Quick, Easy PCN Appeal Help

[Ben Dover]

PF NO - GA9984678
Inspector - GA1487
Issue date - 11/12/2024
From - London Liverpool Street
To - Stansted Airport
Issued at - Stansted Airport

(Short Context):
Uncle travel iteneary was to travel from Kent Canterbury to Liverpool Street then to Stansted Airport. He is not a native English bloke and was under a fair amount of family pressure/exhaustion and under time constraint.

Made his was to Liverpool Street metro, Scanned his contactless Bank card at the gate (took £6) then made his way in. Hopped on the train to Stansted where Ticket Inspectors were waiting. They charged him the £23.90p for the fare than gave a £100 quid PCN (reduced to 50 if paid by 21days).

I hate to be a bother, however we need some help on this.
1 - How to Appeal
2 - Are our grounds going to hold up in the event of an appeal.
3 - What can we add in the cover letter of the appeal
4 - Time frame of the appeal?
5 - What do you think of this?
6 - what would you do in this situation.
7 - Thanks in advance I look forward to hearing what the experts think.

 

[jfollows]

Post up the documents, please, any appeal probably needs to be on a flawed process, a technicalty. Otherwise the Penalty Fare is for precisely this sort of thing, no criminal record, and your uncle is unlikely to repeat his error.

It’s probably little consolation that it’s a common mistake and that contactless will be valid to Stansted Airport in the near future.

 

[Ben Dover]

Post up the documents, please, any appeal probably needs to be on a flawed process, a technicalty. Otherwise the Penalty Fare is for precisely this sort of thing, no criminal record, and your uncle is unlikely to repeat his error.

It’s probably little consolation that it’s a common mistake and that contactless will be valid to Stansted Airport in the near future.

Cheers mate will do and hopefully will be. Unlucky to be dealing with this halfway across the world

 

[WesternLancer]

PF NO - GA9984678
Inspector - GA1487
Issue date - 11/12/2024
From - London Liverpool Street
To - Stansted Airport
Issued at - Stansted Airport

(Short Context):
Uncle travel iteneary was to travel from Kent Canterbury to Liverpool Street then to Stansted Airport. He is not a native English bloke and was under a fair amount of family pressure/exhaustion and under time constraint.

Made his was to Liverpool Street metro, Scanned his contactless Bank card at the gate (took £6) then made his way in. Hopped on the train to Stansted where Ticket Inspectors were waiting. They made charged him the £23.90p for the fare than gave a £100 quid PCN (reduced to 50 if paid by 21days).

I hate to be a bother, however we need some help on this.
1 - How to Appeal
2 - Are our grounds going to hold up in the event of an appeal.
3 - What can we add in the cover letter of the appeal
4 - Time frame of the appeal?
5 - What do you think of this?
6 - what would you do in this situation.
7 - Thanks in advance I look forward to hearing what the experts think.

Whatever you do there is a prompt payment deadline that reduces the Penalty Fare from £100 to £50 (it will say on the paperwork given to him but it is the 21 days from the incident) - do not miss this deadline as that will mean paying £50 more than necessary.

It may be best to pay this soon, even if an Appeal is submitted. If any Appeal was upheld then the Penalty would be refunded. This is what I would do in this situation.

FWIW I don't think an Appeal would be successful (sadly you can not appeal on the basis that you did not understand the rules / made a simple mistake / English is not your first language /, or that this 'is not fair' - for an Appeal to be successful you have to set out why the Penalty Fare was incorrectly given)

 

[Ben Dover]

Whatever you do there is a prompt payment deadline that reduces the Penalty Fare from £100 to £50 (it will say on the paperwork given to him but it is the 21 days from the incident) - do not miss this deadline as that will mean paying £50 more than necessary.

It may be best to pay this soon, even if an Appeal is submitted. If any Appeal was upheld then the Penalty would be refunded. This is what I would do in this situation.

FWIW I don't think an Appeal would be successful (sadly you can not appeal on the basis that you did not understand the rules / made a simple mistake / English is not your first language /, or that this 'is not fair' - for an Appeal to be successful you have to set out why the Penalty Fare was incorrectly given)

I see, he just told me that they physically wouldn't let him leave, I've heard that the Inspector's have powers to demand name, address and DOB. However they dont have the power to block your way, they leave that to the Plod. Idk how true this is would like to double check

 

[jfollows]

I see, he just told me that they physically wouldn't let him leave, I've heard that the Inspector's have powers to demand name, address and DOB. However they dont have the power to block your way, they leave that to the Plod. Idk how true this is would like to double check

That sounds about right.
They have the right to name & address, it’s in the railway bylaws. They can’t detain you.
See https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a79c14b40f0b66d161ade8c/railway-byelaws.pdf

 

[Ben Dover]

That sounds about right.
They have the right to name & address, it’s in the railway bylaws. They can’t detain you.
See https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a79c14b40f0b66d161ade8c/railway-byelaws.pdf

Brilliant.

