Court summons from TFL

[hahanana]

Received the below letter (added in the witness statement)

1) would this likely to be a criminal conviction that ends up to be a criminal record? My research is that this is a byelaw civil conviction?

2) in relation to the other suspected fare evasion, there are other familiar members who have used it. Should i disclose it. Obviously not at the expense that there will be further investigation against

4) i am a pre cancer patient who is going through expensive medical care, which is why I started using the pass. On The day i was caught i just came out of the portland hospital, would that get me any sympathy.

5) what is my best way to approach this between now and the court dat? Shouls i engage legal professionals? Any other advice

 

[notmyrealname]

Hi, welcome to the forum.

I'm sure the pros will have questions for you, but maybe I could start this off. Are you planning to plead guilty and do you agree with the schedule of other 84 offences they mention?

If you're already in financial services or similar, do you have a union rep that you can ask about this?

It's possible that if this will affect your job, you may need to look at getting a solicitor, but let the experts have a look at your case first.

 

[hahanana]

i think it is the best to plead guilty, given that i did get caught using the pass?

I have admitted that i have been using the pass for six months in the witness statement. the pass was used by multiple people in the family. but i wont wanna get others in the family in trouble. in that case, should i just agree? - would like to take some advice on this.

yes, in financial service. need to find out about the union. what would the role they can play in this?

thank you

 

[John R]

As someone who has worked in Financial Services for 40 years, latterly in reasonably senior roles, I’m afraid this is very likely to affect your employment. To be more specific, I have seen instant dismissals for fare evasion convictions.

Personally, I am doubtful a union will be able to help if you are convicted, as FS companies have very strict regulatory requirements in terms of integrity, fit and proper etc. And in your case there wouldn’t seem to be any mitigation that it was a one- off lapse of judgment, let alone a genuine mistake or misunderstanding as to what you were doing.

 

[island]

Someone being guilty of 85 charges of fare evasion would likely be grounds for summary dismissal if your financial services employer found out, yes.

If you are not already in-role, but are thinking of applying in the future, the convictions would be spent after a year and would no longer appear on a basic DBS check. Only the most senior roles (CEO, their direct reports, as well as head of compliance and money laundering reporting officer) allow for a standard DBS check which will still show them.

 

[styles]

Assuming you're not an 'approved person' subject to criminal records checks above Basic DBS/Disclosure Scotland, it'll stop being visible on future criminal records checks after a year.

However you will need to check your contract and employee handbooks as my experience of working in finance is there will be a requirement there to inform your employer if you acquire a criminal record while under their employment. Failure to do so may lead to disciplinary action. If you are proactive about things, HR and compliance teams are more likely to be accepting than if they find out some other way. It's unlikely to be at the level where the local London press would be interested in reporting on it, but you never know. You'd also need to consider whether you're due a periodic DBS check. You could risk not mentioning it, but it is ultimately a breach of contract if your contract says you must inform, so that's your call really.

If you are an approved person and you don't mention it, it will show up on your next Standard level disclosure and I can almost guarantee you'll be dismissed. Frankly if you're an approved person it's going to be viewed very dimly, and I'd be looking to switch industries. Your mileage may vary.

 

[hahanana]

Added more information and questions. Look forward to the advice

 

[John R]

Re point 3, we strongly recommend people don’t lie, which you would be doing. They won’t believe you anyway after such a clear admission.

Re point 4, it might, but this wasn’t a one off, and you have admitted doing it for several months, so I am doubtful that it would make any difference.

Re point 5, I would suggest your only hope is to engage with a solicitor who specialises in fare evasion. That will cost you several hundred pounds though, with no guarantee of success.

 

[AlterEgo]

Received the below letter (added in the witness statement)

1) would this likely to be a criminal conviction that ends up to be a criminal record? My research is that this is a byelaw civil conviction?

It is a criminal matter. You are to be convicted of a criminal offence and will have a criminal record. There is no such thing as a "civil conviction" - you have committed a crime.

2) in relation to the other suspected fare evasion, there are other familiar members who have used it. Should i disclose it. Obviously not at the expense that there will be further investigation against them.

That is a question for you to answer yourself. It may be that TfL's suspicions are already high about this pass given you stated under caution that the owner doesn't even live in this country.

3) i have admitted using the pass for six months. Can i backtrack on that statement? By stating that i simply grabbed the wrong pass on the day.

You are being asked to take the offences into consideration. If you backtrack on that now, you need to have a very good explanation for the court why you lied under caution but aren't now lying under oath. This is a serious matter, and your suggestion in the last sentence that you might just lie to the court is not on. Lying to a court is extremely serious and if they find out, you can go to prison for this. I can't underline enough how serious that is.

