Indeed, the situation where the revenue department introduces a surcharge for using the ticket gates for platform 13 and the operational department schedules 'normal' trains to depart from that platform is not customer friendly.
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Doubling back at Gatwick off the Express from Victoria
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Minstral25
Established Member
The new charging was brought in to cover Fare Dodgers at Horley (doubling back via Gatwick Airport on a direct ticket) - because Gatwick Express no longer employees on-train staff.
As Horley is in the same Oyster/Contactless group as Merstham, Redhill, Earlswood and Salfords this has affected these stations as well. The affect of the change was not properly thought through.
As Horley is in the same Oyster/Contactless group as Merstham, Redhill, Earlswood and Salfords this has affected these stations as well. The affect of the change was not properly thought through.
Are passengers travelling on Gatwick Express to Horley regarded by GTR as 'fare dodgers'. There is no concept of fare dodging on Contactless as you are charged for displacement.
Someone who travels, for instance, Victoria to East Croydon to Norwood Junction isn't fare dodging if they use Oyster / Contactless despite going via Zone 5 to get from Zone 1 to Zone 4.
Minstral25
Established Member
Gatwick Express is a "premium"
service and as such passengers using it to Horley should pay the "premium" to board the "luxury" train service.Are you sure. Would a person paying to enter zone 1-4 then going from Victoria to Norwood Junction journeying through Zone 5 not "technically" be a fare dodger if they did not pay to enter Zone 5? If you go through Zone 1 you pay more than if you validate to avoid zone 1! Although I suspect no-one cares much.
bakerstreet
Member
No, your only obligation is to touch in and touch out and remain within the contactless / oyster / PAYG coverage areas applicable to the journey.
It’s up to the system to charge you the appropriate amount
Haywain
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Whilst having an available PAYG balance in the case of Oyster (if outside the zones covered by a travelcard).
bakerstreet
Member
Thanks yes I forgot that bit
Passengers should not be required to deliberately go to the gateline of the wrong platform and then walk towards the correct platform, nor should passengers be expected to know they should be doing this!
Passengers who simply behave reasonably and in a manner that would not be unexpected of a passenger should put in a refund request and I will be happy to assist anyone in this position; the more people I can assist, the better as this could be used as evidence of wrongdoing on the part of GTR.
If you are happy for GTR to get away with it that is your prerogative.
No; passengers need to give the TOC a chance to rectify the matter before escalating to London Travelwatch. However if we can evidence that a lot of people are being charged, we can certainly ask LTW to investigate the matter and contact GTR for comment.
GTR's view of a fare dodger is very different to the reality; they may well view people who either hold perfectly valid tickets, or who use PAYG in a completely correct manner, to be "dodging" the fare which GTR erroneously deems appropriate for the journey.
But that does not make it so.
Indeed I would take anything GTR says with a hefty pinch of salt.
Haywain
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However, it is not reasonable to ask people to deliberately allow themselves to be overcharged, as you appear to have asked, when they know how to avoid it.
Bishopstone
Established Member
Is there an easement which permits doubling-back from Gatwick to Horley etc, on paper and season tickets?
swt_passenger
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I can imagine the conversation.
TOC staff: “you can’t divert into that platform, it’ll charge the wrong fares.”
Signaller: “the way fares work are nothing to do with me…”
See also Paddington HL for platform dependent fares. Didn't someone report they get mischarged routinely on Sunday mornings when a two track railway is in operation or something?
It is worse than that. It is the timetable planners who have put the Redhill route services into platform 13 on a scheduled basis, not just on the day signalling decisions.
WizCastro197
Established Member
How come they’ve done that? Are no platforms between 15-19 available?
Minstral25
Established Member
100% agree on platform gates. Passengers should not be expected to know which gate to go through and the set up at Victoria does not help that.
As a note - TfL just refunded me. Slight issue they refunded £5 more than they had to.
The problem has come about simply because GTR are trying to replace the person on the "Gatwick Express" train checking tickets with automated barriers. The latter does not work.
