All other issues aside, and as an advocate of the retention of guards, this statement does not reflect my experiences in the slightest. It has been rare to find guards doing any revenue collection for a long time now. I can't recall the last time I saw one doing so (my regular route is Redhill to London), including first class enforcement (which would, even if done, only amount to asking the errant person(s) to move rather than collect any further revenue). While I understand that morale is low and has been for some time, the revenue-earning case for guards is, unfortunately, very weak.
Of course, other routes may be dramatically different, but I doubt it.
While I have acknowledged several times the morale issue, on my line (as I also just wrote), revenue collection by guards is very rare in my experience, along with any sight of the guard during journeys. As I also said, all other routes may be dramatically different for some reason. "Significant sums of revenue" - would this be likely to be the, say, £60,000+ per annum per guard that salary and overheads would require to be covered to justify guards on revenue grounds alone, do you suppose?
I repeat that I would far prefer to see the guard's role retained, but the case for doing so can only be weakened in the eyes of the public if they perceive no benefit from the increasingly-invisible role.
I was careful to include overheads in the (estimated) sum that I quoted. If individuals are collecting huge sums - great, but I simply say that it's not happening everywhere, and certainly not on my route.
Regarding first class, on Southern and Thameslink, both of which I use frequently, first class enforcement simply ceased months ago (again in my twice-daily experience) with RPIs gone and guards very rarely seen, let alone collecting/enforcing. Before the current era, those few guards who did try to enforce first class simply asked the miscreants to move, rather than collect extra revenue, as they were/are not authorised to issue penalty fares and seemed not to want to charge upgrade fares either.
Regarding First Class, many people make a swift exit anyway when they are told that their Standard Class ticket / Oyster / receipt from two weeks ago isn't valid. Once you point it out, often they basically just run away. Those who
don't are generally so obstructive that you need to get other resources to deal with them. Now that revenue staff are all OBSs and therefore all diagrammed to their own trains, and the rarely-seen neighbourhood officers generally deal with vandalism and disorder rather than tickets, you can predict how well
that works... not having backup is a fairly big part of the problem now.
As for checks in general, as has been stated it is partly due to poor morale, as well as such routes which have conductors now being so busy (often due to others on the same routes being cancelled) that it's as much as anyone can do to get to the correct dispatch positions. There have also been a number of very nasty cases of abuse by passengers towards staff checking tickets due to dissatisfaction at the service, including amongst OBSs and non-RMT conductors (of which certain depots have a fairly high number) who haven't been on strike. Sometimes, in fact I would say often, the mood onboard services is such that a conductor would be unwise to check - better to just maintain the safety of the train and themselves, give out what information they can, and be visible enough to sell tickets to those who want them.
All that said, a number of people do still check tickets and I have good cause to say it's more by fluke than universal working practice that you haven't been checked.
Lastly - regarding revenue collection paying for conductors; whilst management at GTR have long wrangled with the issue of how to get staff visible on trains, statistics for the amounts collected has never really seemed part of this debate. Indeed, some conductors are being retained at depots with the very routes where they collect the least revenue. Some conductors at Southern collect a tiny amount, usually because the trains are long and the major stations have barriers, with those hopping between the smaller stops having developed a culture of hiding 6 coaches from the dispatch positions and not paying when challenged. There are depots where every conductor will see several months of the year go by without a shift with takings in four figures.
No - the Redhill (Southern) to London trains are not DOO, although it is often hard to tell!
Some of them are now, including services to and from Reigate, some of the early morning and late evening coastal services, and Tonbridge line services on the section of route between Redhill and London (except with Southeastern drivers, who are not permitted to drive Southern 377s under DOO(P) under any circumstances). An OBS or conductor should be onboard but may be present only for selected parts of it. And for some of said selected parts of journeys, that may be less time than it takes to walk through the whole train and get back to their locker! Checking tickets takes much longer than that, too.
!
!
