I'm getting uncomfortable reading the disputes forum now - they are making me lose confidence in traveling with Advance tickets.

[Watershed]

Two of those cases are examples of the passenger not contacting the operator for advice on what to do, one of which involved trying to claim a train over 12 hours later was the next available service, and then claiming that the PRO rules mean they could unilaterally change which train they wanted to catch. The other was someone trying to use a LNER only ticket on a Lumo service, which escalated to the point of being kicked off the train at an unscheduled stop.

The final example was of someone rushing on to the first train they saw as they believed it to be theirs, only to find out it was a delayed service that happened to be in the station at the time the other train was due to depart.

In the first case, the passenger obtained permission before boarding, but nevertheless had their details taken by the RPI.

In the second case, the passenger could quite legitimately say they were relying on the Advance ticket terms and conditions, which entitle them to take "the next available service(s) to complete your journey". In any event, only their first ticket, which was for a tiny proportion of their overall journey, was actually LNER only - the second two tickets were LNER & connections, which doesn't exclude the use of Lumo services.

In the third case, the passenger boarded a train that said it was going to their destination, at the time their booked train was due to depart. And again, they could say they were relying on the Advance ticket T&Cs.

Of course, in each of the three cases you could try to level criticism at the passengers by saying that they could have obtained written permission to board another train to minimise the chances of prosecution. But why should they be forced to do this, when in each case the situation arose through failings on the part of the railway, and there was no guarantee that such written permission would be forthcoming or easily obtained?

I'm not saying you are necessarily making this argument, but it seems little more than victim blaming to me; I'm sure one can imagine other contexts where such victim blaming would be abhorred (e.g. if a passenger killed by a train accident didn't hold a valid ticket).

Ultimately, in each of the above cases the passenger was morally and legally in the right, but that did not prevent them from encountering threats of prosecution. I don't think there is much mileage in trying to defend the TOCs here.

 

[TUC]

This thread is a prime example of how some rail enthusiasts overthink.

 

[Wallsendmag]

It was noticeable on strike days that all operators in the North East had ticket acceptance with one exception

 

[gabrielhj07]

All the above cases are destroying my confidence in buying Advance tickets for travelling by train.

In times of disruption, I always think it is prudent to find the reporting number of the train you are booked on, so you won't mistake another train for your own. It's also sensible to check with the guard before boarding.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It sometimes doesn't run! Delayed train should mean guaranteed exemption from prosecution. In fact, prosecution is too harsh a penalty for travelling by train under any circumstances unless there is obvious and persistent fraud. Other countries treat fare evasion as a civil offence, which is more appropriate.



What if your phone gets stolen during the journey? You have no e-ticket, therefore you get prosecuted.

Look after your phone properly so it doesn't. If you are mugged or pickpocketed, pull the passcom and report it immediately, that's one key reason why it is there, and it may mean the criminal can be arrested.

 

[johncrossley]

Look after your phone properly so it doesn't. If you are mugged, pull the passcom and report it immediately, that's one key reason why it is there.

The mention of phone was really incidental. I was really talking about to the theft of the ticket regardless of format. Theft can occur even without realising and even if you think you have secured your property with reasonable care.

 

[Joe Paxton]

This thread is a prime example of how some rail enthusiasts overthink.

Or more broadly, internet forums (of all sorts) are perhaps an attractive arena for those who are predisposed to overthink matters, and can help foster such a mindset too.

 

[redreni]

A large number of passengers travel successfully without any risk of prosecution on advance tickets every day.

Without wishing to judge the outcome of any of the specific disputes you have read about, the important thing to do is to seek approval from a member of staff or get your ticket endorsed if something goes wrong and don't just assume that you can take a given course of action that you decide.

I travel regularly on advance tickets.

Recently I booked an advance single on Avanti from Euston to Stockport on a Tuesday afternoon, but when I arrived at Euston the west coast mainline had been closed just north of Milton Keynes and all Avanti trains were "suspended until further notice". After I'd been at Euston for about 10 minutes, Avanti's twitter account confirmed ticket acceptance on LNER (London to Leeds) and TPE (Leeds to Manchester) and announcements urged passengers for Manchester to travel via Kings Cross and Leeds. No specific advice was given for Stockport passengers, but I went to King's Cross.

It simply wasn't possible to speak to a member of Avanti staff at Euston - staff were outnumbered by passengers facing disruption and seeking advice by a ratio of hundreds-to-one.