4) i am a pre cancer patient who is going through expensive medical care, which is why I started using the pass. On The day i was caught i just came out of the portland hospital, would that get me any sympathy.

Sympathy doesn't come into it much at this stage. The court will sentence you for the offending by way of a fine according to your income. There is a 40% surcharge on the fine, plus you will be ordered to pay the costs of TfL, as well as the fare/s avoided. I would not mention your privilege at being able to be treated at the Portland Hospital; it's very expensive and most people in this country cannot afford that (healthcare in the Uk is free unless one chooses to go private) - and those people don't choose to fraudulently use Freedom Passes to save a few quid here and there.

5) what is my best way to approach this between now and the court dat? Shouls i engage legal professionals? Any other advice

It is now too late to convince TfL to not prosecute you. You should plead guilty to the offence; that you admitted to doing it 85 times is less important, because all that will do is change the fares outstanding by a few hundred pounds.

 

[Wolfie]

I'm sorry to hear about your health situation. However the Portland is a very expensive private hospital. If you can afford to have treatment there then to be honest l'm not sure that TfL will have much sympathy with any attempt at using your health as mitigation. Particularly given the sustained nature of your offences.

TfL will look at the travel history too. Their starting position is likely to be that you are liable for all of the questionable travel made on the ticket.

I imagine that the Freedom Pass has been withdrawn. Whoever it was issued to might well, particularly if it is apparent that they knew about and condoned the misuse, struggle to get a replacement. Indeed the worse case scenario is that they themselves could face prosecution.

 

[dosxuk]

3) i have admitted using the pass for six months. Can i backtrack on that statement? By stating that i simply grabbed the wrong pass on the day.

To underline what other posters have said - do NOT do this.

There is a non-zero chance TfL will be aware of this post and if you changed your story in the way you suggest they could bring it to the attention of the courts. I doubt there are many other people going through their system with the circumstances you have presented in this thread which would make it trivial to confirm your identity. By doing this you'd be putting yourself immediately at risk of conviction for perjury - a significantly more serious offence than fare evasion, with significantly higher, and longer-term, consequences.

 

[Wolfie]

To underline what other posters have said - do NOT do this.

There is a non-zero chance TfL will be aware of this post and if you changed your story in the way you suggest they could bring it to the attention of the courts. I doubt there are many other people going through their system with the circumstances you have presented in this thread which would make it trivial to confirm your identity. By doing this you'd be putting yourself immediately at risk of conviction for perjury - a significantly more serious offence than fare evasion, with significantly higher, and longer-term, consequences.

Absolutely. When in hole don't start digging! A conviction for perjury would likely destroy most careers.

 

[Hadders]

1) would this likely to be a criminal conviction that ends up to be a criminal record? My research is that this is a byelaw civil conviction?

TfL normally prosecute these sort of offences under the TfL Byelaws. Byelaw convictions aren't normally entered into the Police National Computer and ordinarily won't show on a basic or standard DBS checks. That said, a byelaw conviction is a criminal conviction and also a matter of public record and organisations do sometimes have other ways of finding out this sort of information. I always advise being honest if asked whether you have an unspent conviction, trying to cover it up is much worse.

2) in relation to the other suspected fare evasion, there are other familiar members who have used it. Should i disclose it. Obviously not at the expense that there will be further investigation against them.

If you disclose it then you will have to tell TfL who these family members are and they will likely be investigated by TfL as well.

3) i have admitted using the pass for six months. Can i backtrack on that statement? By stating that i simply grabbed the wrong pass on the day.

I would not advise doing this. In any case it won't stop you from being prosecuted for the offence on the day where you were caught.

4) i am a pre cancer patient who is going through expensive medical care, which is why I started using the pass. On The day i was caught i just came out of the portland hospital, would that get me any sympathy.

I am very sorry to hear this and wish you a speedy recovery. If your condition impaired your decision when it came to paying for your fares then by all means mention it but to have a chance of getting TfL to drop the case it would beed to be evidenced by a Medical Practitioner who is an expert in the relevent field.

5) what is my best way to approach this between now and the court dat? Shouls i engage legal professionals? Any other advice

If you intend to plead guilty then there is little that a solicitor will be able to do to assist. Upon conviction you will have to pay:

- A fine based on your income, normally discounted by a third if you plead guilty at the earliest opportunity
- A surcharge of 40% of the value of the fine
- Compensation for the fares avoided
- Contribution towards TfL's costs

Based on what you have told us I can't see how you can realistically plead not guilty. A solicitor specialising in rail fare evasion might be able to present an argument to TfL to persuade them to drop the case although given the scale of fare evasion this is highly unlikely. Solicitors don't come cheap and you will have to pay their fee regardless of whether or not they are able to keep the case out of court.