Can losing your ticket lead to a criminal record?

[radamfi]

There have been conflicting threads on this over the years and no satisfactory ruling, as far as I can recall.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There have been conflicting threads on this over the years and no satisfactory ruling, as far as I can recall.

It could certainly lead to a Byelaw prosecution, as that is absolute.

Most likely that would only occur if you failed the attitude test, though, e.g. tried to get away with it rather than reporting it to staff to purchase a replacement (for the whole journey, not short-fared) as soon as you discovered it to be missing.

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

There have been conflicting threads on this over the years and no satisfactory ruling, as far as I can recall.

It depends on the stage at which you lose your ticket, and your reaction when or if the issue is discovered. If you board without a valid ticket because you've lost it before ever getting on the train then you commit an offence under both Byelaws 18(1) and 18(2) for boarding without a ticket and being unable to hand over a ticket. If you lose it whilst onboard then you would only commit the Byelaw 18(2) offence. This is, of course, assuming that there were ticketing facilities before boarding. There could be further offences depending on what you do or don't do when asked.

If convicted of either Byelaw offence you would have to declare it when asked whether you had a conviction for 12 months, but to answer your question literally speaking, in most cases it appears that you would not have a record held on your criminal record and so you could probably get away with not declaring it in most circumstances. Of course, if non-declaration were later discovered, the consequences could be a lot more serious than the Byelaw offence ever was.

 

[cuccir]

If convicted of either Byelaw offence you would have to declare it when asked whether you had a conviction for 12 months, but to answer your question literally speaking, in most cases it appears that you would not have a record held on your criminal record and so you could probably get away with not declaring it in most circumstances. Of course, if non-declaration were later discovered, the consequences could be a lot more serious than the Byelaw offence ever was.

This is a very concise summary of the role of a Byelaw conviction on criminal records - I might nick it for future use!

 

[kristiang85]

What about if you had a ticket for boarding, had a ticket when inspected on the train, but accidentally put the ticket in the rubbish bin with your sandwich wrapper when leaving the train, and then got caught by a random inspection by the exit gates? Is that covered by a byelaw?

I'm only suggesting this as I did exactly this once a couple of years back, but luckily no inspection at the arrival station, but I did wonder what would have happened.

 

[najaB]

There have been conflicting threads on this over the years and no satisfactory ruling, as far as I can recall.

Like many things related to ticketing law, the answer is: it depends.

As already posted by others, a Byelaw 18 conviction would be a slam dunk since if you didn't have the ticket when you boarded (18.1) or weren't able to hand over a valid ticket on request (18.2). But this wouldn't result in a criminal record.

Where you could find yourself in trouble is if you were intending to take advantage of a "loophole" ticket, or were split ticketing and were asked for the lost ticket for the second leg of the journey after you had already passed the split point. Especially if the train didn't call at the splitting point (e.g. season ticket split).

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

What about if you had a ticket for boarding, had a ticket when inspected on the train, but accidentally put the ticket in the rubbish bin with your sandwich wrapper when leaving the train, and then got caught by a random inspection by the exit gates? Is that covered by a byelaw?

I'm only suggesting this as I did exactly this once a couple of years back, but luckily no inspection at the arrival station, but I did wonder what would have happened.

For the purposes of Byelaw 18(2) the reason for your non-production of a ticket etc. is irrelevant unless it is one of the exceptions enumerated in Byelaw 18(3). You must be ready to produce your ticket at any point up until having exited the paid part of the station concourse, if there are barriers, or if there are no barriers then to be safe I would say to keep the ticket until you've left railway property.