I did speak to an LNER ticket office clerk at King's Cross and asked for my ticket to be endorsed for travel on LNER. He seemed very irritated and refused, telling me ticket acceptance was in place so my existing ticket was sufficient. Given that one of the cases that gave rise to this thread involves a passenger being told their ticket was valid by one member of staff and then being ticketed and referred for prosecution by another, I fully understand why you're advising passengers to get their ticket endorsed but it would help if railway staff were willing to do so.

On the LNER train en route to Leeds I began checking times of connecting trains to Stockport and discovered that by far the best route was to change at Doncaster and take the TPE direct to Stockport. That same connection at Doncaster was also by far the best route to Manchester, faster than the "via Leeds" route by nearly an hour. But Avanti had only announced ticket acceptance on TPE between Leeds and Manchester. I tweeted Avanti to explain that I was on an LNER train to Leeds as instructed but my best route to Stockport was TPE via Doncaster, and could they confirm my ticket would be accepted. They replied "we only have ticket acceptance confirmed Leeds to Manchester at the moment".

At that point I could have stuck to the advice I had been given but then I would have missed the whole of the event I was travelling to Stockport to see. I would have arrived at Stockport about 90 minutes later if I travelled via Leeds than if I travelled via Doncaster. If I went via Doncaster I would be a bit late for my event, but would still get to enjoy over two thirds of it. I therefore chose to travel via Doncaster. I was fortunate that the guard on the TPE accepted my ticket, and the tickets of the other passengers diverted from Avanti and headed to Stockport, Manchester and Liverpool, without question. But the experience of other forum users suggests we might equally well have faced fines or prosecution or even police intimidation, seemingly at the whim of railway staff.

Your advice is generally sensible and I would always try to follow it, but it's not always practical and it in no way lessens or undermines the OP's points about shortcomings of the rail industry.

 

[dciuk]

In times of disruption, I always think it is prudent to find the reporting number of the train you are booked on, so you won't mistake another train for your own. It's also sensible to check with the guard before boarding.

Will that not cause even more delays as a queue of people could be approching the guard at each station to check the validity of their ticket before boarding?

 

[bramling]

That isn't wrong, but it remains for the railway to decide how to roll out the red carpet, not the passenger to assume any particular red carpet is for them.

Where I think there can be a genuine issue is inconsistency between different staff, especially guards. You can encounter one who doesn’t give a stuff about anything, another who will be very friendly and helpful, another who will agree to anything simply to pass the problem elsewhere, but then come across one who rubs their hand with glee at the prospect of having come across something they deem to be irregular or one of their own pet hates - the latter type certainly seem to exist on the likes of LNER and AWC.

Elements of the industry never quite seem to have managed to achieve consistency in this respect, and this is where problems arise when people get caught doing the same thing but with a different guard (or revenue for that matter).

 

[yorkie]

A large number of passengers travel successfully without any risk of prosecution on advance tickets every day.

You mean without being prosecuted; yes absolutely. But the risk is there.

This thread is a prime example of how some rail enthusiasts overthink.

How do you know who is and who isn't a rail enthusiast, and how does 'overthinking' change the fact that people are prosecuted for making innocent mistakes?

Can you elaborate on your post; you aren't quoting anyone and it isn't clear what you are referring to, or what you mean.

But a tiny proportion of their customers though

This doesn't make it any less unacceptable; furthermore only a tiny proportion of people wronged by the rail industry post here.

 

[Starmill]

without any risk of prosecution

Do you not think that this is a little presumptive of you? You personally aren't at risk of prosecution, perhaps. We're talking about the risk here, rather than people who are actually in fact prosecuted.

 

[AlastairFraser]

the railway is a hostile environment so far as I'm concerned. I'm pretty sure of the rules going a couple of stops down the line with the local monopoly trainco, but any more than that? not likely.

bought a long distance ticket once and was given the choice of "any permitted" or "not via London". via London would have been a huge dog leg but didn't get a reply as to whether any permitted meant via London was ok!

then there's the prices: I bought a car a while ago and the marginal cost of driving is *way* cheaper plus there's much less chance of an unpleasant confrontation, "attitude tests" and the like.

Spot on : the railway is a more expensive form of travel, but railway rules, especially ticketing rules and staff sometimes do not justify this extra expense in travelling.

The vast majority of guards, drivers, platform staff, ticket office staff, others that I encounter front line etc. are friendly, helpful and sterling representatives for a national institution, but the tendency of the same institution to penalise you when you make a minor mistake or misunderstanding and then provide insufficient support when they (rather frequently post-Covid) screw up and cancel/delay services is not good enough.

Plus the deliberate employment of barely literate agency staff by some TOCs to check tickets at a few major stations can lead to unfortunate sanctions for the passenger, even when their affairs are in order - these practises are a poor way of promoting the railway.

