Witnesses to the rescue

[EGO]

Looking for anyone on Thameslink train from St Albans or Harpenden to St Pancras on 28 Jan 2026 (approx 07:30–08:15). Around 10 passengers were issued penalty fares and then told by staff they would be cancelled but the penalty fares were not cancelled or not cancelled for all including me.

Please message if you were present. My email is engrehimen@yahoo.com. On principle I am going before a magistrate. A statement via email from you will be helpful to boost my case. Get in touch please. My name is Gabriel.

 

[Sun Chariot]

Hello Gabriel, to help us understand more, please will you share the key information explained here; thanks

Please read before posting in Disputes & Prosecutions

Guidance for those asking for advice: Please bear in mind the following, when asking for advice in this section: We need to know all relevant facts in order to assist you, including, for example: The stations* where you actually started & finished your journey The stations* where you changed...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[30907]

Hello Gabriel, to help us understand more, please will you share the key information explained here; thanks

Please read before posting in Disputes & Prosecutions

Guidance for those asking for advice: Please bear in mind the following, when asking for advice in this section: We need to know all relevant facts in order to assist you, including, for example: The stations* where you actually started & finished your journey The stations* where you changed...

www.railforums.co.uk

In addition, please explain why staff said the PFs would be cancelled.

As it is nearly 3 months after the incident, also briefly explain what has happened since, and why you are now (I presume) being prosecuted by GTR;
uploading a complete redacted copy of the PF would be very helpful.

 

[RJ]

Looking for anyone on Thameslink train from St Albans or Harpenden to St Pancras on 28 Jan 2026 (approx 07:30–08:15). Around 10 passengers were issued penalty fares and then told by staff they would be cancelled but the penalty fares were not cancelled or not cancelled for all including me.

Please message if you were present. My email is engrehimen@yahoo.com. On principle I am going before a magistrate. A statement via email from you will be helpful to boost my case. Get in touch please. My name is Gabriel.

Did this happen in the First Class section at the front of the train by any chance?

 

[185143]

The big red flag when staff say penalty fares "will be cancelled if you appeal" is, simply, if they knew there weren't grounds for a Penalty Fare to stand, why on earth would they bother issuing it in the first place.

The only exception being if it is issued for an alleged forgotten railcard/season. Produce the document and all is forgiven. Don't produce it and then pay up. A similar manner to being given a producer by the police after a suspected road traffic offence I suppose?

 

[WesternLancer]

Looking for anyone on Thameslink train from St Albans or Harpenden to St Pancras on 28 Jan 2026 (approx 07:30–08:15). Around 10 passengers were issued penalty fares and then told by staff they would be cancelled but the penalty fares were not cancelled or not cancelled for all including me.

Please message if you were present. My email is engrehimen@yahoo.com. On principle I am going before a magistrate. A statement via email from you will be helpful to boost my case. Get in touch please. My name is Gabriel.

Without us knowing what the penalty fares were issued for it’s hard to give a view on whether you’d have any prospects or not if this went to magistrates court.

As rail ticket offences are strict liability offences aiui it may be that the magistrates have no real ability to do anything even when you make your case to them.
Unless of course there was no ticket infringement at all.

Presumably you appealed the penalty fare given to you at all three stages but were unsuccessful?

If so please share all the paperwork so we can understand this and provide you with information that will help you in the magistrates court.

 

[Sun Chariot]

The big red flag when staff say penalty fares "will be cancelled if you appeal" is, simply, if they knew there weren't grounds for a Penalty Fare to stand

Or they wanted to diffuse a situation. But I recognise that is us speculating.

10 people (post 1) did not possess the required valid ticket.

 

[jkdd77]

If the OP appealed the PF within the 21-day period, and the PF was not cancelled prior to the- presumed- rejection of the appeal, then, based on the plain language of the law, the prosecution is statute-barred, notwithstanding the perverse, and erroneous, non-binding opinion of the Chief Magistrate to the contrary.

 

[WesternLancer]

If the OP appealed the PF within the 21-day period, and the PF was not cancelled prior to the- presumed- rejection of the appeal, then, based on the plain language of the law, the prosecution is statute-barred, notwithstanding the perverse, and erroneous, non-binding opinion of the Chief Magistrate to the contrary.

