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We’ve explained that an eTicket does not need to be scanned.
We’ve explained that some railway staff erroneously say otherwise.
The worst case is that the original poster will be issued some kind of “penalty” which will be overturned on appeal.
I’m not sure what else we can say. The original poster seems convinced of a delusion in some way and seems not to be interested in the facts.
I lost my phone in Derby a few years ago. But I didn't lose my wallet with my convenient orange tickets!
I am completely understanding though of your position, I am a worrier and if I had any doubt over my ticket's validity I would be anxious throughout my entire journey, particularly if rerouting or off my itinerary due to disruption.
The deeper issue here is a bloodthirsty railway and poorly trained employees who make up their own rules. RPIs have a horrible job dealing with chancers who are out to deceive them, but anecdotes of such a lack of knowledge, integrity, humanity and common sense do dent the confidence of the most honest passengers, and I sympathise. I too would avoid reading the anecdotes... because 99% of my interactions with railway staff are positive.
Given the relative value in the day and age of smartphones, I'd have rather lost the wallet and train tickets than the phone and most people will be paying more attention to their phones to not lose them than loose paper tickets - many people don't even carry a wallet these days
I carry a spare smartphone with a very cheap monthly tariff (about £1.50 a month, rotating introductory offers) so even if I lose my phone I've got a spare. Worst case scenario you could ask a friendly staff member or member of the public to allow you to log in to your emails when a RPI wants to see an e-ticket. That option isn't possible using paper tickets, so until I read the thread on the Disputes forum I thought e-tickets were safer.
E-tickets are safer as you can have multiple copies if you wish. In any case paper tickets will soon all be barcoded and thus exactly the same in operation.
If you can see a previous scan on a ticket when you use an online device to check it, that's fairly convincing evidence that someone presented that code at that specified point in time.
If you scan it and no history shows, even though the device is online, that's convincing evidence of doodly squat. This happens all the time, every day, even when tickets have actually been scanned. It is meaningless.
I wouldn't worry about any of this. I think it's being misunderstood.
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E-tickets are safer as you can have multiple copies if you wish. In any case paper tickets will soon all be barcoded and thus exactly the same in operation.
I have assisted someone I didn't know who was sat near me on the train, who broke their phone, by displaying their ticket on mine for them during the ticket check. It is definitely better. If they'd lost their tickets before they'd have paid for new ones.
The OP is worrying completely unnecessarily. I can appreciate they don't like the idea of being confronted by an RPI but it really shouldn't put you off train travel so long as you have a valid ticket.
Some RPIs will make things up such as insisting you have to scan e-tickets at the start of every journey for it to be valid which is simply not true or accuse you of short faring/doughnuting which they will have no evidence of.
Yes, paper tickets could be lost during a journey but if you keep it in a wallet, card holder or similar and then keep this in a bag or zip/button up pocket it is vanishingly unlikely to happen.
You are never going to be able to 100% guarantee that you'll never encounter an issue with an RPI. If you are unwilling to travel by train if there is even the minutest chance of an issue with an RPI then train travel is not for you.
Heck, if you decide never to use public transport and drive everywhere there is still the risk of a run in with the police instead of an RPI. It is simply impossible to remove all risk in life.
I've read that now. Bearing in mind just how many e-tickets are issued these days, and how that case involves one route and one operator, I do suspect that is a very local issue.
How do you think the hundred of thousands of people with e-tickets every year manage?
I've read that now. Bearing in mind just how many e-tickets are issued these days, and how that case involves one route and one operator, I do suspect that is a very local issue.
Let me spell this out for you. That incident was more to do with a single station journey being made which raised suspiscions of travelling further without a valid ticket. The fact that the ticket supposedly hadn't been scanned added to the theory that travel had been from further away. Unless you're going to be making a similarly short journey which is often used by doughnutters then you aren't going to encounter that problem.
Main takeaway: The lack of a scan was used to reinforce the suggestion of doughnutting, it was not the primary issue.
You are never going to be able to 100% guarantee that you'll never encounter an issue with an RPI. If you are unwilling to travel by train if there is even the minutest chance of an issue with an RPI then train travel is not for you.
A lot of rogue behaviour from RPIs has been posted on here over the last few years, and that's only the stuff we hear about. Surely there must be an honest RPI on here who can blow the whistle to help weed them out.
By the same logic, there may be thousands of problems a day with paper tickets that we never hear about.
As many of us have already said, stop panicking. Life isn't entirely risk free and you (and we) would do better relaxing and enjoying what's left of the bank holiday.
A lot of rogue behaviour from RPIs has been posted on here over the last few years, and that's only the stuff we hear about. Surely there must be an honest RPI on here who can blow the whistle to help weed them out.
Heck, if you decide never to public transport and drive everywhere there is still the risk of a run in with the police instead of an RPI. It is simply impossible to remove all risk in life.
Or get caught speeding on an unfamiliar road when you didn't see the speed limit signs. I'm a careful adherent to legal speed limits but even so, a small distraction can leave me wondering if I've missed a sign in an area that could be described as "built up".
I agree there is no requirement to scan barcode tickets, however, GTR in particular does not agree.