As you know I don't fully subscribe to the concept that Gatwick Express is not a separate service as it is clearly branded differently. Here though contactless does not have a "not Gatwick Express" tag on the ticket as there is no ticket so would tend to agree that GTR should not be penalising passengers for doing this. I wouldn't fully blame GTR here, as they are only doing what the DfT bids them to do - after all, DfT are taking 100% of the revenue generated and GTR (as an agent) get none of it.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Because it means less East Croydon passengers on the four car trains - they are supposed to be in platform 12 though not 13 or 14. It seems Network Rail adjusted several platform plans of GTR though as @JonathanH mentions
WizCastro197
Established Member
Ah yes, I believe this was discussed in our other thread?
It won’t really stop people unfortunately, people who go down to Gatwick Airport for a train to Victoria know no one checks your tickets in the contactless area.
Bishopstone
Established Member
Thanks. In which case, I don’t see what the fuss is about.
If you travel Victoria-Horley via Gatwick (whether by Southern or GatEx) in the absence of an easement, then your destination is Gatwick, not Horley, and you’re rightly charged accordingly.
The debate about whether GatEx should be able to get away with charging premium fares looks like an irrelevance here.
The issue is that passengers who don't go via Gatwick are charged a higher fare as well if they touch the 'wrong' barriers at Victoria.
What you are describing would entail a separate gateline for Gatwick Express services at Gatwick Airport.
Bishopstone
Established Member
Fair enough, though that wasn’t the issue/complaint identified in the original post, which can be summarised as ‘commuters angry about being charged correct fare from now on.’
No. At all points you would be complying with the Oyster Conditions of Use, namely that you must touch in before starting your journey and touch out when finishing it.
It is up to TfL to decide how much to charge for this journey, and they would be entitled to charge extra for going via East Croydon (if they had a way of detecting it).
In practice, it would simply cost more than it's worth to install barriers that would allow for this sort of double-back to be detected.
The easement is only relevant to single/return/season tickets. Oyster/contactless (or KeyGo) PAYG is a completely separate regime with its own rules. If you touch in at Victoria and out at Horley then your destination is demonstrably Horley!
If, as with the Heathrow Express, the higher fares for Gatwick Express branded services were lawful and cases of being charged the wrong fare were rare, this sort of pricing would be much less problematic.
Bishopstone
Established Member
I accept the point about easements and Oyster, but the computer has picked-up you’ve joined a train at Victoria that doesn’t stop until Gatwick, and has therefore charged the fare to Gatwick. That was the basis of the original post: I’m not sure it matters whether the train was red or green, or whether other people were mis-charged in different circumstances.
If the barriers at Liverpool Street could be set to ‘catch’ those commuting to Harold Wood (say) via a double-back at Shenfield, versus those who used the Elizabeth Line, with a higher fare then I’d be content with that, though I can see counter-arguments this would be a violation of sacred Oyster principles etc.
There is an official easement for Brentwood, to permit circulation via Shenfield.
Not so for Harold Wood. However, on Contactless it wouldn't matter.
The computer isn't intelligent, it's just been programmed to charge a higher fare if you touch in or out at the platform 13 & 14 barriers at Victoria. That higher charge has been set up on the basis that these platforms are supposed to only see GX branded services - but there were always some early/late Southern branded services which were booked to use these platforms (or were put into them due to disruption), and now there are some peak time SN branded services which are booked there too. That makes it a much bigger problem than before.
The branding does matter, as the higher fare is described as being for the use of GX services. That is aside from the questionable legality of brand-specific fares.
As I say, if this were like the Heathrow Express situation, where being mis-charged is a very rare circumstance, I might be more understanding. But that's certainly no longer the case with peak SN branded services being booked for those platforms.
In principle I don't disagree - Oyster fares have always been charged based on the route taken - but practicalities dictate that it often isn't possible to conclusively detect double-backs and so the benefit of the doubt must be given.
Minor point. The same does not apply to Merstham as it's considered extremely unlikely that anyone would double back that far.
That's not a surprise. Treat it as compensation for the hassle.