But presumably non payment of a penalty fare after the appeal has failed, If that is what has happened, Can be enforced by some sort of court action or otherwise why would anyone ever pay one.

 

[saismee]

The only exception being if it is issued for an alleged forgotten railcard/season. Produce the document and all is forgiven. Don't produce it and then pay up. A similar manner to being given a producer by the police after a suspected road traffic offence I suppose?

Or for it being issued to a child suspected of being an adult. Supply a birth certificate or other proof of age and it's solved without further hassle.

 

[EGO]

Hello Gabriel, to help us understand more, please will you share the key information explained here; thanks

Please read before posting in Disputes & Prosecutions

Guidance for those asking for advice: Please bear in mind the following, when asking for advice in this section: We need to know all relevant facts in order to assist you, including, for example: The stations* where you actually started & finished your journey The stations* where you changed...

www.railforums.co.uk

So. there were some train delays on 28th January 2026 on the Bedford - London Thameslink route . Each train on the route was packed. People squeeze themselves into trains. Many were stranded on platforms. I squeeze into one of them. There was no comfortable space to stand or hold on to something. Some passengers went to stand in the First Class compactment. I joined.

The penalty fare was for not holding a first class ticket. The passengers issued tickets started taking pictures of the crowded train. Some spoke to the ticketing staff to be considerate about the delays and packed train.

The two staff them made an announcement that they will cancel all penalty fares issued because of the delays and packed trains. At this point the train reached St Pancras - my destination - and I jumped off.

Six weeks later I got a penalty warning letter. I appealed twice over the next 5 weeks. They will not even consider the content of appeals. They said it was out of date. Of course it will be out of date because the penalty fares were supposed to be cancelled and I went home with that expectations only to be suprised with a warning letter after appeal deadline passed.

Now Thameslink is preparing to go to court. I need witness statement to make my case strong since they will not consider my appeal.

 

[Sun Chariot]

I updated the post above with more details.

Thanks - the time-lag for your new posts, was why I only saw them appear 4 minutes ago

 

[WesternLancer]

I still only see this:
"...Thameslink train from St Albans or Harpenden to St Pancras on 28 Jan 2026 (approx 07:30–08:15). Around 10 passengers were issued penalty fares and then told by staff they would be cancelled but the penalty fares were not cancelled or not cancelled for all including me."

Much of the key information described in the Mods section-header - I linked it in post 2 - is missing. We do need that as well.

Now showing more info on post 11 etc

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

So. there were some train delays on 28th January 2026 on the Bedford - London Thameslink route . Each train on the route was packed. People squeeze themselves into trains. Many were stranded on platforms. I squeeze into one of them. There was no comfortable space to stand or hold on to something. Some passengers went to stand in the First Class compactment. I joined.

The penalty fare was for not holding a first class ticket. The passengers issued tickets started taking pictures of the crowded train. Some spoke to the ticketing staff to be considerate about the delays and packed train.

The two staff them made an announcement that they will cancel all penalty fares issued because of the delays and packed trains. At this point the train reached St Pancras - my destination - and I jumped off.

Six weeks later I got a penalty warning letter. I appealed twice over the next 5 weeks. They will not even consider the content of appeals. They said it was out of date. Of course it will be out of date because the penalty fares were supposed to be cancelled and I went home with that expectations only to be suprised with a warning letter after appeal deadline passed.

Now Thameslink is preparing to go to court. I need witness statement to make my case strong since they will not consider my appeal.

I’ve never heard of a penalty fare being cancelled apart from via the Appeals process that in this case would sets out the reason for the appeal based on your claim of the announcement.
Then if that failed taking it through the Ombudsman process.

I don’t believe that now trying to get this overturned in the Magistrates court will be successful and may simply end up with you paying more money.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

The railway company should have kept a log of an announcement that declassified the first class area so standard class passengers can use it.
Perhaps you should try a freedom of information request for a copy of the log for any such announcements made on that train service.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

I updated the post above with more details.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==


Yes.


Yes.

