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Mid last month I was traveling from London st pancras to Crayford and I got half way ticket from st pancras to London bridge instead of the full one to Crayford.
I was stopped by a revenue officer and my postcode was taken. Yesterday I got a letter saying the matter has been provisionally authorized for prosecution and asked me to make a comment about the incident on reverse.
I feel very sad and broken because I have never had any legal case before talk more of going to court.
I am scared and don’t know what to do.
Please I need assistance on what to do next and how to respond to avoid going to court.
The usual procedure is that they will write to you (that's the letter you've posted). You then write back to them and hopefully the matter remains out of court. But before we can advise on what you should write, we need the information requested in the link I posted.
I started my journey from London st pancras en route Crayford, I was supposed to join a connecting train at London bridge. I was stopped at London bridge and then he asked to see the ticket from London st pancras to London bridge which I didn’t have.
He requested to see my trainline history which I showed him and he discovered I got only half tickets for the journey. I sincerely apologized and he asked me few questions including my postcode which I gave him before the letter was sent.
It may be different if it was a one-off but if you have done this before and for a long time that changes things slightly. How long have you been short faring?
Why couldn't you show your ticket from STP to London Bridge?
Why are you doing this?
I believe fares from to/from London St Pancras from south of the Thames are the same price as London Bridge if you purchase a ticket to/from London Thameslink.
In short you need to convince them that you will not be short faring again. Southeastern do allow out of court settlements, so you may be able to settle this matter out of court (for a very expensive sum!) without a criminal record although this is not a guarantee.
In your reply you want to be apologetic, making clear that you understand:
- that fare evasion is wrong and costs the taxpayer hundreds of millions of pounds each year
- that you have learned your lesson and will not be fare evading again
- that you hope to be allowed the opportunity to settle the mater out of court
- that you are willing to pay all outstanding fares and administrative costs incurred
Keep out any sob stories about living conditions, etc. because frankly they don’t care and it will only make them more annoyed at you, as they read thousands of sob stories every day.
In your letter you need not admit to instances of fare evasion they have not asked you about but you must take care to be frank and honest. Do not equivocate or lie.
If they offer you an out of court settlement you can expect to pay the anytime single ticket (undiscounted) for every journey you have fare evaded without regard for fares already paid, plus £150 in administration fees. Gather this sum now as they will expect you to pay it promptly and at once once they offer you a settlement.
If they offer you an out of court settlement you can expect to pay the anytime single ticket (undiscounted) for every journey you have fare evaded without regard for fares already paid, plus £150 in administration fees. Gather this sum now as they will expect you to pay it promptly and at once once they offer you a settlement.
Be £9.00 for each and every one way journey between London and Crayford, or vice-versa, or £8.60 for journeys made before the March 2024 fares revision.
Why are you doing this?
I believe fares from to/from London St Pancras from south of the Thames are the same price as London Bridge if you purchase a ticket to/from London Thameslink.
TBH! It hasn’t been a pattern, I recently moved to London because I got a new job and it’s my first month here and it only happened not more than three times. I don’t have any history of fare evasion in the last one year on my trainline apart from this and I sincerely regret it. The first time I worked late and the barricade was open.
That was my first week of going to work, it’s even sad because I used my hand to meet the revenue officer asking for directions before he asked for my tickets.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
In short you need to convince them that you will not be short faring again. Southeastern do allow out of court settlements, so you may be able to settle this matter out of court (for a very expensive sum!) without a criminal record although this is not a guarantee.
In your reply you want to be apologetic, making clear that you understand:
- that fare evasion is wrong and costs the taxpayer hundreds of millions of pounds each year
- that you have learned your lesson and will not be fare evading again
- that you hope to be allowed the opportunity to settle the mater out of court
- that you are willing to pay all outstanding fares and administrative costs incurred
Keep out any sob stories about living conditions, etc. because frankly they don’t care and it will only make them more annoyed at you, as they read thousands of sob stories every day.
In your letter you need not admit to instances of fare evasion they have not asked you about but you must take care to be frank and honest. Do not equivocate or lie.
If they offer you an out of court settlement you can expect to pay the anytime single ticket (undiscounted) for every journey you have fare evaded without regard for fares already paid, plus £150 in administration fees. Gather this sum now as they will expect you to pay it promptly and at once once they offer you a settlement.
Fermiboson gave you some good advice about what to write.