 

[AlterEgo]

You can't emigrate to the USA (for example) if you have a criminal record. This probably applies to many other countries as well.

Untrue.

Which ones in particular? How about making fare evasion a civil matter rather than a criminal one? Why isn't that viable?

I think we can agree on that train companies should have their prosecution powers moved.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I think we can agree on that train companies should have their prosecution powers moved.

I think the £100 Penalty Fare is a good enough reason to remove the Byelaw and RoRA options. A fraud charge would remain available for serious cases e.g. of falsification of tickets (and that probably would prevent you from emigrating to the US - there's little more "moral turpitude", as they like to put it, than wilful fraud! )

I'd also extend PFs to include "prices" for other things like feet on seats and misuse of the passcom and door release (or just make them all £100, or £50 if paid promptly, as it's about the right amount). Much easier to apply and less overkill.

As for Advances, a simple rule is needed - if one of the booked trains is cancelled or a connection is missed due to a delay, the ticket becomes an Any Permitted Anytime Day Single (as e.g. DB does it), and in cases where the journey could not be completed that day because the cancellation was on the last connection the railway needs to validate it for the next day as well as providing accommodation (though this is very rare - if you speak to staff in such a case a taxi is normally arranged as it's generally cheaper than a hotel at short notice). If every TOC ensures they scan tickets, revenue can be reallocated in the background for such usage.

Also, for any other cases where individual discretion is given rather than blanket acceptance, any member of staff giving it must be required to scan the e-ticket and add a note indicating this acceptance, and issue a slip of paper confirming it. Any staff seeing this must accept it; whether it should have been given or not is an internal disciplinary matter.

 

[miklcct]

A large number of passengers travel successfully without any risk of prosecution on advance tickets every day.

Without wishing to judge the outcome of any of the specific disputes you have read about, the important thing to do is to seek approval from a member of staff or get your ticket endorsed if something goes wrong and don't just assume that you can take a given course of action that you decide.

In the past I regularly bought Advance tickets from Southampton, Winchester or Basingstoke to Bournemouth. The train schedule back then were a CrossCountry train and South Western Railway train 6 minutes behind which both ran fast to Bournemouth.

A few times happened to me that, due to CrossCountry delay, or a delay from a previous South Western Railway connection to Basingstoke on another ticket causing me to miss the CrossCountry connection, the next available service to me was the South Western Railway train 6 minutes after my booked CrossCountry train. In those cases I showed my CrossCountry e-ticket and ask the guard if I could use this train due to delay of the CrossCountry service / delay from a previous connection, etc. and I was always waved on.

Considering the gap between my missed train and the next train from the operator was only 6 minutes, there wouldn't be enough time for me to visit a ticket office in between. If I played by the rules, the next CrossCountry train would be 2 hours later in the case of missed CrossCountry connection from a previous SWR delay (the journey in question was Woking - Basingstoke on an SWR train to Exeter, connecting to CrossCountry to Bournemouth, using a flexible ticket to Winchester and an Advance ticket on CrossCountry afterwards remaining on the same train if everything was on time) and SWR would be liable for Delay Repay for my whole journey, where if I was accepted onto the SWR train there would be no Delay Repay due.

Apparently such behaviour would land me in hot water if I was met by an RPI on the train even if the guard waved me on from what I read from the quoted threads.

Fortunately now most of my train travel don't have Advance tickets available as they are all in the London commuter area.

 

[gabrielhj07]

Will that not cause even more delays as a queue of people could be approching the guard at each station to check the validity of their ticket before boarding?

Perhaps, but when have you seen more than a couple of people ask the guard a question at a station?

 

[yorksrob]

That is false.


You left out the middle step*: the passenger afforded the railway no opportunity to correct the first mistake by speaking to a member of staff.

*I've not read the threads, but feel reasonably confident this is the case.

Realistically though, the railway industry should have accepted that the situations above were of its own making and acted accordingly.

The fact that the industry is allowed to act like a Court of Star Chamber doling out its own prosecutions, allows it to act sloppily by not giving due consideration to its own failings. There needs to be more external scrutiny in the process.

 

[najaB]

As for Advances, a simple rule is needed - if one of the booked trains is cancelled or a connection is missed due to a delay, the ticket becomes an Any Permitted Anytime Day Single (as e.g. DB does it)

Probably doesn't need to go that far. It would be enough to say that any TOC restrictions still apply, unless it would result in any additional delay of greater than X minutes (where X is, say, 31 minutes).

