Appealing a Penalty Fare

[jollyrancher10]

Hi all,

Recently I was issued with a penalty fare between two small stations (Hampton-in-Arden & Berkswell), which are along the Birmingham New Street to London Euston train with London Northwestern Railways.

I was travelling from Hampton-in-Arden to Berkswell, which is a journey I don't complete often. I was planning to buy my ticket for the train on the platform, but there was no phone signal at the station so I couldn't. I thought I'd just buy it once I'd made it to Berkswell as I knew I'd have signal there. However, when I was on the train (on the 3 minute train journey to Berkswell) I was asked for my ticket by the worker and didn't have one so she issued me with a Penalty Fare. I've never had a problem with purchasing a ticket at the train station before but since Hampton-in-Arden is a small village there isn't a lot of phone signal, but I obviously didn't anticipate this before travelling.

As soon as I reached Berkswell, I bought a ticket at that station.

I genuinely don't believe I am at fault here as I had no idea there was no signal at the train station for me to be able to buy a ticket. I would have used the ticket machine if I had more time before the train's arrival but I didn't want to miss it. Once again, the train journey was 3 minutes long so I didn't think there was any issue in just buying a ticket after getting off the train. If this was a longer journey I would have found a staff member and bought a ticket from them as I know that's something you can do.

Is there any point in trying to appeal this, and if so how would I prove that there is no phone signal at the station?

Any help is appreciated, thank you

 

[saismee]

Unfortunately, if there is a ticket machine or ticket office available, you have to use it. You won't be able to appeal on the grounds of not having enough time, as it's realistically not the train operator's problem. Post a picture of the penalty fare here with identifying details redacted and someone may be able to find a mistake on it, which could then be grounds for appeal.

The only time you can pay after boarding is on pay train services (they must be specifically marked, and you have to buy from a guard), if you have a disability that prevents you from using a ticket vending machine, or if the machine doesn't sell the ticket you need.

 

[Pushpit]

I am afraid you don't have much basis to appeal. Maybe you should do so, to slightly reduce the insignificant-to-zero risk of being prosecuted for fare evasion, since strictly speaking that is how this looks in terms of the railways' byelaws. For sure the appeal will not be successful. The ticket inspector could have referred you off to court for this. I appreciate it seems over-kill for a short journey but we see so many reports of people finding their lives turned upside down by the threat of prosecution, such that you really should take a minute or two to get your ticket in advance, or get something like a season ticket. Otherwise what distinguishes you from fare evaders who only pay when challenged?

The other possibility is that the penalty fare was mistakenly issued - ticketing is so complex that this does happen. So a technical appeal, but you would need to share the full penalty ticket for that to be checked here, redacting personal details. But fundamentally a penalty fare is the correct fare for your position - it's not a fine, it's just the legitimate rail fare, at an unattractive cost, that applies if you have not conformed to the requirement to buy the correct ticket.

Before the advent of digital ticketing, the same rules were in place (approximately), but it was still a requirement to get a ticket from a machine before travel if a machine was available for your ticket. It doesn't take more than about 30 seconds to get a ticket out of them.

 

[WesternLancer]

Hi all,

Recently I was issued with a penalty fare between two small stations (Hampton-in-Arden & Berkswell), which are along the Birmingham New Street to London Euston train with London Northwestern Railways.

I was travelling from Hampton-in-Arden to Berkswell, which is a journey I don't complete often. I was planning to buy my ticket for the train on the platform, but there was no phone signal at the station so I couldn't. I thought I'd just buy it once I'd made it to Berkswell as I knew I'd have signal there. However, when I was on the train (on the 3 minute train journey to Berkswell) I was asked for my ticket by the worker and didn't have one so she issued me with a Penalty Fare. I've never had a problem with purchasing a ticket at the train station before but since Hampton-in-Arden is a small village there isn't a lot of phone signal, but I obviously didn't anticipate this before travelling.

As soon as I reached Berkswell, I bought a ticket at that station.

I genuinely don't believe I am at fault here as I had no idea there was no signal at the train station for me to be able to buy a ticket. I would have used the ticket machine if I had more time before the train's arrival but I didn't want to miss it. Once again, the train journey was 3 minutes long so I didn't think there was any issue in just buying a ticket after getting off the train. If this was a longer journey I would have found a staff member and bought a ticket from them as I know that's something you can do.

Is there any point in trying to appeal this, and if so how would I prove that there is no phone signal at the station?

Any help is appreciated, thank you

You are not obliged to buy your ticket on line but you are obliged to have a valid ticket before you step on the train.

If you found no signal you should have used the ticket machine or ticket office as far as the regulations are concerned unless ticket office was closed and machines out of order which you would need some evidence of eg a photo of it not working when you tried to use it.

There is nothing to lose by appealing but I would not expect that to succeed.

Don’t miss the prompt payment deadline that reduces the Penalty by half to £50, or the Appeal deadline. An appeal pauses the clock on the prompt payment discount.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Jun 2025 ==

Buying a ticket from a member of staff on board is NOT something you should ever rely on being able to do by the way. That could just result in one of these penalties too!

Buying a ticket when you got to your destination will make no difference to this either. Sadly it will just have been money wasted rather than being seen as an attempt to do the right thing I’m afraid.

The rule is you MUST buy before you board. Anything else is pretty much at their discretion or good luck unless there are no working ticket buying facilities at your departure station. As I say you are not obliged to use your own phone to buy a ticket however.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Jun 2025 ==

Your thoughts on this are not unreasonable but the railway doesn’t care about that. Sadly they are often the sorts of reasons / excuses given by deliberate fare evaders and it’s not easy for the railway staff to make the destination when faced with people who don’t have a ticket.

 

[island]

If you had enough time to buy a ticket on your phone you had enough time to use a ticket machine. Regardless, not leaving enough time to buy a ticket is not an excuse and it sounds to me that the Penalty Fare has been properly issued, any technicalities aside.

 

[Hadders]

Welcome to the forum!

Legally speaking you are required to possess a valid ticket for your journey before you board the train. Unfortunately, you did not do this which technically is a criminal offence. West Midlands Trains are entitled to send the case to the Magistrates Court if they wanted to but instead have decided to issue you with a Penalty Fare. A Penalty Fare is not an accusation of fare evasion, it is a higher than normal fare issued to people who have made an 'honest' mistake or breeched a ticket requirement.

My advice is to pay the Penalty Fare which will bring this matter to a close. Do be sure to pay within the 21-day deadline to benefit fromm the reduced rate. There is nothing to stop you from appealing although ordinarily I would not expect an appeal to succeed. While the appeal is decided the clock is stopped on the 21-days to pay at the reduced rate.

There might be some very technical reasons why the Penalty Fare is invalid. I'll let other forum members advise on thisbut any appeal on this basis is only likely to succeed at stage 3 and needs to be written in a very precise. legalistic way to have any chance of success.

One further point to be aware of. We have seen WMT search the online ticketing accounts of people who have come to their attention, looking for discrepancies on other occasions. For example, purchsasing tickets aftrer the train has departed, applying railcard discounts they aren't entitled to, excessive refunds or delay repay claims etc. If this suggests issues with the tickets you've purchased they might contact you about this threatening police, fraud, prosecution etc. Should you receive any further contact from WMT DO NOT reply to it. Do not even ackowledge it but instead post a redacted copy of what's been sent in this thread and we will assist in the best way to respond.