You don't want to plead guilty, that's for if they send a court summons. And you don't want a fine because that's what a court hands out. You're asking for an out of court settlement, as Fermiboson said.
Fermiboson gave you some good advice about what to write.
You don't want to plead guilty, that's for if they send a court summons. And you don't want a fine because that's what a court hands out. You're asking for an out of court settlement, as Fermiboson said.
I started my journey from London st pancras en route Crayford, I was supposed to join a connecting train at London bridge. I was stopped at London bridge and then he asked to see the ticket from London st pancras to London bridge which I didn’t have.
In short you need to convince them that you will not be short faring again. Southeastern do allow out of court settlements, so you may be able to settle this matter out of court (for a very expensive sum!) without a criminal record although this is not a guarantee.
In your reply you want to be apologetic, making clear that you understand:
- that fare evasion is wrong and costs the taxpayer hundreds of millions of pounds each year
- that you have learned your lesson and will not be fare evading again
- that you hope to be allowed the opportunity to settle the mater out of court
- that you are willing to pay all outstanding fares and administrative costs incurred
Keep out any sob stories about living conditions, etc. because frankly they don’t care and it will only make them more annoyed at you, as they read thousands of sob stories every day.
In your letter you need not admit to instances of fare evasion they have not asked you about but you must take care to be frank and honest. Do not equivocate or lie.
If they offer you an out of court settlement you can expect to pay the anytime single ticket (undiscounted) for every journey you have fare evaded without regard for fares already paid, plus £150 in administration fees. Gather this sum now as they will expect you to pay it promptly and at once once they offer you a settlement.
This is the reply I want to sent, please help me check it out.
Dear Sir,
On the 6th of May, I made a terrible error of judgement to not buy a full ticket travelling from London st pancras to Crayford . Instead, I bought a half ticket from London bridge to Crayford. This was so foolish of me and I’m so full of regrets as i recently moved to London the previous week to start a new job.
I sincerely apologise for my behaviour that I learned later after the incident that this could cause financial losses to you company and overhead accounts.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
Your sincerely
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I wanted to use the restroom at London bridge station, so I asked the officer at the barrier for direction before he asked for my tickets. That was how I was stopped.
On my train app it happened only two times that’s the only time I have done it. I can post my history here if you want me to.
I just want this to get over and i will never attempt such again
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
This is the reply I want to sent, please help me check it out.
Dear Sir,
On the 6th of May, I made a terrible error of judgement to not buy a full ticket travelling from London st pancras to Crayford . Instead, I bought a half ticket from London bridge to Crayford. This was so foolish of me and I’m so full of regrets as i recently moved to London the previous week to start a new job.
I sincerely apologise for my behaviour that I learned later after the incident that this could cause financial losses to you company and overhead accounts.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
Your sincerely
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I wanted to use the restroom at London bridge station, so I asked the officer at the barrier for direction before he asked for my tickets. That was how I was stopped.
On my train app it happened only two times that’s the only time I have done it. I can post my history here if you want me to.
I just want this to get over and i will never attempt such again
I just scanned with the ticket I bought in the morning while traveling from Crayford to St pancras and it opened so I felt I should just buy from London bridge to Crayford.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I just scanned with the ticket I bought in the morning while traveling from Crayford to St pancras and it opened so I felt I should just buy from London bridge to Crayford.
This is the reply I want to sent, please help me check it out.
Dear Sir,
On the 6th of May, I made a terrible error of judgement to not buy a full ticket travelling from London st pancras to Crayford . Instead, I bought a half ticket from London bridge to Crayford. This was so foolish of me and I’m so full of regrets as i recently moved to London the previous week to start a new job.
I sincerely apologise for my behaviour that I learned later after the incident that this could cause financial losses to you company and overhead accounts.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
Your sincerely
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I wanted to use the restroom at London bridge station, so I asked the officer at the barrier for direction before he asked for my tickets. That was how I was stopped.
On my train app it happened only two times that’s the only time I have done it. I can post my history here if you want me to.
I just want this to get over and i will never attempt such again
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
The ticket I bought was from London bridge to Crayford. He asked for the ticket from st pancras to London bridge
This is the reply I want to sent, please help me check it out.
Dear Sir,
On the 6th of May, I made a terrible error of judgement to not buy a full ticket travelling from London st pancras to Crayford . Instead, I bought a half ticket from London bridge to Crayford. This was so foolish of me and I’m so full of regrets as i recently moved to London the previous week to start a new job.
