Help! Penalty Fare Notice given

[johnch24]

Hi, new member here but long time lurker of RailUkForum. Thanks in advance for any feedback.

I travel from [station redacted for OP's privacy] to London Euston for work [redacted] times a week. When I first got the job, I must admit I was short faring for [redacted] in a desperate attempt to save some money. However, after reading this forum, and several close-calls later with inspectors, I freaked myself out and decided to pay the full fare. I have since made a new trainline account, with a new email and bank card. However, I have a railcard linked to my old trainline account.

Recently, my phone ran out of battery at Euston and I stupidly boarded the train and thought I would get away with it, but I was caught buying a ticket upon arrival at [redacted] by the guards. The penalty notice is for ‘purchase after departure’. I was very honest about my wrongdoing and as such, the guard said he respected our interaction and said he gave me a penalty notice as he understands these things happen. The guard took an image of my valid railcard, the ticket which was purchased after departure. Both will link to separate trainline accounts. I have immediately paid the fine.

My question to the forum is, do I have anything to worry about with LWR looking into my account via the details I gave for the penalty fare notice, will they look into any historic offences - or will this be treated as an isolated incident? As I said, I have been buying tickets for the last few months and I think the station staff have recognised me as a regular paying customer.

Naturally, I am very concerned and anxious so any insights of what may happen would be much appreciated. Thank you

 

[Watershed]

Welcome to the forum. Your concerns are understandable, because the TOC you mentioned (I have redacted the details for your privacy) do seem to have a habit of investigating people's purchasing history after they are issued with Penalty Fares (PFs).

This practice is highly questionable from a data protection (GDPR) standpoint, and aside from that they will also lack concrete evidence that you were the person who travelled as single/return tickets are transferrable, so you could entirely legitimately buy a ticket for someone else or even sell it to them. So if you do get an email accusing you of irregularities, you shouldn't respond immediately - come here for advice first.

However, cor now there is nothing more you can do, other than to make sure you buy a valid ticket for your entire journey before boarding so that you don't ever come to their attention again.

You could also stop using Trainline and instead use another retailer, ideally with completely different details (the fewer you have to provide, the better - some only take your email and payment details). However this wouldn't change the outcome of any investigation they do; you can't delete your purchasing history.

You could consider appealing your PF on the basis that it was incorrectly issued - buying a ticket after boarding is not a lawful basis for issuing a PF. If a train company wants to pursue such an irregularity, it has to be dealt with by means of a prosecution under the Byelaws (or an out of court settlement in lieu of a prosecution).

There is arguably an advantage in appealing, since if you submit an appeal, the train company will be legally barred from prosecuting you in relation to this incident, unless they cancel your PF before the appeal is decided. This applies whether your appeal is accepted or rejected; effectively, you are rewarded for engaging with the process rather than ignoring the PF.

In our experience, train companies never cancel PFs unless your appeal(s) are rejected, the PF remains unpaid after around 4-6 weeks, and they want to prosecute you - although at that stage they are legally barred from prosecution, so cancelling the PF is pointless. Unfortunately we have heard of several train companies that act in breach of the legal bar on prosecution in these circumstances; you may therefore have to apply for the case to effectively be "thrown out".

Even if your first appeal is unsuccessful, there are two further stages of appeal, each of which should be considered independently by different assessors. In our experience, first and second stage appeals are often rejected even if they are valid, as the assessors don't seem to be particularly well trained or competent. Third stage appeals are decided by a panel of assessors, who seem to have more of an open mindset to accepting appeals. So it is worthwhile persevering even if you don't succeed at first.

Of course, I completely understand if you're reticent to bring an appeal (let alone multiple appeals) thinking that it'll aggravate the situation. That said, I don't think it is likely to cause any additional suspicion to be aroused - if they are going to investigate your purchasing history, they'll do so regardless. And as mentioned above, it could be beneficial even if your appeal is refused.

 

[Egg Centric]

Don't give any more specific details in this thread so it can't be used against you. That's why I've not quoted your response (although the TOC may have got it already). It's vague enough at present that you shouldn't be fine; just ignore them if they do start messaging.

Also for goodness sake start behaving impeccably now. If you are stressed out by minor stuff like this you simply cannot take this sort of risk, it's bad for your soul!

For those reasons in your very specific circumstance (ie identifiability by public confession + fairly obscure penalty fare appeal reason, small amount of money at stake, and being easily stressed) I don't suggest you appeal. If any of those three didn't apply I'd echo @Watershed 's advice