Fined 1,5K.

[30907]

Thanks for the update.

 

[WesternLancer]

Hi, so baiscally they said no to everything the reduction , and payment plan and then I just paid in full let me show you what was said for the payment plan-
Unfortunately, no UK Rail Operator will allow the use of any type of railcard discount for a settlement such as the one GTR have proposed to you. It is stated in the Railcard Terms and Conditions, '2.8. You must carry your valid Railcard with you on your journey. When asked by rail staff, you must show a valid ticket and valid Railcard within its period of validity when you travel'. 'If you fail to comply with condition 2.8, a Train Company reserves the right to charge you the full price for the single fare applicable to your journey.'

Please find your Railcard Terms and Conditions here: https://www.16-25railcard.co.uk/help/railcard-terms-conditions/.

The settlement sum of £1,595.95 is final and no discount is considered when generating a settlement. Adding a railcard discount to the fares included in your settlement is simply not possible, and entirely out of my control.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 6 Jan 2026 ==


sorry , no this is for the railway card.

Thanks for the update - this does not surprise me really - but at least you asked and were no worse off for asking as a result.

You should keep your proof of payment of the settlement and all the paperwork / e-mails associated with this - and you should keep all that long term (i.e. for some years, probably 6 years) in case you ever need to refer to it.

Going forward it's important you recognise the need to have the correct ticket in all your rail travels because you are now on their radar - if you come to their attention again - potentially even for a genuine mistake - the chances of court prosecution are higher in future because they now have your details on record.

But good luck for the future with your studies and career.

 

[z444z]

this does not surprise me really

Me neither. Worth a shot though. Thanks for the input everyone

 

[furlong]

Depends how far you want to push this, but how is 2.8 relevant to most of the journeys in the spreadsheet? You presumably did comply with 2.8 except for the one time you were spoken to in that you presumably did carry your railcard. The second part you quote doesn't kick in because no rail staff challenged you on the other journeys. Indeed if they had, the whole thing might have stopped a lot sooner and they would never have needed to be seeking this sort of retrospective settlement! (Their argument really relies on 2.7, namely that you can only obtain the railcard discount on tickets bought prior to travel.)

But the bottom line is that courts will normally take the basis for compensation as how much you would have paid had you acted correctly, all else being equal, and you can argue that that would have been applying the correct 16-25 discount instead of the incorrect 16-17 one. The courts aren't there to facilitate a company to make extra profit out of crimes committed against them (or to enforce dubious consumer "penalty" clauses) but merely to put the company back into the financial position it would have been in had there been no crimes committed. All that said, I don't think we know of any cases where this specific railcard issue has been tested in court and it could go either way. (It's worth noting they are using some off-peak and season fares which is in line with an approach we have seen the courts take.)

 

[island]

Depends how far you want to push this, but how is 2.8 relevant to most of the journeys in the spreadsheet? You presumably did comply with 2.8 except for the one time you were spoken to in that you presumably did carry your railcard. The second part you quote doesn't kick in because no rail staff challenged you on the other journeys. Indeed if they had, the whole thing might have stopped a lot sooner and they would never have needed to be seeking this sort of retrospective settlement! (Their argument really relies on 2.7, namely that you can only obtain the railcard discount on tickets bought prior to travel.)

But the bottom line is that courts will normally take the basis for compensation as how much you would have paid had you acted correctly, all else being equal, and you can argue that that would have been applying the correct 16-25 discount instead of the incorrect 16-17 one. The courts aren't there to facilitate a company to make extra profit out of crimes committed against them (or to enforce dubious consumer "penalty" clauses) but merely to put the company back into the financial position it would have been in had there been no crimes committed. All that said, I don't think we know of any cases where this specific railcard issue has been tested in court and it could go either way. (It's worth noting they are using some off-peak and season fares which is in line with an approach we have seen the courts take.)

As mentioned in post 118 the sum has been paid now so the matter is closed. It's not going to court. So all of the above is academic.

 

[Fawkes Cat]

What we may be able to draw from this is that while the railway (specifically GTR) are prepared to review the amount they want if someone can show that they didn't make all of the listed journeys, the railway isn't prepared to enter into complex negotiations to reduce the amount. I'm not sure if we can take from this that there is no mileage in trying to negotiate the amount down at all - or if it's that there is only limited room for negotiation.

But from our point of view, a useful learning experience. So thanks to the OP for bringing the matter to our attention.