 

[Haywain]

I see, he just told me that they physically wouldn't let him leave, I've heard that the Inspector's have powers to demand name, address and DOB. However they dont have the power to block your way, they leave that to the Plod. Idk how true this is would like to double check

That's all rather irrelevant though, and doesn't give grounds for appeal.

 

[Ben Dover]

That's all rather irrelevant though, and doesn't give grounds for appeal.

(1) Any person reasonably suspected by an authorised person of breaching or
attempting to breach any of these Byelaws shall give his name and address
when asked by an authorised person.

Doesn't say that they can block him from leaving tho.

 

[Haywain]

Doesn't say that they can block him from leaving tho.

No, and I'm not arguing that it does. But a Penalty Fare has been issued and that has to be dealt with, and a perception* of being prevented from leaving doesn't change the facts of the Penalty Fare or provide grounds for appeal against the Penalty Fare.


*Like you, I wasn't there.

 

[Ben Dover]

No, and I'm not arguing that it does. But a Penalty Fare has been issued and that has to be dealt with, and a perception* of being prevented from leaving doesn't change the facts of the Penalty Fare or provide grounds for appeal against the Penalty Fare.


*Like you, I wasn't there.

Fair enough. Will still give it a go in the appeal, best chance we have atm.

 

[AlterEgo]

I see, he just told me that they physically wouldn't let him leave, I've heard that the Inspector's have powers to demand name, address and DOB. However they dont have the power to block your way, they leave that to the Plod. Idk how true this is would like to double check

They can, in fact, prevent a passenger from leaving if they reasonably suspect them of committing an indictable offence, such as one under the Regulation of Railways Act. Same powers as any other member of the public. The Bylaws @jfollows quoted don’t mention that because it’s not relevant. The power for any member of the public to detain someone is enshrined elsewhere in the law.

Leaving while being penalty fared isn’t a good look. I wouldn’t mention this in the appeal, because it was correctly issued for an offence, and you are hoping to have it waived on compelling grounds.

 

[furlong]

Please post the COMPLETE notice for checking - you've missed off the bottom part. (Cover up personal details etc.)
Discretion should be shown for non-native speakers and particularly at airports etc. - you might want to quote from the SRA's original policy (4.5, 4.20, 4.30) which advised against issuing penalty fares for airport travel and indeed originally explicitly excluded Stansted Airport - then argue that whatever mitigations they might have put in place since then to justify changing that were clearly ineffective in this particular instance.

 

[Ben Dover]

Please post the COMPLETE notice for checking - you've missed off the bottom part. (Cover up personal details etc.)
Discretion should be shown for non-native speakers and particularly at airports etc. - you might want to quote from the SRA's original policy (4.5, 4.20, 4.30) which advised against issuing penalty fares for airport travel and indeed originally explicitly excluded Stansted Airport - then argue that whatever mitigations they might have put in place since then to justify changing that were clearly ineffective in this particular instance.

Posting the complete notice as we speak. will look at this in depth, cheers mate

 

[AlterEgo]

you might want to quote from the SRA's original policy (4.5, 4.20, 4.30)

Has this ever been successful? It's quoting from a past policy.

 

[Gloster]

You say in #1 that he is ‘not a native English bloke’, but even if he is not a UK citizen, English may be his native language. Is it? (This may be a small point, but it is not clear.)

 

[Ben Dover]

You say in #1 that he is ‘not a native English bloke’, but even if he is not a UK citizen, English may be his native language. Is it? (This may be a small point, but it is not clear.)

Uk citizen, sub par English skills lol.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 19 Dec 2024 ==

Please post the COMPLETE notice for checking - you've missed off the bottom part. (Cover up personal details etc.)
Discretion should be shown for non-native speakers and particularly at airports etc. - you might want to quote from the SRA's original policy (4.5, 4.20, 4.30) which advised against issuing penalty fares for airport travel and indeed originally explicitly excluded Stansted Airport - then argue that whatever mitigations they might have put in place since then to justify changing that were clearly ineffective in this particular instance.

Cheers for the help, life saver. Wish everyone the best health and wealth.

 

[30907]

Uk citizen, sub par English skills lol

But, with respect, the signage at Liverpool St stating that Oyster/contactless are not valid to Stansted is extremely clear and should be obvious even to someone with minimal English. Photo showing this here:
https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/stansted-airport

Good luck, though!

 

[Cantab26]

They can, in fact, prevent a passenger from leaving if they reasonably suspect them of committing an indictable offence, such as one under the Regulation of Railways Act.

The offence created by section 5 of RORA is not indictable which means that an ‘any person’ arrest is not applicable in this instance.