So. there were some train delays on 28th January 2026 on the Bedford - London Thameslink route . Each train on the route was packed. People squeeze themselves into trains. Many were stranded on platforms. I squeeze into one of them. There was no comfortable space to stand or hold on to something. Some passengers went to stand in the First Class compactment. I joined.

The penalty fare was for not holding a first class ticket. The passengers issued tickets started taking pictures of the crowded train. Some spoke to the ticketing staff to be considerate about the delays and packed train.

The two staff them made an announcement that they will cancel all penalty fares issued because of the delays and packed trains. At this point the train reached St Pancras - my destination - and I jumped off.

Six weeks later I got a penalty warning letter. I appealed twice over the next 5 weeks. They will not even consider the content of appeals. They said it was out of date. Of course it will be out of date because the penalty fares were supposed to be cancelled and I went home with that expectations only to be suprised with a warning letter after appeal deadline passed.

Now Thameslink is preparing to go to court. I need witness statement to make my case strong.

We need to see the papers that you gave been issued with regarding the court action.
If you appealed it may be that they can not take court action for domestic aspects of this anyway.
Please up load copies in full with personal details removed.

 

[Haywain]

You don’t need to keep posting the same thing!

 

[30907]

Did you get a Penalty Fare on the spot (£100 plus the fare, reduced to £50 if paid promptly)?
If so, did you follow the appeal procedure as per the PF notice?
If you did, what happened at stage 3?

 

[EGO]

You don’t need to keep posting the same thing!

Noted. Thanks

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

Did you get a Penalty Fare on the spot (£100 plus the fare, reduced to £50 if paid promptly)?
If so, did you follow the appeal procedure as per the PF notice?
If you did, what happened at stage 3?

Hi,
in post #12 and 13 and 14 above, I updated my initial post with details.

No. I did not pay the fine on the spot. It is still unpaid.

Rearding appeal, I did not even have a chance to appeal properly. I pushed my appeal twice , they said my appeal was out of date. However, the reason for it being out of date is because I reasonably relied on the staff member saying they will cancel the penalty fare and went home without worries.

At Stage 3, London Travel Watchdog have now written to Thameslink but they said they do not have powers to cancel Thameslink penalty fare. This is rather a weak intervention in my view.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

I appreciate that you came here in the hope that there may have been someone else who was on the same train - but as we don't seem to have anyone who can help on that, we might be able to help you to understand the process that you're facing and work out how else to get the best outcome.

So to pick up on something you told us:

Now Thameslink is preparing to go to court. I need witness statement to make my case strong since they will not consider my appeal.

Please could you share with us what you have received from Thameslink at this stage? There's a couple of reasons for that:
- the railway won't be able to take the penalty fare to the criminal (i.e. magistrate's) court. If they're considering court action then presumably they have cancelled the penalty fare and have substituted (or are planning to substitute) something that they can prosecute in court
- or maybe Thameslink are talking about going to the civil court to try and enforce recovery of the penalty fare
- and either way, it's not quite clear what stage the process is at. Are Thameslink thinking about doing this, or have they actually decided that they will see you in court?

All of this affects what the best advice is that we can give you.

 

[WesternLancer]

At Stage 3, London Travel Watchdog have now written to Thameslink but they said they do not have powers to cancel Thameslink penalty fare. This is rather a weak intervention in my view.

I think this is probably correct - the Penalty Fare system, AIUI, is set down in regulations that are backed up in the law that I believe (the law that permits a transport operator to issue a Penalty Fare) -it's likely that the law specifies who can cancel Penalty Fares and outlines the issues to do with rights of Appeal - other forms of sanction the railway issues to do with ticket issues - including sitting in a 1st class carriage without a 1st class ticket - have no rights of Appeal and can be escalated to court by the railway company directly if they so wish.

However, I suspect what London Travelwatch could do is:

a) ask Thameslink for their version of events on this service that day
b) ask Thameslink to refund a penalty Fare paid - but probably not compel them to do so (but you have refused to pay the Penalty Fare as I understand it -so they would not ask you to be refunded for something you have not paid presumably)

What this forum can do
There are experts here with detailed knowledge of railway fares / offences rules and laws, as well as experience in knowing how railway companies tend to apply and enforce these rules in practice
That knowledge can be used to help you understand the prices you are in (if you want that information) and give you an idea of your prospects for success or failure, and tell you how it would be handled by a court and what to expect to happen in the court, so that you can make an informed decision on if you wish to try and resolve the matter in court to your satisfaction.

