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Today I got caught using a child ticket on a journey I make frequently for work on a Crosscountry train. I know it was stupid of me but the adult fares were way too expensive and the child fare was less than half the price.
The woman who spoke to me went through my phone, took my details (name, address etc) and also took pictures of my entire booking history on Trainline (to clarify, only the last couple journeys have been using a child ticket not my entire 5 years history). She gave me a caution and emphasised that I wasn't being arrested and this wouldnt go on my criminal record or anything, but she seemed sympathetic and didn't mention anything about a fine or a letter in the post or anything.
I guess what I'm concerned about is that they are gonna investigate me for fraud or something and I'll get prosecuted/given a criminal record but wouldn't she have told me that I would be further contacted or something? I'm happy to pay the fines and stuff but there was no mention of further action at all so I don't know so I'm a bit worried because I don't know what to expect going forward. Any advice/information would be appreciated
Today I got caught using a child ticket on a journey I make frequently for work on a Crosscountry train. I know it was stupid of me but the adult fares were way too expensive and the child fare was less than half the price.
The woman who spoke to me went through my phone, took my details (name, address etc) and also took pictures of my entire booking history on Trainline (to clarify, only the last couple journeys have been using a child ticket not my entire 5 years history). She gave me a caution and emphasised that I wasn't being arrested and this wouldnt go on my criminal record or anything, but she seemed sympathetic and didn't mention anything about a fine or a letter in the post or anything.
I guess what I'm concerned about is that they are gonna investigate me for fraud or something and I'll get prosecuted/given a criminal record but wouldn't she have told me that I would be further contacted or something? I'm happy to pay the fines and stuff but there was no mention of further action at all so I don't know so I'm a bit worried because I don't know what to expect going forward. Any advice/information would be appreciated
Whatever you were told in the train (staff often say things to prevent face to face situations escalating and say eg 'you don't need to worry about this' / 'you will just be asked to pay the correct fare' etc etc) you need to take this extremely seriously. This is deliberate fare evasion which is a criminal offence for which you can be prosecuted. It seems unlikely to me that you will not receive further contact in due course.
Not helped by that fact that Cross Country often use a contractor for the follow up work on these things called ITAL who are difficult to deal with over things like this.
You might get a flavour from this thread as an example. Which I don’t think even involved deliberate evasion.
Hi everyone I’m really hoping someone here can offer some guidance or share their experience, as I’m feeling overwhelmed and unsure what to do next. I’ve received a letter from CrossCountry’s Prosecutions Unit accusing me of fare evasion. I had travelled from Manchester to Birmingham (and a...
www.railforums.co.uk
Hopefully people here can give you advice on how to try to seek the least worst outcome.
I would predict This isn’t going to be one of those £100 charges you see on Penalty Fare posters at stations.
As a general idea you can expect to be threatened with prosecution for fares evasion and you will need to seek to persuade the railway company to offer you an out of court settlement in order to avoid prosecution in court. You can see plenty of examples of this on the forum here if you have a look.
If it went to court It’s very unlikely to be a fraud prosecution, but it would be a fare evasion prosecution. That would not result in prison but court fines , costs and a criminal record would be the outcome.
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Today I got caught using a child ticket on a journey I make frequently for work on a Crosscountry train. I know it was stupid of me but the adult fares were way too expensive and the child fare was less than half the price.
The woman who spoke to me went through my phone, took my details (name, address etc) and also took pictures of my entire booking history on Trainline (to clarify, only the last couple journeys have been using a child ticket not my entire 5 years history). She gave me a caution and emphasised that I wasn't being arrested and this wouldnt go on my criminal record or anything, but she seemed sympathetic and didn't mention anything about a fine or a letter in the post or anything.
I guess what I'm concerned about is that they are gonna investigate me for fraud or something and I'll get prosecuted/given a criminal record but wouldn't she have told me that I would be further contacted or something? I'm happy to pay the fines and stuff but there was no mention of further action at all so I don't know so I'm a bit worried because I don't know what to expect going forward. Any advice/information would be appreciated
The most important thing now is that you receive and act on anything they send you - and it could be some weeks before they write so you need to
- watch out for post / e-mail and spam. Post at the address they took from you over the coming weeks and months (they have up to 6 months to bring prosecutions so that is a time frame they often work to), e-mail on any account linked to your ticket purchasing etc
- carefully check your ticket purchasing records and keep copies of them. Are you 100% sure that when they investigate your Trainline account (which they will do and are permitted to do) will they only find a couple of cases of child tickets bought after you turned age of 16?
- when you receive anything from the Railway about this (most likely from Cross Country or their contractors) - head back here for advice on how best to reply.
- make sure from now on you have the correct ticket 100% of the time. You are on their radar.
- if you can do something to legitimately reduce the fares you pay (eg buy a Railcard if you are entitled to one), or a season ticket / flexi season ticket for your work travel if it makes sense to do so, then do that - it's something practical you can then show them you have done to 'change your ways' - which is what you need to convince them you have done as part of avoiding being taken to court.
I think this issue has been raised before in threads where passengers have mentioned their phone has been looked at by staff, and I think even rail staff who use the forum pitched in with what the policy of their employer is on this point, including if the phone got dropped and broken when in the hands of a member of staff.
Obviously we don't know the exact circs as not present - for example perhaps the staff member asked if they could look at the passenger's phone and the passenger let them look at it (so gave permission), or did not actively refuse them looking at it.
At the end of the day the booking scan details of the one ticket is enough for the train operator to investigate previous purchases in the back office to see if other instances of child tickets purchased by the OP. And if those tickets were for another person who might be a child to use is not possible for either the back office or the on board staff to know. Tho I would suggest that making up a lie about that is not wise since if the matter did end up in court you either have to lie in court (not a wise idea at all) or admit you previously lied, which is not a good look....
"Let me see that" and handing over the phone for them to go through would be sufficient permission, as would "scroll through your past journeys for me so I can see them" and then complying. Unless you are suggesting the RPI snatched the phone and did it without any consent at all?
I am sorry if it came across in that fashion, mea culpa.
Moreover I am suggesting that wilfully showing all of this is only going to get you in more of a pickle in the given situation. Likewise in handing over the device.
That being said, I was watching that channel 5 programme the other day where they seemed to want to see a name, without ID they were taking the apple ID on the phone as a suggestion of a name?
OP
Maybe a good idea as well as paying fares as per suggestion, that you perhaps start to put a little bit aside after you have totted up the prior fares on your account, such that you are ready in case of anything that could be needing to be paid.
I am sorry if it came across in that fashion, mea culpa.
Moreover I am suggesting that wilfully showing all of this is only going to get you in more of a pickle in the given situation. Likewise in handing over the device.
That being said, I was watching that channel 5 programme the other day where they seemed to want to see a name, without ID they were taking the apple ID on the phone as a suggestion of a name?
I think a lot of people's evasion strategies are 'acceptable' to them because they can get a ticket without a human intervention (eg buy on line / ticket machine etc) - they would basically not do some things if they had to go to a ticket window and tell a bare faced lie to another human (tho no doubt back in the day plenty of people did do that - tho probably not someone in their 20s buying child tickets at the ticket widow maybe)
So when faced with an inspector who questions them in person they may well not want to double down on the lie and think things might be better of they co-operate and maybe they will then get a warning, or be sold a new ticket or have to pay at worst a £50 penalty fare. Showing staff their phone or handing it over might be all about appearing to be co-operative and helpful in the hope of a less severe punishment for such people.
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