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On a (now disappeared) thread, the OP said they were asked, whilst on a platform, their occupation as well as the usual name, address & date if birth.
They were also asked to open the Trainline App and to hand over their phone.
Would I be right in thinking you don't need to give your occupation? Or hand over your phone?
On a (now disappeared) thread, the OP said they were asked, whilst on a platform, their occupation as well as the usual name, address & date if birth.
They were also asked to open the Trainline App and to hand over their phone.
Would I be right in thinking you don't need to give your occupation? Or hand over your phone?
If I was caught by an RPI with an invalid ticket I would give only the information I was required to give. I definitely wouldn't allow them to touch my phone.
If they ask to see my existing railcard I would display it on my phone but they don't need to touch my phone to see it.
If they want to see my Trainline purchase history they would need to contact Trainline directly for this information. Not that I have a Trainline account or have ever purchased any tickets on Trainline.
As for occupation I don't see how that would benefit their investigation. An invalid ticket is an invalid ticket regardless of what you do for a living. I wouldn't provide this information as it simply isn't needed.
If I was caught by an RPI with an invalid ticket I would give only the information I was required to give. I definitely wouldn't allow them to touch my phone.
If they ask to see my existing railcard I would display it on my phone but they don't need to touch my phone to see it.
If they want to see my Trainline purchase history they would need to contact Trainline directly for this information. Not that I have a Trainline account or have ever purchased any tickets on Trainline.
As for occupation I don't see how that would benefit their investigation. An invalid ticket is an invalid ticket regardless of what you do for a living. I wouldn't provide this information as it simply isn't needed.
I do wonder if only giving the minimum information required by law but otherwise refusing would be seen as uncooperative and be more likely to lead to an unfavourable outcome, particularly in minor or marginal cases.
Edit: In particular, in applicable cases maybe if you show them a "clean looking" trainline account on the spot they might issue a penalty fare for the current journey; if you refuse they might send you down the further investigation/prosecution/out of court route.
I do wonder if only giving the minimum information required by law but otherwise refusing would be seen as uncooperative and be more likely to lead to an unfavourable outcome, particularly in minor or marginal cases.
Edit: In particular, in applicable cases maybe if you show them a "clean looking" trainline account on the spot they might issue a penalty fare for the current journey; if you refuse they might send you down the further investigation/prosecution/out of court route.
Exactly that. If I went into someone's history and saw they'd only made one journey with an expired railcard, or similar, then most likely it's just a PF.
However, if there's a pattern of behaviour then that's more concerning, so I'd probably go down the MG11 route.
Exactly that. If I went into someone's history and saw they'd only made one journey with an expired railcard, or similar, then most likely it's just a PF.
However, if there's a pattern of behaviour then that's more concerning, so I'd probably go down the MG11 route.
Hadn't thought of it like that. If I had a Trainline account and nothing to hide I suppose it would be beneficial to show this to the RPI but I wouldn't allow them to touch my phone. They can see what they need to without handling my device.
They don't have the power to ask someone to login to a website and/or hand over a phone, so wouldn't it be murky waters to say someone wasn't being cooperative?
I've seen staff at barriers take a phone out of someone's hands to check their ticket before letting them through. I wouldn't be overly happy with that!
Might even be a criminal offence? Battery, assault, trespass of the person?
They don't have the power to ask someone to login to a website and/or hand over a phone, so wouldn't it be murky waters to say someone wasn't being cooperative?
I've seen staff at barriers take a phone out of someone's hands to check their ticket before letting them through. I wouldn't be overly happy with that!
Might even be a criminal offence? Battery, assault, trespass of the person?
This is a big no when checking tickets.
What if you take it and the passenger wants it back and you drop.
I really did not know Revenue guys actually took the device.
Yeah hell no.
They don't have the power to ask someone to login to a website and/or hand over a phone, so wouldn't it be murky waters to say someone wasn't being cooperative?
