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On 11 September 2024, I travelled from Huddersfield to Manchester Victoria. Since I had returned to China for the summer holidays, I was unaware that my railcard had expired by the time I came back. It was only when I was asked to show my railcard at Victoria that I realised it had expired — probably by no more than half a month. The ticket inspector was extremely angry and hostile, and even verbally abused me. I tried to explain the situation, but they still issued me a penalty notice. I noticed that the notice did not specify a fine amount, but I didn't understand what that meant at the time. Afterwards, I tried to contact the railway DRPU department by phone and email, but they told me nothing and just said to wait. Then in late December I moved house. In the first half of this year, I received a phone call saying I needed to pay, and only then did I find out I had been convicted. I subsequently paid the fine and applied for a statutory declaration. The statutory declaration hearing is scheduled for February next year. I had absolutely no intention of evading the fare, and I have been actively dealing with this matter throughout. However, the ticket inspector's extremely harsh attitude at the time is what caused things to escalate to this point. As an international student, a criminal record would be a devastating blow to my future immigration status. What should I do?
Can you clarify what 'penalty notice' you were given? Usually you are either given a Penalty Fare (where you are fined £100 on the spot for an innocent mistake plus the cost of the fare, reduced to £50 plus fare if you paid within 21 days), or your details are taken and the rail company writes to you to ask for your side of the story.
I think we need to get you some advice on how best to make use of the Statutory Declaration process.
You don’t want to wait for a hearing in 2027 where you will just be found guilty again of the same offence (because you almost certainly were guilty of it I assume.
Advice here is usually to get the stat Dec witnessed by a solicitor for a modest sum (£10?) then submit it to the court, meanwhile you approach the train company in writing seeking to resolve the matter out of court before the case is heard again and the legal action is withdrawn.
Need to find a thread that explains all this for you to read and act on if it’s possible.
Or other experts might be able to set it out.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
You should also seek advice from your university student union advice service. They may be able to assist with the process or may have an arrangement with a local
Legal firm who could assist you at a reduced fee.
But if they don’t really know how to deal with rail fare legal work you may get more expert advice here.
Any legal firm ought to know how to deal with stat Declarations though I would think.
Can you clarify what 'penalty notice' you were given? Usually you are either given a Penalty Fare (where you are fined £100 on the spot for an innocent mistake plus the cost of the fare, reduced to £50 plus fare if you paid within 21 days), or your details are taken and the rail company writes to you to ask for your side of the story.
This is exactly the situation I want to explain. The ticket inspector that day had a very bad attitude, which was very unusual. They directly issued a prosecution notice with a reference number, rather than a penalty fare. So afterwards I had no idea what to do. I tried to contact the rail company, but they just told me to wait.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
I think we need to get you some advice on how best to make use of the Statutory Declaration process.
You don’t want to wait for a hearing in 2027 where you will just be found guilty again of the same offence (because you almost certainly were guilty of it I assume.
Advice here is usually to get the stat Dec witnessed by a solicitor for a modest sum (£10?) then submit it to the court, meanwhile you approach the train company in writing seeking to resolve the matter out of court before the case is heard again and the legal action is withdrawn.
Need to find a thread that explains all this for you to read and act on if it’s possible.
Or other experts might be able to set it out.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
You should also seek advice from your university student union advice service. They may be able to assist with the process or may have an arrangement with a local
Legal firm who could assist you at a reduced fee.
But if they don’t really know how to deal with rail fare legal work you may get more expert advice here.
Any legal firm ought to know how to deal with stat Declarations though I would think.
The Statutory Declaration is already in process. The hearing in February next year is about the Statutory Declaration. After the Statutory Declaration, my conviction will be set aside, but the rail company will very likely prosecute me again, so I'm here seeking advice
I think university department is good way to ask for advice i will ask next week, thank you
This is exactly the situation I want to explain. The ticket inspector that day had a very bad attitude, which was very unusual. They directly issued a prosecution notice with a reference number, rather than a penalty fare. So afterwards I had no idea what to do. I tried to contact the rail company, but they just told me to wait.
== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==
The Statutory Declaration is already in process. The hearing in February next year is about the Statutory Declaration. After the Statutory Declaration, my conviction will be set aside, but the rail company will very likely prosecute me again, so I'm here seeking advice
I think university department is good way to ask for advice i will ask next week, thank you
It sounds to me like you were issued with a Travel Irregularity Report in September 2024 (not a penalty fare) for travel without a valid railcard.
This is often standard procedure for cases involving tickets discounted with a railcard when no valid railcard was held, so they can investigate if passengers have done this regularly and then work out what they owe which might be a larger sum than a £50 penalty fare.
They do not have to issue Penalty Fares if they think it should be investigated.
It doesn’t make much difference if the inspector’s attitude was unhelpful sadly. I suspect that didn’t help though as perhaps they didn’t explain the reason for what they were doing or what would happen next.
You later on rang / sent e mail to the railway company (Northern) but they told you to wait until you were contacted. They would have meant contacted by letter.
Do you have copies if any e mails you sent them and copies of any replies you received?
They then wrote to you in December 2024 about this but by that date you had moved address so you never got the letter.
You thus never replied to their letter so eventually they sent the matter to court and all the papers from the court went to the old address too.
Presumably you made no arrangements to have post sent to your new address after you moved, didn’t go back to your old address to look for post and you did not tell the railway company of your change of address?
Do you think the above is correct?
Let us know what the university advice service suggest you do or if they can help you directly.
Who was it who advised you to do the Statutory Declaration?
Was it someone at the court where your case was heard, or whoever phoned you trying to collect the money? Do you know who they were that telephoned you?
You could also get help with this from a solicitor (lawyer) who specialises in railway fares type work to help try to resolve this if you are unsure how best to do it yourself but you would have to pay them for that assistance. We can provide a list of firms who do this work if that is something you want to consider.
Sorry to ask you lots of questions but it helps to know what happened and how it might be best for you to now best deal with it.
What date in April 2025 please. Anyway by my calculation they had from September 11th until March 11th to take you to court so they might have been out of time in the first place. Try to establish what date they commenced proceedings if you can.
What date in April 2025 please. Anyway by my calculation they had from September 11th until March 11th to take you to court so they might have been out of time in the first place. Try to establish what date they commenced proceedings if you can.
I am not an expert in court processes but I think it's too late for worrying about that. The OP has been convicted and, whether through the statutory declaration process or something else, will need the courts to reset the process. In any event, it is quite likely that the papers were laid before the court ahead of the 6-month deadline with the hearing taking place not long after.
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.
