Help with NIP draft response letter - Thameslink

[Ryder97]

Hi all,


I’m posting this on behalf of a friend (yes, really!) who received a notice of intention to prosecute letter from Thameslink this morning. I am helping them deal with this as they have a lot of other stuff going on.


Details:

• Incident was in June 2025
• They bought a paper ticket (Peak Travelcard) from the platform machine at Otford with a 26-30 railcard added.
• Friend previously had a 26-30 valid railcard which has expired. They’re 31 (since January 2025) so cannot renew it or buy a new one in mitigation.
• They were travelling on the Thameslink service to Sevenoaks, where they then picked up Southeastern’s Sevenoaks to London Bridge train.
• They were asked for the railcard by the ticket inspector whilst on the Thameslink train between Bat & Ball and Sevenoaks.
• Upon being challenged, they cooperated with the inspector, provided genuine details etc.

They would obviously like an out of court settlement - could you please provide feedback on the draft response below?


My friend mentioned that the ticket machine screen was smashed and it was hard to see what buttons they were pressing and wanted to claim in the letter that they didn’t know the railcard discount had been added. However I do not think this will work as a mitigation as it sounds like a fanciful excuse, and they’d be better off just apologising about not having the correct railcard. Can I get other people’s thoughts on this? Would the inspector have recorded what was said to them on the day? (i.e. if the screen wasn’t mentioned before, it couldn’t be mentioned now).


Thanks in advance for any help/suggestions/guidance!


————————————————————————

Dear Fare Evasion Manager

I am writing in response to your letter regarding my journey on 24 May 2025, during which I was found to be travelling on a discounted ticket without holding a valid 26-30 railcard.

Firstly, I would like to apologise for this incident. I understand and respect the rules regarding railcard validity and the importance of travelling with a valid ticket.

I previously held a valid 26-30 railcard but regrettably forgot that it had expired when I bought my ticket on [insert date here]. When asked for the railcard by the inspector, I immediately accepted responsibility, cooperated fully and provided all of the information requested. This was an unintentional oversight on my part, which I regret deeply. I understand that travel fraud costs GTR money and regret that I contributed to this.

I fully understand the seriousness of this matter and would be grateful if you could please consider it a genuine mistake and allow me to resolve it outside of court proceedings. I am willing to pay any outstanding fares and administrative costs to help conclude this matter. It will not happen again.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Kind regards,

 

[WesternLancer]

Hi all,


I’m posting this on behalf of a friend (yes, really!) who received a notice of intention to prosecute letter from Thameslink this morning. I am helping them deal with this as they have a lot of other stuff going on.


Details:

• Incident was in June 2025
• They bought a paper ticket (Peak Travelcard) from the platform machine at Otford with a 26-30 railcard added.
• Friend previously had a 26-30 valid railcard which has expired. They’re 31 (since January 2025) so cannot renew it or buy a new one in mitigation.
• They were travelling on the Thameslink service to Sevenoaks, where they then picked up Southeastern’s Sevenoaks to London Bridge train.
• They were asked for the railcard by the ticket inspector whilst on the Thameslink train between Bat & Ball and Sevenoaks.
• Upon being challenged, they cooperated with the inspector, provided genuine details etc.

They would obviously like an out of court settlement - could you please provide feedback on the draft response below?


My friend mentioned that the ticket machine screen was smashed and it was hard to see what buttons they were pressing and wanted to claim in the letter that they didn’t know the railcard discount had been added. However I do not think this will work as a mitigation as it sounds like a fanciful excuse, and they’d be better off just apologising about not having the correct railcard. Can I get other people’s thoughts on this? Would the inspector have recorded what was said to them on the day? (i.e. if the screen wasn’t mentioned before, it couldn’t be mentioned now).


Thanks in advance for any help/suggestions/guidance!


————————————————————————

Dear Fare Evasion Manager

I am writing in response to your letter regarding my journey on 24 May 2025, during which I was found to be travelling on a discounted ticket without holding a valid 26-30 railcard.

Firstly, I would like to apologise for this incident. I understand and respect the rules regarding railcard validity and the importance of travelling with a valid ticket.

I previously held a valid 26-30 railcard but regrettably forgot that it had expired when I bought my ticket on [insert date here]. When asked for the railcard by the inspector, I immediately accepted responsibility, cooperated fully and provided all of the information requested. This was an unintentional oversight on my part, which I regret deeply. I understand that travel fraud costs GTR money and regret that I contributed to this.

I fully understand the seriousness of this matter and would be grateful if you could please consider it a genuine mistake and allow me to resolve it outside of court proceedings. I am willing to pay any outstanding fares and administrative costs to help conclude this matter. It will not happen again.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Kind regards,

Welcome. Initial thoughts:

If your friend had inadvertently let railcard expired and didn’t remember it had expired (as opposed to knew it had expired but claimed discount anyway) then I would not talk about “fraud” in any way in the response. Do not imply anything fraudulent or intentional might have happened. Ie drop the last sentence in third paragraph for example.

