing.
(BA didn't charge, but Ryanair's £20 isn't particularly unreasonable as such)
Ah. I go out of my way to avoid Ryanair, so hadn't realised that.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I doubt easyJet would have done an airside reprint either. Low cost airlines typically don't have any staff airside able to do that sort of thing.
That said, airport departure lounges basically always have (usually chargeable) phone charging stations which include cables, and free sockets. This was a long time ago when such things were much less common and having your boarding pass on your phone was quite a new thing.
Class800
Established Member
That's really odd as when I go to concerts, almost always they just have the names on a guest list and tick them off and don't want to see tickets. The system is the system, but it does seem to be quite hostile to customers and doubtful in terms of ensuring it does not disadvantage people with additional needs under equality legislation. When I'm not feeling great, I won't go by train, but I will go to concerts!
I’ve never had that happen. Always had to show (or self-scan) a barcoded ticket.
Class800
Established Member
Must be going to different places - everywhere I go it's clipboard with a list of names. Even the Phoenix Arts centre in Exeter which is quite a large venue I brought my print out but they had no scanners, just went through the guestlist and ticked me off. Even in London
Haywain
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That may be the case at small single-entrance venues but certainly not at large venues with multiple entrances.