All of that advice would be freely given here and is not designed to make you do one thing or the other - but should be helpful in helping you weigh up the pros and cons of things you might wisher to do (for example letting it go to court on principle)

But to do that best people here will need to see the following:

- copies of any of the appeals you have sent (even if they were rejected because they were sent after the appeal deadline time)
- copies of the replies you have had from the Appeal body
- copies of anything you have had from the railway company about this (eg saying they are going to take you to court)
- copies of the paperwork from the court that you have received (if you have had it yet)

all of those should have your personal details and case ref numbers blanked out before uploading

What happened on the day?
Thanks for explaining more about what happened on the day above - that's helpful and I can imagine the scenario

After the Penalty Fares were issued you say that there was a separate announcement saying they would be cancelled. Can you answer these questions at all - please answer the ones you can. if you do not answer any of them I will assume you do not know, but you could state that for clarity if you wish, for questions you do not know the answers to:

1) I'm assuming you don't have any proof, like a recording, of that announcement (it would be remarkable if you did so I'm not expecting you have the good luck of having that proof)
2) How was the announcement about the PFs made - over the train announcements systems or in person to the people who had been given the Penalty Fares?
3) Who made the announcement saying they would cancel the PFs? Thameslink trains have only one member of staff on board - the train driver? - inspectors get on, check tickets / issue Penalty fares etc then get off again and do the same on another train. Do you know if it was the train driver who said Penalty Fares would be cancelled for people sitting in 1st class without the correct ticket, or was it one of the Inspectors who had issued the Penalty Fare?
4) Similarly - who made the announcement that stated that 1st class was then being opened to standard Class ticket holders? Do you know?
5) At roughly what point in the journey was the announcement about 1st class being open to Standard Class ticket holder made?

 

[jumble]

Noted. Thanks

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==


Hi,
in post #12 and 13 and 14 above, I updated my initial post with details.

No. I did not pay the fine on the spot. It is still unpaid.

Rearding appeal, I did not even have a chance to appeal properly. I pushed my appeal twice , they said my appeal was out of date. However, the reason for it being out of date is because I reasonably relied on the staff member saying they will cancel the penalty fare and went home without worries.

At Stage 3, London Travel Watchdog have now written to Thameslink but they said they do not have powers to cancel Thameslink penalty fare. This is rather a weak intervention in my view.

Can you clarify exactly why you did not have the chance to appeal in time.
Do you have any hard evidence that the RPIs said that the PFs would be cancelled?
It is a presumably fact that LTW do not have the powers to cancel PFs so all they can do is to ask politely if TL will consider not prosecuting so cannot see how their approach could possibly be considered weak.

 

[WesternLancer]

Can you clarify exactly why you did not have the chance to appeal in time.

I think the OPs point is they had the chance but had not reason to believe they needed to because they took the announcement mentioned as information that the PFs would be cancelled by the operator, after the operator seemingly declassified 1st class at a point in the journey presumably after the PFs were issued

Do you have any hard evidence that the RPIs said that the PFs would be cancelled?

So far we don't even know who did actually say that even

It is a presumably fact that LTW do not have the powers to cancel PFs so all they can do is to ask politely if TL will consider not prosecuting so cannot see how their approach could possibly be considered weak.

My suspicion also
Problem is if a passenger heard someone announce 'it will be cancelled' it's not unreasonable for the passenger to rely on this information - tho anyone who regularly reads this forum and sees the many occasions where people say 'I was issued with a Penalty Fare and the staff told me I could appeal and it would be cancelled' - will know to take this with a large pinch of salt.... but most people don't realise that for obvious reasons.

 

[Snow1964]

My suspicion also
Problem is if a passenger heard someone announce 'it will be cancelled' it's not unreasonable for the passenger to rely on this information - tho anyone who regularly reads this forum and sees the many occasions where people say 'I was issued with a Penalty Fare and the staff told me I could appeal and it would be cancelled' - will know to take this with a large pinch of salt.... but most people don't realise that for obvious reasons.

