Why people are so stuborn not using their ticket but rather showing to staff to open gates?

AngryPanda · 22 Sep 2026

Failed Unit said:
It also depends on your situation, we all know the tickets that never open the gates, such as “London Terminals - Anywhere on Great Northern” at kings cross, so there is little point in trying. Likewise at most stations carnets don’t open barriers, so why bother? Travelcards are hit and miss to if they open the barriers. I am sure railcard users also frequently get stopped. I try one, if it fails I don’t again.

London Terminal tickets were closed on purpose because people will have Thameslink, LNER or EMR ticket and travel through KXX. It is like at Paddington H&C you can enter to the underground using London Terminal ticket, but in reality it is not valid to travel. Instead of using Underground to travel between Finsbury Park, Highbury, KX, Old Street or Moorgate, I would just change at Finsbury Park for correct NR train.

For travelcard, using contactless is just easier, and you always pay correct fare for your travel zones, I see people with Zone 1 only or zone 2 tickets, or boundaries of zone 6 and they try to travel through wrong zones.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2026 ==

Snow1964 said:
I think that is another reason, if ticket wouldn't open a gate earlier in journey (even if it was rejected for say a manual check because railcard needs to be shown), there is an assumption by most passengers that same ticket wont open any subsequent barriers encountered during their journey either.

So if journey involves say 4 barriers, (start, 2 cross London, exit station), and first barrier rejects, then passenger is probably not going to waste time trying the other at subsequent barriers, but will go straight to manned barrier instead.

Basically the failure to program barriers to accept valid tickets early in a journey is likely to mean all subsequent barriers (even those on return) are going to be treated as needing manual checking.

So if want to avoid people going straight to manual gates, got to fix the problem of valid tickets being rejected, even if that means expensively programming obscure tickets (or simplifying ticket variations to the gate capacity)

I agree, I truly believe Nation wide smartcard would be the solution, buy your ticket on the app or on the machine and just load to your smartcard and there will be no issues. Smartcards can be loaded with Travelcards too. So would believe people won't buy magnetic tickets anymore, these should exist anymore.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2026 ==

Benjwri said:
Why? The normal conditions of travel also apply. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for a company to impose further rules on their services. What actually differences are there? Many of TfL’s are not usually enforced.

bramling said:
One reason is that some people will have arrangements where they can claim some form of reimbursement from their employer on single or return tickets. This is particularly a thing since Covid where people don’t use season tickets as much. Clearly people aren’t going to want to put a single in the gate if this results in it being swallowed, which ultimately is going to cause more hassle for the staff in having to recover it.

Another potential reason is that repeatedly removing paper season tickets from wallets can cause them to wear prematurely. It can either damage the magnetic strip, or in some cases wipe the printed data off the front of the ticket. This then results in the hassle of having to have the ticket replaced.

Thirdly they may have a ticket that they know isn’t going to work the gates. My local station seems to reject valid tickets pretty much half of the time, and infuriatingly it always seems to be when one is in a hurry. People aren’t going to want to waste time trying the gates if they know the ticket isn’t going to work.

I suspect that many people will take the view that having a member of staff, or in some cases multiple staff, positioned and spending a lot of their time not doing a great deal means it’s not unreasonable to be able to manually show their ticket in either of the above scenarios, hence they might become arsey if the member of staff is awkward which could quite reasonably be seen as unreasonable and unnecessary.

In London all gates are ATG (Automated Ticket Gates), so there is no need for staff to assist customers, they are mainly to give directions or assist Visually or Mobility Impaired customers. If ticket goes through the gate and it does not open, is not the gate is the ticket.

RailUK Forums

Failed Unit · 22 Sep 2026

I suspect in reality the number of people travelling from say Enfield Chase - Kings Cross on a paper ticket is low now. My gut feeling is if you don’t have a railcard why would you. (Which actually is the only reason I buy a paper ticket now).

However I can’t comment if people still prefer to change at Highbury and Islington. Both have same platform interchange. The Victoria line is more frequent, but getting out of Thameslink isn’t worse then King’s Cross LUL

I notice most issues a barriers are because valid tickets are rejected. For good reason in most cases (fraud prevention). I am not sure how much data is on a magnetic stripe. I can see people using it to get from Kings Cross - Victoria if there isn’t much.

