Off Peak Return - Return Portion scribbles!

[johntea]

Over the weekend I travelled to Nottingham

Coming back today I had 3 Northern Rail journeys and 3 ticket inspections! This is the results on my return portion of my ticket : (You may have to click to enlarge)



First journey : Nottingham to Chesterfield. A very small biro pen line (Inside the circle just above the * after Nottingham.

Second journey : Chesterfield to Sheffield. Accused immediately of maybe having already used the ticket by the conductor due to the small mark from the previous journey (I will be mentioning this to Northern!), then a large circle round the start date and 31/8 written on the ticket plus a further large scribble just for good measure

Third journey : Sheffield to Castleford. Short visual inspection by the conductor.

So...if I had stayed in Sheffield overnight as an example the conductor on the second journey could have caused me some issues getting home!

 

[Central Trains]

No real need to scribble all over a ticket - I had a Devon Day Ranger last weekend and the guard scribbled all over it.

 

[tom1649]

I've never come across a Northern guard/conductor with a proper Zifa stamper. Do any exist? A few have the 'hole punch'. A minority don't even mark the ticket. Biro looks messy but it is cheap.

 

[northwichcat]

I've never come across a Northern guard/conductor with a proper Zifa stamper. Do any exist?

I did a a few years back.

A few have the 'hole punch'. A minority don't even mark the ticket. Biro looks messy but it is cheap.

The ones with the hole punch (on both Northern and TPE) always seem to stamp through the magnetic stripe - I thought they were supposed to avoid doing that.

I'd actually say the majority don't mark the ticket unless it's the return part of an Off Peak Return or Anytime Return.

 

[185]

Even Zifa aren't great. Swiss-made Zifa ink comes off however, the Swiss Federal Railways have a Zifa version with a hole punch in the stamp.

A 99p hole puncher is a good alternative, but that only suggests the journey was started.

 

[DeeGee]

There are at least two guards on FTPE who insist on ringing the date on every ticket they see with a thick black felt-tip.

Why do that with an advance?

 

[185]

Probably quicker to start ringing the date on every ticket than stop, wait and work out which ticket is which, then get the pen out. Far quicker to just do all than some.

 

[johntea]

I suppose my main point was by marking my ticket with the date, if I had stopped overnight in Sheffield then coming back this week may have been a problem.

But then with tickets that terminate at an unstaffed station I can't actually think of a way to ever mark the ticket as fully 'used', if it terminated at Leeds for example the theory would be to swallow the ticket at the gates (although I'm doubtful they're smart enough! :roll: )

 

[thebigcheese]

On HS1 the TMs sometimes use animal shaped hole punches but without a 'punch collector' so sometimes there's hundreds of cat shaped bit of ticket strewn throughout the train

 

[northwichcat]

But then with tickets that terminate at an unstaffed station I can't actually think of a way to ever mark the ticket as fully 'used', if it terminated at Leeds for example the theory would be to swallow the ticket at the gates (although I'm doubtful they're smart enough! :roll: )

Like I've said before I think barriers should always return your ticket but if it's a single/return they should print something on the reverse of the ticket indicating you've gone through them e.g. EXIT LDS 01.09.14 15:08

 

[thelongestroad]

ZIFAs are not very good... clearly they were not designed for our 'shiny' tickets and are more suitable for tickets which are made of paper that absorb the ink.

I will use a pen the majority of the time. If I use my ZIFA I just stamp the back so the ink sinks in and leaves an impression on the front.

 

[northwichcat]

ZIFAs are not very good... clearly they were not designed for our 'shiny' tickets and are more suitable for tickets which are made of paper that absorb the ink.

They worked on the old non-glossy style tickets that seemed to disappear completely by around 2006.

 

[Merseysider]

Since the criminalisation of graffiti in the 1970s, many conductors have had to resort to expressing themselves on tickets instead. The widespread nature of tickets means, thankfully, this vandalism is kept off the streets.

It is not uncommon however, to see lines, circles and all manner of squiggles spray painted near Teeside Airport station, as the conductors in that area don't get many tickets.

Furthermore, there is an ongoing debate about whether drawing circles in biro is actually a gateway crime, leading to the more serious offence of scribbling out dates on open returns.