On Train Ticket Checks - Victoria Line

[duncanp]

Travelling home from work today, as the train left Finsbury Park, (Northbound) two revenue protection inspectors got on the train and proceeded to check everyone's tickets.

Needless to say there were one or two people without validated Oyster cards.

Has anyone seen this elsewhere on the tube lately?

I suppose it could have happened because Finsbury Park is not barriered (yet)

Elsewhere, the automatic barriers would keep out anyone without a ticket, except of course for tailgating.

 

[Failed Unit]

Not recently but it does happen, even in zone 1. Catch out people that have 2-6 travelcards taking the quick way across.

 

[Mojo]

Whilst most work undertaken by Revenue Control Inspectors is at stations, on-train inspections are also often carried out at Off-peak times. It would not have been because of the (lack of) barriers at any particular location. Zone 1 is often the most effective location in which to do it, as you can easily catch people with Travelcards that don't include Z1 travelling!

 

[jon0844]

Finsbury Park is of course one well known station for 'free' entry into the Underground system.

 

[gottago]

It always surprises how in the almost five years I've lived in London I've never once had a ticket check on the tube but have had plenty on the DLR and Overground. Granted there are many more stations without ticket barriers but still I've travelled the entire system and would have thought I'd of encountered it somewhere!

 

[MikeWh]

Finsbury Park is of course one well known station for 'free' entry into the Underground system.

Except I thought that they had gated it now. Or are they sometimes left open?

 

[Ianno87]

I've been a tube regular for about 10 years now, and had one ticket inspection ever - evening peak at Sloane Square on the Circle Line in 2009.

 

[jon0844]

Except I thought that they had gated it now. Or are they sometimes left open?

They have gates only on some ways in. Just go in via the Network Rail entrance and down the spiral stairs. TfL believe people won't use the longer route just to avoid paying!

 

[bramling]

It always surprises how in the almost five years I've lived in London I've never once had a ticket check on the tube but have had plenty on the DLR and Overground. Granted there are many more stations without ticket barriers but still I've travelled the entire system and would have thought I'd of encountered it somewhere!

LU's revenue tend to target particular things, so just because you haven't been asked for your ticket doesn't mean you haven't encountered revenue. They also often work in plain clothes so you wouldn't necessarily see them.

A favourite is to set the gates up to utilise the feature that allows a lamp to illuminate when a particular ticket type is encountered. After passing through the gate plain clothes staff will then swoop on the individual. The beauty of this method is that having already passed through the gates it's a straightforward RORA prosecution with the person being bang to rights and caught on CCTV. An example of the sort of thing they look for is using someone else's season ticket. A lot of people get caught for this. I'd say my PTAC gets checked at least once a month by this means, sometimes more often, so they're certainly active.

 

[Starmill]

I have had my railcard checked after I've touched in at gates, in one case even after I inserted a railcard discounted ticket to Zone u12 into the gate, after I had walked through.

I have also had my travelcard and railcard checked during an onboard ticket inspection on a TfL bus.

 

[gray1404]

I once had a travel card that wasn't operating the gates - it stopped mid way through the day. Having inserted it and had it rejected I was approached by a plain clothed inspector. She couldn't have been happier to help and let me out. I've also been approached by one when I was looking at bit lost changing trains. Showed ID as in plain clothes, and directed me to where I needed to be (no ticket check).

 

[Bletchleyite]

I have had an on-train check on LU precisely once, on the Central Line in the early 2000s. Never before, never since.

 

[rebmcr]

I've had passageway blockades a few times now.

Once in the Vic > Jub tunnel at Green Park (going for Finsbury to DLR unbarriered journeys?) and another on the bridge towards DLR/Jub at West Ham (deep in unbarriered land).

 

[Antman]

It always surprises how in the almost five years I've lived in London I've never once had a ticket check on the tube but have had plenty on the DLR and Overground. Granted there are many more stations without ticket barriers but still I've travelled the entire system and would have thought I'd of encountered it somewhere!

I'm exactly the same, never had an on train ticket check on LU despite having used them regularly for donkeys years.

I have heard that there are occasional checks at Finsbury Park due to the lack of ticket gates on some entrances.

 

[Dent]

Zone 1 is often the most effective location in which to do it, as you can easily catch people with Travelcards that don't include Z1 travelling!

That doesn't apply as much now that the Z2-6 day travelcard is no longer sold, and most season tickets are on Oyster card which allows travel outside the ticket's zones.

 

[MarlowDonkey]

How does a revenue inspection work if someone has used Contactless to touch in?

Is there a way of determining whether a presented card had actually been used earlier to touch in?

 

[Kite159]

How does a revenue inspection work if someone has used Contactless to touch in?

Is there a way of determining whether a presented card had actually been used earlier to touch in?

