Even the best lawyer wouldn't be able to defend you against a charge under Byelaw 18 - boarding a train without a valid ticket.
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When is buying a ticket too late?
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Byelaw 18.1 is quite clear.
So buy before you board (exceptions apply of course). You may well get away with buying (online) boarding, but that makes no difference..
(Split ticketing is a separate issue, but you still have to have the ticket as soon as it is required.)
Really? Evidence, please.
The issue surely is not one of proving intention not to pay, but that you boarded a train without a ticket. You may have a ticket later on in the journey, but at the point of boarding you are in the wrong if you don't have a ticket.
(Unless of course, there were no suitable faclities at the station you boarded to buy a ticket.)
Sapphire Blue
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It often is.
nedchester
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Indeed a lot of court case outcomes are not about the truth even in supposedly black and white cases.
As an example there could be an argument that a purchaser had pressed “buy” at a certain time with the ticket not coming through immediately by email. The purchaser could reasonably assume they were in possession of a valid ticket at time of departure.
And all that may play into determining whether intent exists for the purposes of section 5(3)(a) of RoRA. But it would be of no relevance to a potential prosecution under Byelaw 18.
Byelaw 18 is strict liability so none of that matters. If it went to court, the company could easily show that the purchase was made (so when the 'buy button' was pressed) was at 08.52, the train departed from that station at 08.48 and ticket facilities at that station were provided and working - offence complete.
However - you are unlikely to be taken to court over it, as long as you're not a persistent offender and the ticket purchase has completed well before any inspection. The issue comes when you don't have a chance to complete the purchase before you're asked for your ticket, or the inspector thinks you only bought it because you saw them coming. In which case (assuming facilities were available at the station you boarded) you don't have a leg to stand on.
trainophile
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Would the e-ticket scanning device flag up a time discrepancy once the ticket was in your app or wallet, even if the train had left a minute before it got there?
The time you add it to your Apple/Google wallet, or any delay in it appearing in the app of the company where you purchased it is irrelevent, what matters is the purchase time which will be coded into the Aztec code (barcode), wherever it's accessed from.
My daughter found that the TPE service for which she had an Advance ticket was cancelled and so, needing to get to a meeting on time, jumped on board a LNER train in the station going to the same destination and went online to buy a ticket. (An open ticket, not one tied to that service.) She found that the app would not respond and the guard (who accepted her explanation and sold her a ticket) told her that certain ticketing apps detect when one is already aboard a train and are set to decline to sell tickets in such circumstances. Is this correct or was the guard not being accurate?
This forum has a tendency to overcomplicate things, whereas in 99.9% of cases it really is very simple.
If you're starting your journey at a station that has facilities to sell you your ticket, buy before boarding.
If you do not have a valid ticket with you when you join the train at such a station, you commit an offence. Simples.
If you're starting your journey at a station that has facilities to sell you your ticket, buy before boarding.
If you do not have a valid ticket with you when you join the train at such a station, you commit an offence. Simples.
This sounds like a load of nonsense. I am not aware of any such use of location data in ticket buying apps, beyond a list of "stations near me" etc.
Was there another TPE service that would have enabled your daughter to reach her destination within an hour? If not, TPE were obliged to reroute your daughter 'at the earliest opportunity' which may well have meant the LNER service which she boarded. In that case, she should not have had to buy any additional ticket.
Even if there was another TPE service within an hour, there is currently general ticket acceptance in place on LNER, between York and Edinburgh, where TPE services are cancelled. This has been the case since the end of last year.
Haywain
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You mention this quite a lot but the devil is in the detail. It appears to me that the customer has a right to be offered rerouting options by the operator who has let them down but this does not automatically confer a right to board the service of another operator without a valid ticket.
The vast majority of the industry, let alone passengers, are unaware of the rights bestowed by the PRO.
I agree, hence why I said that they should not have had to buy any additional ticket if the circumstances were as I explained. If TPE didn't comply with their obligations under the PRO, the customer would be able to perform them in lieu of TPE (i.e. by buying a new ticket as required), and subsequently recover the cost of doing so.
In this particular instance it's all rather academic, as there is general ticket acceptance in place for cancellations. And so in any event, if the incident described occurred within the last 4 or 5 months, the LNER member of staff should have informed the passenger of the acceptance and accepted their TPE ticket without additional charge.
My daughter enquired at York and was told there was no cross-ticket acceptance.
Presuming this happened during the period where ticket acceptance was in place (i.e. since the end of last year), that is wrong. She should raise a complaint to LNER, asking them to refund the wrongly charged additional fare, as well as whoever employed the member of staff at York (which could be TPE or LNER) for misleading your daughter about ticket acceptance.
Around three weeks ago.
trainophile
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All well and good, but in the case of my experience (post #18) it was a choice of running for the train or hanging around New Street for almost three hours due to cancellations. Surely it would have been understandable that I took the first option.
I routinely only activate my M-tickets once I'm on the train and it's started to move. After having a refund claim rejected where I'd activated one beforehand and subsequently all trains were cancelled I consider that sensible. Obviously there are many people who would disagree, so am not giving that as general advice.
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