Benjwri · 22 Sep 2026

AngryPanda said:
In London all gates are ATG (Automated Ticket Gates), so there is no need for staff to assist customers, they are mainly to give directions or assist Visually or Mobility Impaired customers. If ticket goes through the gate and it does not open, is not the gate is the ticket.

What a wonderful theory. It just isn’t true though. It absolutely is the gate sometimes, the gates aren’t programmed to accept every valid ticket, because they don’t support it. There will be valid tickets which are rejected. Not to mention things like e tickets at some stations.

Failed Unit · 22 Sep 2026

Benjwri said:
What a wonderful theory. It just isn’t true though. It absolutely is the gate sometimes, the gates aren’t programmed to accept every valid ticket, because they don’t support it. There will be valid tickets which are rejected. Not to mention things like e tickets at some stations.

I know this thread is about TfL. However at Welwyn Garden City the gates reject:

Any ticket with a railcard.
carnets
Child tickets.

All deliberate programming, which causes dangerous queues in the rush hour. As you allude in your post I suspect TfL also block a lot of valid tickets. However travel cards (Welwyn garden city - zones1-6) never work either. Not understood if the ticket isn’t programmed at Welwyn garden city or if the gates reject it. Suspect the former but if the queue is short I go directly to the staff. If it is long I try the gate but success rate is low. (If only contactless credit cards were an option with a railcard- although if I recall the paper ticket is cheaper without)

crablab · 22 Sep 2026

AngryPanda said:
If ticket goes through the gate and it does not open, is not the gate is the ticket.

Are you TfL staff, out of interest?
The view that gatelines are totally infallible and the customer is wrong sounds rather familiar.

I suggest reading some historic threads about issues members have experienced with valid tickets rejected at TfL gatelines and their difficulties in getting staff to help:

Break of journey rule confusion - National Rail to TFL

I started a new job today in Holborn and I was commuting from Cambridge. I bought an anytime day ticket from Cambridge to Orpington as this is where I was heading to after work. I took the train to Kings X followed by the Piccadilly line to Holborn but the guy at the gate refused to let me out...

www.railforums.co.uk

Unstaffed barriers not accepting valid tickets

Just on my way home from Chesham. I needed to travel from a Zone 6 National Rail station in SE London to Chesham and back in a day and I hold a Network Railcard, so naturally I bought a Zones 1-6 Travelcard AAA Zones 7-9, as this is cheaper than two Contactless or Oyster single fares. On the...

www.railforums.co.uk

New NRCoT & Starting Late/Stopping Short & Core Elizabeth Line

With the new NRCoT in place, I thought the "loophole" I was using was completely closed, but then I was reading another thread and I wasn't sure. I don't want to give the ticket away, because it has interesting pricing but I will layout the particulars that I think are necessary: The ticket(s)...

www.railforums.co.uk

Maltese Cross cross-London transfer starting/stopping short

I've tried to use a National Rail ticket with a cross-London transfer included indicated by a Maltese Cross to exit half-way during my transfer. In my experience the gates always reject my ticket, and I have to ask a member of gateline TfL staff to let me through, explaining what it says on the...

www.railforums.co.uk

Snow1964 · 22 Sep 2026

Benjwri said:
What a wonderful theory. It just isn’t true though. It absolutely is the gate sometimes, the gates aren’t programmed to accept every valid ticket, because they don’t support it. There will be valid tickets which are rejected. Not to mention things like e tickets at some stations.

Whilst magnetic stripes carry limited information, so cannot be programmed for every combination, does that apply to e-tickets too.

There are around 2500 BR stations, about another 400 if you include Underground, Metrolink and others

So the question is can e-tickets be properly programmed, or is is simply a case of the programming team stop after they have a few dozen common routes to save time (not that it should really be any more difficult with databases and spreadsheets to upload a list of 3000 entries rather than a list of 30 entries). I cannot believe in this day and age, each entry is manually created for a gate, rather than copied from a derived table on someone's laptop.

The exile · 22 Sep 2026

Snow1964 said:
Whilst magnetic stripes carry limited information, so cannot be programmed for every combination, does that apply to e-tickets too.

There are around 2500 BR stations, about another 400 if you include Underground, Metrolink and others

So the question is can e-tickets be properly programmed, or is is simply a case of the programming team stop after they have a few dozen common routes to save time (not that it should really be any more difficult with databases and spreadsheets to upload a list of 3000 entries rather than a list of 30 entries). I cannot believe in this day and age, each entry is manually created for a gate, rather than copied from a derived table on someone's laptop.