If true better to say eg: please be assured I had no intention not to pay the correct fare for my journey.

Your point about the smashed machine screen reads like you don’t believe it’s true anyway so I’d not include it.

Bear in mind they may check for other tickets wrongly discounted in on line purchases so get your friend to check for any in their own records.

 

[Titfield]

Did the person forget it had expired or did not realise it had expired?

I would not use the word fraud.

I would not use the word mistake (as that it implies a degree of choice) but repeat the use of "oversight".


I fully understand the seriousness of this matter and would be grateful if you could please consider it an oversight genuine mistake and allow me to resolve it outside of court proceedings. I am willing to pay any outstanding fares and administrative costs to help conclude this matter. It will not happen again.

 

[MotCO]

The bit about the smashed screen does not make sense insofar as did your friend not realise the ticket was cheaper than he was expecting? I think this is a distraction, and being open and honest is the best policy.

 

[Ryder97]

Welcome. Initial thoughts:

If your friend had inadvertently let railcard expired and didn’t remember it had expired (as opposed to knew it had expired but claimed discount anyway) then I would not talk about “fraud” in any way in the response. Do not imply anything fraudulent or intentional might have happened. Ie drop the last sentence in third paragraph for example.

If true better to say eg: please be assured I had no intention not to pay the correct fare for my journey.

Your point about the smashed machine screen reads like you don’t believe it’s true anyway so I’d not include it.

Bear in mind they may check for other tickets wrongly discounted in on line purchases so get your friend to check for any in their own records.

Thanks! I've seen a picture of the screen and it feasibly could be true that you pressed something & didn't realise or the screen glitched. But it does sound very far-fetched and I don't fully believe it so it seems a bit of a stretch to ask a GTR employee to believe it too. Additionally you'd have to be very lucky to have randomly pressed a couple of buttons in the right sequence and ended up with a cheaper ticket...

Okay thanks, will do! If they haven't bought any tickets online and only ever buy paper tickets from the machine, would they GTR likely check credit card purchase history? Or would they not have the full backing data? [E.g. they can see they spent £30 on X date but don't see ticket details behind it?]

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 19 Oct 2025 ==

Did the person forget it had expired or did not realise it had expired?

I would not use the word fraud.

I would not use the word mistake (as that it implies a degree of choice) but repeat the use of "oversight".


I fully understand the seriousness of this matter and would be grateful if you could please consider it an oversight genuine mistake and allow me to resolve it outside of court proceedings. I am willing to pay any outstanding fares and administrative costs to help conclude this matter. It will not happen again.

Thank you for comments & suggested changes, will use those when we respond.

I think they probably had forgotten it had expired although I expect there'll be some degree of skepticism as they're 31 and the clue is in the 26-30 railcard name...

 

[WesternLancer]

Thanks! I've seen a picture of the screen and it feasibly could be true that you pressed something & didn't realise or the screen glitched. But it does sound very far-fetched and I don't fully believe it so it seems a bit of a stretch to ask a GTR employee to believe it too. Additionally you'd have to be very lucky to have randomly pressed a couple of buttons in the right sequence and ended up with a cheaper ticket...

Probably best just left out GTR are usually ok to settle things out of court anyway so imho no need to get into it.

Okay thanks, will do! If they haven't bought any tickets online and only ever buy paper tickets from the machine, would they GTR likely check credit card purchase history? Or would they not have the full backing data? [E.g. they can see they spent £30 on X date but don't see ticket details behind it?]

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 19 Oct 2025 ==

You have to assume they might be able to. But at this stage if they have not asked about it best not to worry about if they have unless they do ask about bout it at some point. Then deal with it then if they do.

The fundamental thing is the difference between this being an oversight or deliberate evasion because that affects the content of what should be said now given that a lie must not be told because your friend can not know what the railway may or may not know.

Thank you for comments & suggested changes, will use those when we respond.

I think they probably had forgotten it had expired although I expect there'll be some degree of skepticism as they're 31 and the clue is in the 26-30 railcard name...

I think with some railcards you can use an existing valid one beyond your birthday. Ie if you bought it just before your 31 st birthday you can use it for 12 months most of which you’d be aged 31. Not sure if that does apply to the 26-30 railcard but you can check.

 

[Ryder97]

Hi all,

Just to update you that Thameslink have replied & agreed to settle out of court for £70 which is a much better result than we were expecting.

Thank you all so much for your help, this is an invaluable resource!

 

[WesternLancer]

Hi all,

Just to update you that Thameslink have replied & agreed to settle out of court for £70 which is a much better result than we were expecting.

Thank you all so much for your help, this is an invaluable resource!

Thanks for taking the time to update. This sounds like a fairly reasonable outcome.