And that is a problem too, when staff overstep the mark and advise passengers of a fact. There are sections in the laws and bylaws that basically say when told by an official of the railway, should follow instructions and that will be treated as observing the rules.

What we do appear to have here (if I have read it correctly), is a declassification of First class, but some people had received penalties for being in First Class. Possibly this happened between stations so is unfair to those issued upto the announcement but on same section of route.

Of course the RPIs will have their receipts so they could have logged these and instigated or requested a voiding process. Possibly this didn't happen, but clearly should have if that was the announcement made. This smacks of of Thameslink staff acting like right hands and left hands that have never met and doing their own things, and management are too stupid to sort it.

Really need to know what they are now saying in their letter.

 

[Haywain]

What we do appear to have here (if I have read it correctly), is a declassification of First class

I'm not sure where you get that idea from.

 

[WesternLancer]

And that is a problem too, when staff overstep the mark and advise passengers of a fact. There are sections in the laws and bylaws that basically say when told by an official of the railway, should follow instructions and that will be treated as observing the rules.

What we do appear to have here (if I have read it correctly), is a declassification of First class, but some people had received penalties for being in First Class. Possibly this happened between stations so is unfair to those issued upto the announcement but on same section of route.

Of course the RPIs will have their receipts so they could have logged these and instigated or requested a voiding process. Possibly this didn't happen, but clearly should have if that was the announcement made. This smacks of of Thameslink staff acting like right hands and left hands that have never met and doing their own things, and management are too stupid to sort it.

Really need to know what they are now saying in their letter.

I agree with all this.
But indeed we need to see all the paperwork in the hope it sheds more light on aspects
I suspect the appeals body have simply rejected the appeal as out of time and given no consideration to the point the OP has tried to make - and it's just escalated eg has OP tried to raise any of this with Thamelsink themselves - we need to know all of this - even if the OP has failed to do something they maybe should have done, albeit unknowingly to them (and would have been advised of here had they had the good luck to find this forum earlier)

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

I'm not sure where you get that idea from.

actually good point - I thought I had read that it has been announced that 1st class could be used by std class ticket holders - but I can't see that now so either I imagined it or the post has been removed (there were some duplicates, maybe they were not all exactly the same)
I suspect no such announcement was made to declassify 1st class

so the only announcement at stake is the claim that staff said they would cancel the PFs (of which there will be no proof held by the OP hence their request for witnesses presumably)

Do Thameslink ever declassify the front 1st class compartment? (the rear one always being declassified) If so it would have to be the driver that made that announcement I presume as no one else on board to be able to do so.

 

[saismee]

I'm not sure where you get that idea from.

I was going to question this earlier. OP never actually stated that they said first was declassified, and sitting/standing in first prior to any announcement would still be an offence.

 

[EGO]

I think this is probably correct - the Penalty Fare system, AIUI, is set down in regulations that are backed up in the law that I believe (the law that permits a transport operator to issue a Penalty Fare) -it's likely that the law specifies who can cancel Penalty Fares and outlines the issues to do with rights of Appeal - other forms of sanction the railway issues to do with ticket issues - including sitting in a 1st class carriage without a 1st class ticket - have no rights of Appeal and can be escalated to court by the railway company directly if they so wish.

However, I suspect what London Travelwatch could do is:

a) ask Thameslink for their version of events on this service that day
b) ask Thameslink to refund a penalty Fare paid - but probably not compel them to do so (but you have refused to pay the Penalty Fare as I understand it -so they would not ask you to be refunded for something you have not paid presumably)

What this forum can do
There are experts here with detailed knowledge of railway fares / offences rules and laws, as well as experience in knowing how railway companies tend to apply and enforce these rules in practice
That knowledge can be used to help you understand the prices you are in (if you want that information) and give you an idea of your prospects for success or failure, and tell you how it would be handled by a court and what to expect to happen in the court, so that you can make an informed decision on if you wish to try and resolve the matter in court to your satisfaction.