With e-tickets isn’t it more of the case that certain “suspicious flows” will be programmed to reject and require human monitoring (Vauxhall - Waterloo-for example)

Chiltern 165 · 22 Sep 2026

Benjwri said:
What a wonderful theory. It just isn’t true though. It absolutely is the gate sometimes, the gates aren’t programmed to accept every valid ticket, because they don’t support it. There will be valid tickets which are rejected. Not to mention things like e tickets at some stations.

Almost every time I purchase a paper day travelcard it stops scanning after 1/2 passes.

Maybe I am mistaken, but I also found that NR 1-9 would not work at LU stations, and LU 1-9 would not work at NR stations.

Silent · 29 Sep 2026

AngryPanda said:
Hi,

On daily basis we see on many stations staff asking people to put the ticket through the ticket machine and people always argue and treat staff rude.
Most of the ticket used are for one journey, or even if it is a travel card or a gold card, staff have right to ask to use ticket on the gate before allowing you to travel.

TFL's Conditions of Carriage states;

5.1.6 Duty to insert printed ticket into ticket gates. You must insert your printed ticket into the ticket gate, where available, at the start and end of a Tube, DLR, London Overground, or National Rail journey.

5.1.7 Duty to show printed tickets. At stations where there are no ticket gates, or where the ticket gates are open or not in use, and on buses and trams, you must be prepared to show your printed ticket (and photocard, if needed) to a member of staff before starting or ending your journey. You must let a member of staff or a Police Officer examine it at any time during your journey if they ask you to do so. If you fail to do so, you may be liable to pay a penalty fare or you may be prosecuted.

What is wrong with most NR travellers that do not respect TFL's Conditions of Carriage and treat staff disrespectfully? If you would be asked to put your gold card through the gate how you would react?

Maybe they aren’t use to putting the ticket in the machine since tap in and out has been the standard for probably 20 years now.

Russel · 29 Sep 2026

Mawkie said:
Don't they? Is that a recent change? I certainly remember emptying the gateline bins on LU. And fishing single tickets out that people needed for work receipts.

Of course they do!

My fault, the only paper tickets I've used on the tube in the last 10+ years have been Travelcards that get spat out by the barrier every time, I'd forgotten single paper tickets were even still available!

reddragon · Friday at 14:46

Because paper tickets often don't work or stop working after a few goes; many TfL barriers don't accept paper tickets, compatibility issues, exiting a station to enter another too quickly. I had a gate barrier strip my magnetic strip off!

I do have a GWR contactless card, OK if you are on your own but buying all the tickets as a family group is a right faff as each card needs to be topped up in a separate purchase and it can take ages. Ticket office staff can get really arsey when you ask them to do it.

Contactless only covers one route for me to London, so not an option and how does that work with kids?

philjo · Saturday at 21:45

At Canary Wharf Elizabeth Line station they encourage passengers with paper tickets to exit through the manual gate during the morning peak as there is usually a large queue waiting to touch out through the barriers. I generally get though much quicker just showing my paper ticket.

The exile · Saturday at 22:39

reddragon said:
I had a gate barrier strip my magnetic strip off!

One of the gates at Bath Spa does this with depressing regularity.

njamescouk · Sunday at 00:18

old style: go to ticket office, buy ticket.
go to barrier, present ticket, get told time and platform of next service.
get on train.

new style: any one of 100 things could go wrong.

frediculous · Sunday at 13:35

The exile said:
One of the gates at Bath Spa does this with depressing regularity.

At Denmark Hill, only the wide gates don't wipe my ticket. I've experimented with new tickets and different barriers and found this to be the case. I ended up getting told by the ticket office to get a Key ticket instead, but I don't know how that works on London buses, whereas my paper travelcard can be read by the bus driver's mk1 eyeballs (if they care)

Why people are so stuborn not using their ticket but rather showing to staff to open gates?

AngryPanda

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Failed Unit

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Break of journey rule confusion - National Rail to TFL

Unstaffed barriers not accepting valid tickets

New NRCoT & Starting Late/Stopping Short & Core Elizabeth Line

Maltese Cross cross-London transfer starting/stopping short

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