I've seen staff at barriers take a phone out of someone's hands to check their ticket before letting them through. I wouldn't be overly happy with that!
Might even be a criminal offence? Battery, assault, trespass of the person?
The revenue inspectors don't have that legal power, but they can ask. And as discussed above if they have a choice between a penalty fare if you let them see your trainline history (for example) and the worse option of "further investigation" (involving getting data direct from trainline etc.) if you don't, it's not unreasonable for them to make that decision based on the evidence you allow or do not allow them to see.
However, I would argue that the system should perhaps change so that if you refuse access but their subsequent checks show no discrepancies, the option should be available for a retrospective penalty fare (which is not currently possible), for the cases where one would have been issued if you had "cooperated" on the spot, so you wouldn't be punished for "non-cooperation" in this regard.
I don't have the knowledge that a lot of people on this forum have (I'm just someone who commutes to work by train once or twice a week, and have been lurking on this forum for some months), but RoRA 1889 s 5(1) says "Every passenger by a railway shall, on request by an officer or servant of a railway company, either produce, and if so requested deliver up, a ticket..."
The "deliver up" implies to me that you don't just have to show the ticket, you have to physically hand it over if requested. And if the ticket is on a phone, that suggests that you have to hand over the phone.
The question is whether or not the person checking the ticket is allowed to do any more than to check the ticket as presented. My view is that they shouldn't -- and they certainly shouldn't be looking at your ticket purchasing history!
I don't have the knowledge that a lot of people on this forum have (I'm just someone who commutes to work by train once or twice a week, and have been lurking on this forum for some months), but RoRA 1889 s 5(1) says "Every passenger by a railway shall, on request by an officer or servant of a railway company, either produce, and if so requested deliver up, a ticket..."
I don't have the knowledge that a lot of people on this forum have (I'm just someone who commutes to work by train once or twice a week, and have been lurking on this forum for some months), but RoRA 1889 s 5(1) says "Every passenger by a railway shall, on request by an officer or servant of a railway company, either produce, and if so requested deliver up, a ticket..."
The "deliver up" implies to me that you don't just have to show the ticket, you have to physically hand it over if requested. And if the ticket is on a phone, that suggests that you have to hand over the phone.
The question is whether or not the person checking the ticket is allowed to do any more than to check the ticket as presented. My view is that they shouldn't -- and they certainly shouldn't be looking at your ticket purchasing history!
I'm pretty sure that the law has not been tested as to whether you need to actually hand over your phone for ticket inspection, as opposed to just presenting it for scanning. The original laws were based on a physical ticket, which (I understand) remains the property of "the railway" in some sense, so it's entirely reasonable to have to actually hand it over; a phone ticket is a virtual item which resides in your property, so the law might decide it's unreasonable to interpret it such that you to are compelled to hand the phone over (as long as you make the ticket available for scanning and/or inspection). It could be argued also that the ticket itself doesn't really reside in your phone, that's just a copy or key to something in the railway company database which is the "real" ticket (the actual proof of validity), so the concept of handing it over is meaningless. I'm not an expert in these matters but I'm sure this could exercise legal and technical minds for some time if it ever comes to court.
Ideally this and any other relevant laws should be modernised to be more explicit about how they apply to virtual tickets.
I *am* pretty sure however that revenue inspectors and so forth work on the basis that they do not have the power to take a phone off you if you refuse, And I'm pretty sure we've never had any reports of anyone getting prosecuted for failing to "deliver up" because they refused to hand over their phone but presented it with a valid ticket showing for scanning.
As far as them looking at your ticket history, the situation, like it or not, is that they are legally entitled to ask to see it, and it may be to your advantage to cooperate, but you are fully entitled to refuse. Personally I do think it's entirely reasonable to look at your ticket history to try to determine if you are a serial offender (possibly costing the railway thousands of pounds and deserving the prosecution/out of court settlement route) or if this looks like an honest mistake or oversight (just a penalty fare). Never investigating people's history would potentially allow the very worst fare evaders to effectively get away with it - they would pay the occasional penalty fare but save much more than that by evading the rest of the time.