All of that advice would be freely given here and is not designed to make you do one thing or the other - but should be helpful in helping you weigh up the pros and cons of things you might wisher to do (for example letting it go to court on principle)

But to do that best people here will need to see the following:

- copies of any of the appeals you have sent (even if they were rejected because they were sent after the appeal deadline time)
- copies of the replies you have had from the Appeal body
- copies of anything you have had from the railway company about this (eg saying they are going to take you to court)
- copies of the paperwork from the court that you have received (if you have had it yet)

all of those should have your personal details and case ref numbers blanked out before uploading

What happened on the day?
Thanks for explaining more about what happened on the day above - that's helpful and I can imagine the scenario

After the Penalty Fares were issued you say that there was a separate announcement saying they would be cancelled. Can you answer these questions at all - please answer the ones you can. if you do not answer any of them I will assume you do not know, but you could state that for clarity if you wish, for questions you do not know the answers to:

1) I'm assuming you don't have any proof, like a recording, of that announcement (it would be remarkable if you did so I'm not expecting you have the good luck of having that proof)
2) How was the announcement about the PFs made - over the train announcements systems or in person to the people who had been given the Penalty Fares?
3) Who made the announcement saying they would cancel the PFs? Thameslink trains have only one member of staff on board - the train driver? - inspectors get on, check tickets / issue Penalty fares etc then get off again and do the same on another train. Do you know if it was the train driver who said Penalty Fares would be cancelled for people sitting in 1st class without the correct ticket, or was it one of the Inspectors who had issued the Penalty Fare?
4) Similarly - who made the announcement that stated that 1st class was then being opened to standard Class ticket holders? Do you know?
5) At roughly what point in the journey was the announcement about 1st class being open to Standard Class ticket holder made?

1. No. But I took two pictures of the train jam-packed before the Thameslink staff said I am not allowed to do that.
2. Announcement was inside the carriage/coach we were in. First class coach at the front.
3. The ticketing staff. I call them Thameslink staff. Maybe they are not. There was a man and a woman. The lady made the announcement. Not the driver. Driver was in his pit driving the train all through.
4. I did not say first class was opened to others. Instead the train was packed such that when people could not even find space to stand, they went to stand inside the first class compactment.
5.First class was never declassified.

 

[WesternLancer]

1. No. But I took two pictures of the train jam-packed before the Thameslink staff said I am not allowed to do that.
2. Announcement was inside the carriage/coach we were in. First class coach at the front.
3. The ticketing staff. I call them Thameslink staff. Maybe they are not. There was a man and a woman. The lady made the announcement. Not the driver. Driver was in his pit driving the train all through.
4. I did not say first class was opened to others. Instead the train was packed such that when people could not even find space to stand, they went to stand inside the first class compactment.
5.First class was never declassified.

Thanks for those answers - so this basically rests on you being able to demonstrate or prove that a member of staff in the 1st class compartment stated that the Penalty Fares would be cancelled.

Hence your appeal for witnesses which is understandable - worth a try but I suspect the statistical probability of any of the people in that part of the train on that date will ever see you post here.

My personal advice, FWIW, would be not to let this go to court.

There is no right to occupy first class seating area without a 1st class ticket however crowded a train might be (so photos prooving it was jam packed don't alter this rule anyway - and it can't have been so jam packed that the inspectors could not make their way through to issue Penalty Fares to people....) - unless a member of staff authorises a passenger with a Std Class ticket to use 1st class . You will be unable to show that anyone authorised it - and you yourself admit no staff did do that anyway.

It may be that if you uploaded the paperwork asked for up thread better advice can be given but

I would advise
a) paying the sum demanded in whatever most recent letter you have been sent in order to prevent the matter going to court (we still don't know what sort of court action you are being threatened with however)
b) persuading London Travelwatch to seek to persuade Thameslink to refund the sum based on your version of events that happened

but you are free to 'have your day in court' of course -

f you do it would be really helpful to keep us updated on what happens and the outcome etc - that would be important for other people to see in the future too, if anyone comes here after a similar situation to what happened to you.