 

[miklcct]

Probably doesn't need to go that far. It would be enough to say that any TOC restrictions still apply, unless it would result in any additional delay of greater than X minutes (where X is, say, 31 minutes).

I think that TOC restrictions should be abolished for all Advance tickets. However, geographical route restrictions should still continue to apply, i.e. if the booked train fails to appear on time, or a connection is missed, the passenger should be free to take the next available train as long as they run on the same route.

 

[AlterEgo]

However, geographical route restrictions should still continue to apply, i.e. if the booked train fails to appear on time, or a connection is missed, the passenger should be free to take the next available train as long as they run on the same route.

I think you’d need to define that more tightly. If my Avanti is cancelled between London and Birmingham, may I take a LNWR service which goes via Northampton?

 

[MarlowDonkey]

I think that TOC restrictions should be abolished for all Advance tickets.

Something that bothers me about split Advance tickets is this. Suppose there's a route with a mixture of non-stop and semi fast trains. Let's assume you have an Advance ticket on one of the stoppers with a split at one of the less frequently served intermediate stations. Are you expected to wait for the next stopping service to call there even though that isn't your ultimate destination? If the non-stiop and semi-fast trains are two different operators that makes it even more complex.

 

[Skymonster]

I must admit I find the whole “the railway is right, the customer is wrong“ approach that comes out here quite frequently to be rather disconcerting. Yes, I have no doubt there are plenty of passengers who are not innocent and try it on and its difficult to tell them from those who have made a genuine mistake.

My case in point was a few weeks ago when I was travelling on a Sunday from Leeds to Sheffield. The Cross Country train I used always (perhaps better to say usually) goes via Wakefield, but unbeknownst top me on this occasion was diverted via Doncaster because of engineering works. My ticket was “Not via Doncaster” but I never gave it a thought - I used the particular train fairly regularly and I know it didn‘t go via Doncaster, so I didn’t really pay much attention to the screens on the platform and just boarded. It was only after the train left Leeds that I suddenly realised that it wasn’t going the usual way. Then I did a bit of digging on RTT and found that it was going via Doncaster, and calling there too. I was sufficiently panicked that I might be pulled up during a ticket check and land myself in trouble that when the train got to Doncaster (no ticket check that far) I got off, bought another ticket, and got a later train to Sheffield. Thing is, I made what amounts to (what I regard as) a perfectly innocent “mistake” - I’m not even convinced it really was a mistake or even an oversight - which, once I realised, made me sufficiently uncomfortable / concerned about the risk of having my details taken that I ended up changing my travel arrangements, getting back late and at greater cost.

So I really don’t think the current approach helps even reasonably informed in innocent customers feel comfortable, and potentially puts the uninformed but innocent at risk of landing themselves in trouble. And before someone comes along and says “it would be a pretty mean guard / train manager / revenue office that snagged you for doing that” - we all know they exist.

 

[6Gman]

The chance of your house getting flooded or burned down is extremely tiny but you wouldn't go without the insurance because the consequences are so severe. Getting a criminal record basically means the end of your life.

That is simply absurd.

11 million people in the UK are reported to have at least one criminal conviction. (Including me.)

One-third of men born in 1953 had a conviction by 2006.

Their lives have not ended!

Source. Unlock - an organisation that works on issues around offending.

 

[johncrossley]

If a criminal record is no big deal, why are passengers threatened with one?

 

[najaB]

If a criminal record is no big deal, why are passengers threatened with one?

Because it is a deal, and it is a possible outcome of repeatedly chancing it.

It's not a "your life is over" thing, but it will likely cause some problems.

 

[johncrossley]

Innocent mistakes leading to enforcement action are almost impossible to make when travelling by coach or local bus. Advance tickets are way riskier by comparison. Air travel is also safer. Even driving is relatively safe. You can commit quite serious motoring offences without going to court.

 

[danm14]

If a criminal record is no big deal, why are passengers threatened with one?

Because a lot of people believe it is the end of their life, and thus it's a good threat.

 

[najaB]

Innocent mistakes leading to enforcement action are almost impossible to make when travelling by coach or local bus.

And if train tickets were checked at the door...

If "local bus" includes TfL services, then the Disputes and Prosecutions section is replete with cases of people "innocently" using Freedom cards and staff Oyster cards.

 

[johncrossley]

---

Because a lot of people believe it is the end of their life, and thus it's a good threat.

But if it deters risk averse travellers then the railway loses out. By contrast, someone who takes risks won't care.

And if train tickets were checked at the door...

Exactly, the problem is that tickets are checked when mistakes cannot be rectified.