The original post was about changes made to journeys which circulated via Gatwick. There is still no issue if you take a train from anywhere else other than platforms 13-14 at Victoria. You'll be charged the normal fare to Horley whether you've circulated or not. This is standard PAYG practice.
However, the later discussion is based around customers not circulating via Gatwick but being charged as if they do just because their train went from platform 13. This is clearly indefensible and is a problem that GTR really need to address.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
When you bear in mind that Oyster was originally an LU concept where TfL are quite happy for passengers to travel from zone 1 to Neasden (3) via Wembley Park (4), it's obviously a conscious design decision. In practice I'd say that most TOCs are happy for people to circulate if they can be sure that they won't try to exit at the further point for a cheaper fare. PAYG solves that issue because if you do exit at Shenfield then you're charged the correct fare.
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I imagine it's a problem wherever there are "premium" and "non premium" fares to the same destination controlled through different gatelines. As far as I'm aware the only issues are for 13-14 Victoria and 1-7 at Paddington. It's generally much stricter platforming at Paddington and of course far less of an issue now the TfL/Elizabeth line services are at the lower level (two track excepted as you rightly state).
Of course the reverse can also occur - if an Express (Gatwick or Heathrow) service ends up on a "non-premium" platform then passenger will be charged less via that gateline. As you say it's almost unavoidable as signalling and revenue are about as disparate railway areas as possible! Or we don't run 'Express' services (which often are anything but) to the same destination with fare differentials but that's probably for another discussion...
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Also true of everywhere that only recieves metro/stopping services, but just is 1 station back "up" from the first call of an express service. These cases will always exist and are notorious sites for revenue operations. You pick your battles.
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Capvermell
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Its stuff precisely like this that makes me not trust or use my Southern Key Card that has a Network Card loaded on it and to much prefer buying a paper ticket with a Network card added on to it for the two to three off peak return journeys I tend to average currently with Southern.
If I load a Zones 1 to 6 Travelcard on to my Key card with Network Card from Ockley then for the system not to go mad and try to start penalty charging me it seems I have to remember to tap in and out on the card reader at Ockley as well as the usually closed barriers at Victoria and on the Underground. But if I buy Zones 1 to 6 paper Travelcard ticket with Network Card discount I just use it in those gates that are closed against me but don't get maximum fare or penalty charged for failing to tap in or out at ungated and generally deserted Ockley (so no one else is around tapping in and out on card readers from my train hence reminding me to do so) and don't have to force myself to change existing habits re using the card reader on barriers that are always open at Victoria for the final 2325 weekday service to Ockley.
Using the Key gives me no additional discount for doing so but every possibility of being penalised for failing to remember to tap in or out at the various card readers without barriers or open barriers along the route. It therefore seems far better to continue to use paper Travelcard tickets from Ockley until such time as they are one day no longer available.........
Also the above apparently unresolvable issues re Gatwick Express users who double back to Redhill, Horley etc if they use the GX barriers strongly suggests that these passengers should not be being charged a penalty for reaching their destination this way as it then also become irrelevant as to which set of barriers at Victoria they pass through in order to reach their train.
All in all its clearly high time that GTR was prevented for good for charging passengers any extra for using its scarcely any faster so called Gatwick Express trains as has been proposed more than once in the last few years.
Minstral25
Established Member
Same goes for Redhill, Earlswood and Salfords in terms of likelihood - the only worthwhile double back is Horley. However as TfL have them in the same fare group they all receive the double back charge including Merstham
The issue is that Southern Reigate trains (calling at Merstham and Redhill all day plus Earlswood, Salfords and Horley in peak) are often programmed into platforms 13 and 14 so as you say it is indefensible.
It should be the same for our stations along Redhill corridor via Gatwick
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gabrielhj07
Established Member
I will try this journey at some point in the next two weeks, one VIC-GTW on the Express, and one VIC-HOR changing from a Redhill train.
WizCastro197
Established Member
But why? There isn't any point unless: You need to go to Horley or you want to charge yourself more than if you do the usual route. Are you planning to double back on the first one and then tap in on platform 13 for the second one?
gabrielhj07
Established Member
I quite often have a need to travel from London - Horley, so this will be of interest to me.
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