I sincerely apologise for my behaviour that I learned later after the incident that this could cause financial losses to you company and overhead accounts.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
Your sincerely
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Not a big deal but Ref your draft letter I'd be tempted to swap the last 2 paras around - make it so the request for them to consider you letting them settle out of court is the last part of the letter / message that they read (because this is the most important part of what you are saying to them, it needs to be what is left in their mind when they read to the bottom.
ie make it is this order instead:
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
Not a big deal but Ref your draft letter I'd be tempted to swap the last 2 paras around - make it so the request for them to consider you letting them settle out of court is the last part of the letter / message that they read (because this is the most important part of what you are saying to them, it needs to be what is left in their mind when they read to the bottom.
ie make it is this order instead:
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
personally I would do both hard copy and e-mail to be on the safe side. And if posting a hard copy I would pay the extra sum at the post office to get it tracked so you can be certain it gets to them.
If this is a regular commute you will be making you may consider purchasing a season ticket to assure them that fare evasion will not occur again. If you don’t need to (or can’t) though then no need to bother.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
This is the reply I want to sent, please help me check it out.
Dear Sir,
On the 6th of May, I made a terrible error of judgement to not buy a full ticket travelling from London st pancras to Crayford . Instead, I bought a half ticket from London bridge to Crayford. This was so foolish of me and I’m so full of regrets as i recently moved to London the previous week to start a new job.
I sincerely apologise for my behaviour that I learned later after the incident that this could cause financial losses to you company and overhead accounts.
In order to demonstrate my determination of not letting it happen again, I have been abiding by your Revenue Protection Policy since then and I will be continuously doing so. I am ready to compensate you with any administrative costs and short fares incurred due to my foolishness. It would be much appreciated if we could settle this out if court, as it could affect my visa decisions and employment which will increase hardships to my personal circumstances.
There are no excuses for my behaviour . I hope you could see that I have learned my lessons and I will ensure this will never happen again no matter under what personal circumstances - I was unemployed for two and half months at the time of this incident.
Your sincerely
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I wanted to use the restroom at London bridge station, so I asked the officer at the barrier for direction before he asked for my tickets. That was how I was stopped.
On my train app it happened only two times that’s the only time I have done it. I can post my history here if you want me to.
I just want this to get over and i will never attempt such again
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
The ticket I bought was from London bridge to Crayford. He asked for the ticket from st pancras to London bridge
Personally I would cut out the bit about the consequences for you - generally speaking the shorter the letter that gets the message across the better.
They read hundreds of letters per day from people with visa problems - hell, we on this forum get a few per day consistently - and it’s very unlikely to change their decision.
If this is a regular commute you will be making you may consider purchasing a season ticket to assure them that fare evasion will not occur again. If you don’t need to (or can’t) though then no need to bother.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
Personally I would cut out the bit about the consequences for you - generally speaking the shorter the letter that gets the message across the better.
They read hundreds of letters per day from people with visa problems - hell, we on this forum get a few per day consistently - and it’s very unlikely to change their decision.
While they may proceed to prosecute, the most likely is that they'll reply offering you a settlement, which is typically £100 to £150 admin costs plus the full cost, at Anytime (Day) Single rate, of the journeys for which the fare was evaded. If this is what they do it will need to be paid promptly and in full, so you may want to work out what it will be roughly and find a way to have that money ready.
If you have done it more than once using any sort of online ticketing system, they will have obtained data from that and will know how many times you've done it and use that in calculating the settlement, so if you've been doing it for a while it could be quite hefty.
If you want more detail than that, you might want to post a redacted version of the letters received.
Make sure you can receive post from the address the original was sent to.
While they may proceed to prosecute, the most likely is that they'll reply offering you a settlement, which is typically £100 to £150 admin costs plus the full cost, at Anytime (Day) Single rate, of the journeys for which the fare was evaded. If this is what they do it will need to be paid promptly and in full, so you may want to work out what it will be roughly and find a way to have that money ready.
If you have done it more than once using any sort of online ticketing system, they will have obtained data from that and will know how many times you've done it and use that in calculating the settlement, so if you've been doing it for a while it could be quite hefty.
If you want more detail than that, you might want to post a redacted version of the letters received.
Make sure you can receive post from the address the original was sent to.
We are aware of an issue with emails from the Forum to Microsoft-based email accounts (hotmail/outlook/live.com email addresses). This is being looked into currently, thanks for your patience meanwhile.