 

[EGO]

Can you clarify exactly why you did not have the chance to appeal in time.
Do you have any hard evidence that the RPIs said that the PFs would be cancelled?
It is a presumably fact that LTW do not have the powers to cancel PFs so all they can do is to ask politely if TL will consider not prosecuting so cannot see how their approach could possibly be considered weak.

Thanks. By 'weak' , I mean they cannot stop prosecution. They are more or less advisory though an objective third party.

As to not having a chance to appeal or submitting out of date appeals, what happened was I believed the PF will be cancelled after the ticketing staff said so. I went about my life only to be surprised by a warning. By the time the warning letter arrived the appeal period had already lapsed.

 

[AlterEgo]

It's not clear to me why you'd want to go in front of the magistrates for this. The train company can cancel the penalty fare and prosecute you. You admit the offence, openly. You will therefore be convicted of a Bylaw offence, for which you admit no defence, and for which no intent need be proven.

 

[EGO]

Thanks for those answers - so this basically rests on you being able to demonstrate or prove that a member of staff in the 1st class compartment stated that the Penalty Fares would be cancelled.

Hence your appeal for witnesses which is understandable - worth a try but I suspect the statistical probability of any of the people in that part of the train on that date will ever see you post here.

My personal advice, FWIW, would be not to let this go to court.

There is no right to occupy first class seating area without a 1st class ticket however crowded a train might be (so photos prooving it was jam packed don't alter this rule anyway - and it can't have been so jam packed that the inspectors could not make their way through to issue Penalty Fares to people....) - unless a member of staff authorises a passenger with a Std Class ticket to use 1st class . You will be unable to show that anyone authorised it - and you yourself admit no staff did do that anyway.

It may be that if you uploaded the paperwork asked for up thread better advice can be given but

I would advise
a) paying the sum demanded in whatever most recent letter you have been sent in order to prevent the matter going to court (we still don't know what sort of court action you are being threatened with however)
b) persuading London Travelwatch to seek to persuade Thameslink to refund the sum based on your version of events that happened

but you are free to 'have your day in court' of course -

f you do it would be really helpful to keep us updated on what happens and the outcome etc - that would be important for other people to see in the future too, if anyone comes here after a similar situation to what happened to you.

Thank you. I will do.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

Thanks for the advice. I recognise I

It's not clear to me why you'd want to go in front of the magistrates for this. The train company can cancel the penalty fare and prosecute you. You admit the offence, openly. You will therefore be convicted of a Bylaw offence, for which you admit no defence, and for which no intent need be proven.

Thanks for the advice. I recognise I need a witness to confirm what ticketing staff said on the day otherwise my case is weak.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==

I agree with all this.
But indeed we need to see all the paperwork in the hope it sheds more light on aspects
I suspect the appeals body have simply rejected the appeal as out of time and given no consideration to the point the OP has tried to make - and it's just escalated eg has OP tried to raise any of this with Thamelsink themselves - we need to know all of this - even if the OP has failed to do something they maybe should have done, albeit unknowingly to them (and would have been advised of here had they had the good luck to find this forum earlier)

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Apr 2026 ==


actually good point - I thought I had read that it has been announced that 1st class could be used by std class ticket holders - but I can't see that now so either I imagined it or the post has been removed (there were some duplicates, maybe they were not all exactly the same)
I suspect no such announcement was made to declassify 1st class

so the only announcement at stake is the claim that staff said they would cancel the PFs (of which there will be no proof held by the OP hence their request for witnesses presumably)

Do Thameslink ever declassify the front 1st class compartment? (the rear one always being declassified) If so it would have to be the driver that made that announcement I presume as no one else on board to be able to do so.

There was no declasdicication on the trip. I only need witnesses to what staff said about cancelling the PF. If not then I admit I have a weak case.

 

[AlterEgo]

Thanks for the advice. I recognise I need a witness to confirm what ticketing staff said on the day otherwise my case is weak.

It doesn't matter if you get a witness.

You committed the offence prior to any "cancellation of penalty fare" announcement and the offence was complete. It makes no difference what, if anything, was said later. The train company is perfectly entitled to prosecute you regardless, and indeed can only do so if it cancels the penalty fare by some mechanism - whether this was at the time, or later, following it going unpaid. You are guilty of the offence, as you have laid out in the series of events.