I believe all that can be checked with a contactless card is that it hasn't been blocked and a mark is put onto the card so that if it hadn't been touched in a max fare is charged.

 

[Mojo]

That doesn't apply as much now that the Z2-6 day travelcard is no longer sold, and most season tickets are on Oyster card which allows travel outside the ticket's zones.

People buy z2-6 Travelcards from NR stations as they are issued on paper tickets. Also people with Travelcards on Oyster touch in and then immediately out, or use a reader at an interchange point to touch out.

 

[MikeWh]

I believe all that can be checked with a contactless card is that it hasn't been blocked and a mark is put onto the card so that if it hadn't been touched in a max fare is charged.

The mark is a transaction on the back-office database used to compile the daily charge. Nothing is ever written to a contactless payment card by TfL or the Oyster system.

 

[MarlowDonkey]

The mark is a transaction on the back-office database used to compile the daily charge.

Could a contactless card be used as a "pay when challenged" system? It would be of limited use as the card holder also has to exit the system. TfL could if it wanted monitor for frequent use of travel without touching in.

 

[Clip]

Could a contactless card be used as a "pay when challenged" system? It would be of limited use as the card holder also has to exit the system. TfL could if it wanted monitor for frequent use of travel without touching in.

It could do but I believe that after 3 times of you doing so the card will be blacklisted and that's where the issues would arise as the inspectors could see that it was blacklisted I believe and then the questions would start about how they entered the system

 

[Mag_seven]

A favourite is to set the gates up to utilise the feature that allows a lamp to illuminate when a particular ticket type is encountered. After passing through the gate plain clothes staff will then swoop on the individual.

You could spot them a mile away as they generally stood in the same place and were the only people standing facing the barriers!

 

[PeterC]

I have had an on-train check on LU precisely once, on the Central Line in the early 2000s. Never before, never since.

Ditto, once on the outer reaches of the Met before the stations all had barriers.

Corridor checks were common at Waterloo on the long walk to the Jubilee Line when I worked on the South Bank.

 

[pethadine82]

At Stratford I have seen RPI, Police and immigration officers working together.
How would the TOC get their revenue when a person is about to be deported?

 

[bramling]

You could spot them a mile away as they generally stood in the same place and were the only people standing facing the barriers!

True! They still seem to catch a lot of people though. Many of them are pretty well built too.

 

[JackS]

Think I've had an on-train check once in the past couple of years, on the Piccadilly line in one of the open sections.

Encountered a corridor blockade at Kings Cross (the one linking the sub-surface lines with the deep level lines) once and had my staff pass checked about four or five times in the past couple of years after going through a barrier as this is one that flashes up.

 

[Hadders]

I've had two checks this year:

Once on the Piccadilly Line travelling between Holborn and South Kensington, it was a weekday off peak morning and I was using Oyster PAYG with a Gold Card discount. The inspector asked to see my Gold Card.

The second occasion was a corridor check at Kings Cross St Pancras in the evening Peak between the tube ticket hall and the sub-surface lines. I was making a Cross London journey as part of a National Rail journey and was waved through.

 

[paddington]

I've only ever been checked twice on the tube and not recently:

~2007/8, upon exiting White City station, using student Oyster and wanted to see the photo. It didn't look like me at all, but he didn't even look at my face...

~2009/10, around Eastcote or Ruislip going to Uxbridge. Inspectors got shouted at since A stock train was packed (morning peak) and they were pushing and shoving people to get past. Then a second set of inspectors came on and tried to do it again with the same result.


Twice on normal buses:

~2009/10, 9 to Hammersmith at High St Ken, several people challenged the inspector who just said "you'd be surprised at the number of people I catch without a valid ticket"

~2011/12, 266 to Brent Cross. Bus took about 2 hours to get past Harlesden. Inspectors boarded and issued a penalty fare to someone who didn't speak English, ostensibly because she had touched in on an "earlier" bus. Then they tried issuing a penalty fare to someone who did know what was going on and then got serious abuse for not bothering to check how long the driver had been driving.


Too many times to remember on bendy buses, DLR and overground and especially trams, where people very frequently get caught. None on boris buses yet.

 

[TFN]

I was only checked once on London Underground (but basically every other day on Thameslink and London Buses). It was a District Line train at Hammersmith mid afternoon back from uni and they asked to see my railcard. Easy stuff. I also saw a pair on the Victoria Line at Victoria but left the train before they got to my car.

As I do revenue protection on Heathrow Express I sympathise with the difficulties of their jobs as some people seem to think An Oyster card is valid on HEX. Except on HEX fines are never issued.

(Also, my first post. Hello all!)

 

[185143]

Never been checked on LU-but encountered 3 sets of RPIs on London Overground, and also once on a tram.