I have correspondence with them where I've pointed out there is no requirement to scan or tap a ticket at all unless the T&Cs of said ticket say there is (e.g. flexi seasons), and they have replied to me doubling down on their theory that there is. Specifically, they have said that if a flexible ticket is scanned or tapped after the scheduled departure time of a train, then the ticket is not valid for that train, even if the scan takes place before boarding (i.e. the train is late).
They have also threatened to prosecute somebody for nothing more than allegedly failing to scan a barcode ticket at their origin station. The insinuation seems to be that they believe the person boarded at a station further up the line, but they haven't said that, if you read their letter they have simply claimed the ticket presented wasn't valid. I suspect the reason they think that is because they believe tickets must be scanned in order to be valid.
This is a misconception held by people senior enough at GTR to be writing the scripts used by front line staff in communications with passengers. It is a misconception that needs correcting.
To answer the OP's question, if a scan fails to register such that it won't show up when an RPI scans your ticket during or at the end of your journey, then presumably, even if there were a system whereby the system was supposed to send you a receipt/scan history, that feature wouldn't work either, because the issue would be that the validator post or ticket barrier wasn't uploading scans to the server, for whatever reason. So I don't think your proposed solution would help.
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It was literally the only 'evidence' they had! And they claimed the ticket presented was not valid, without stating why or in what respect. I take seriously the possibility they believe (wrongly) that it was not valid simply because it wasn't scanned. It would also be invalid if the person had boarded further up the line, of course, but GTR hasn't alleged that as far as I can see?
Or get caught speeding on an unfamiliar road when you didn't see the speed limit signs. I'm a careful adherent to legal speed limits but even so, a small distraction can leave me wondering if I've missed a sign in an area that could be described as "built up".
For speeding, you don't generally get a criminal record that has to be reported on a job or a visa application. You might not even get points if you are allowed to do a speed awareness course.
To answer the OP's question, if a scan fails to register such that it won't show up when an RPI scans your ticket during or at the end of your journey, then presumably, even if there were a system whereby the system was supposed to send you a receipt/scan history, that feature wouldn't work either, because the issue would be that the validator post or ticket barrier wasn't uploading scans to the server, for whatever reason. So I don't think your proposed solution would help.
But if you check it after you pass through the barrier then you can query it with the station staff. You then have a conversation that can be used in evidence later.
You don't need to evidence your innocence at all. It is up to them to prove that you committed the crime, and you won't be convicted based on "well we don't believe you!!"
You don't need to evidence your innocence at all. It is up to them to prove that you committed the crime, and you won't be convicted based on "well we don't believe you!!"
My view is that scan data could be considered personal data in the sense that the records are against a UTN which can be tied back to a customer by the entity that sold the ticket (the fact it works like this is in the public domain, it is well known on the forum that e.g. passengers suspected of fare evasion can have their details requested following a ticket having been scanned).
And so, subsequently, if you wanted a record of the scan events associated with a ticket or all tickets in a booking, I would expect a competent retailer to be helpful upon receiving such a request. It just might not be nicely presented in a pretty-looking receipt PDF.
For speeding, you don't generally get a criminal record that has to be reported on a job or a visa application. You might not even get points if you are allowed to do a speed awareness course.
A byelaw conviction will have minimal consequences for the majority of people. And all operators other than TfL will settle out of court in most or all circumstances.
I have recently seen settlements for values as low as £13, and lots of GTR ones tend to be around £60-£70. This is cheaper than a speed awareness course which tend to be around £100.
Maybe i should have said theres no need to scan your ticket unless the station had gates. BTW both the TIS we use onboard and in Travel Centres can show the scan history of any ticket.
There's no need to scan a ticket if a station has gates. It's precisely misinformation like this from people who work on the railway that results in passengers lacking confidence in the system.
For the avoidance of doubt there is absolutely no requirement to scan an e-ticket prior to boarding a train.
Similarly, there is no requirement to validate a paper ticket before commencing a journey.
If there are barriers at the station where you start or finish your journey, or where you interchange between trains then you will need to scan (if you’re using an e-ticket) or insert it (if using a credit card sized ticket) to be able to pass through. If the barriers are open then you don’t need to scan or insert your ticket. During a ticket check an e-ticket might be scanned or a credit card sized ticket might be stamped to show where and when it was checked.
There is no need to overthink this. Billions of journeys are taken across the network every year entirely without incident. The dispute and prosecutions section is a very tiny snapshot of an overall small number of journeys where ticketing irregularities are reported and is not at all representative of what actually happens day in, day out across the network.
The thread about the Luton to Luton Airport Parkway journey is interesting. As in any case, we only have one side of the story and based on what the OP of that thread has told us there is no case to answer and that should be confirmed in due course.
We should also bear in mind that tickets between Luton and Luton Airport Parkway stations are often used by people short faring, there are threads in D&P that confirm this. Both Luton stations have ticket barriers in operation for most of the day so someone arriving with a ticket that hasn’t been scanned will arouse suspicion about how they entered the station - this doesn’t mean they are guilty - the barriers might’ve been open, they might’ve been through the manual barrier, the ticket might’ve been scanned but the details of that scan not recorded correctly.
All you need to do is make sure you possess a valid ticket before you board the train. As long as you do this then you do not need to spend any time worrying.
There's no need to scan a ticket if a station has gates. It's precisely misinformation like this from people who work on the railway that results in passengers lacking confidence in the system.
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