As far as them looking at your ticket history, the situation, like it or not, is that they are legally entitled to ask to see it, and it may be to your advantage to cooperate...
My gut feeling is that you just made that up. Can you provide the relevant legal requirements you cite?
My made up opinion is that their scope is limited to a "ticket" the current journey and nothing else. There's no such thing as "your ticket history" since the passenger may purchase from multiple retailers for themselves and/or multiple other passengers.
If I was caught by an RPI with an invalid ticket I would give only the information I was required to give. I definitely wouldn't allow them to touch my phone.
If they ask to see my existing railcard I would display it on my phone but they don't need to touch my phone to see it.
If they want to see my Trainline purchase history they would need to contact Trainline directly for this information. Not that I have a Trainline account or have ever purchased any tickets on Trainline.
As for occupation I don't see how that would benefit their investigation. An invalid ticket is an invalid ticket regardless of what you do for a living. I wouldn't provide this information as it simply isn't needed.
You absolutely don't need to give more information than required by law, but - and I don't want to make it sound like the 'if you have nothing to hide' argument - if you answer some questions it could aid staff in showing discretion.
For example, you try to use Oyster beyond its validity. If you are asked why you are visiting that station, for example, and it turns out you are just visiting to look around the shops and you've never been there before, you might be sold a ticket and told how to contact TfL to get a refund. If you are working there and, presumably, travel there regularly then it should be a slam dunk penalty fare.
If you can show your journey history and it doesn't show anything untoward, again that might lead to a penalty fare rather than staff going down the MG11 route with a view to possible prosecution (remember with an e-ticket, they already have your details to check later).
So, it's up to you really. However, not all questions are there to catch you out - they are to potentially give staff other options.
Another example is when discretion was shown to people visiting Tesco HQ for some sort of jobs fair, and they advertised that you could use Oyster to Welwyn Garden City. Clearly incorrect, and I believe from what I heard from someone that was going to Tesco, staff were selling tickets to those who said why they were visiting.
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My gut feeling is that you just made that up. Can you provide the relevant legal requirements you cite?
My made up opinion is that their scope is limited to a "ticket" the current journey and nothing else. There's no such thing as "your ticket history" since the passenger may purchase from multiple retailers for themselves and/or multiple other passengers.
For example, you try to use Oyster beyond its validity. If you are asked why you are visiting that station, for example, and it turns out you are just visiting to look around the shops and you've never been there before, you might be sold a ticket and told how to contact TfL to get a refund. If you are working there and, presumably, travel there regularly then it should be a slam dunk penalty fare.
Just to add.
When oyster cards are scanned to check they automatically show all the latest journeys. Whether it was that day or another day. ie showing the history of travels.
There's no such thing as "your ticket history" since the passenger may purchase from multiple retailers for themselves and/or multiple other passengers.
My gut feeling is that you just made that up. Can you provide the relevant legal requirements you cite?
My made up opinion is that their scope is limited to a "ticket" the current journey and nothing else. There's no such thing as "your ticket history" since the passenger may purchase from multiple retailers for themselves and/or multiple other passengers.
I didn't "make it up" because there doesn't need to be a law permitting it, there would need to be one specifically forbidding it.
Anyone can *ask* to see someone's phone, that's not illegal, and you don't need any special powers. I could ask a random person in the street if I could inspect their phone, and I expect I would get short shrift, but it's not illegal to *ask*. I'd say the onus is on you to point to a law that actually forbids them from asking.
To emphasise, they do not have any powers to compel you to show your ticket history on trainline or elsewhere. It's entirely voluntary.
Saying they are "legally entitled to ask" gives the reader the impression that there's some formal basis supporting the statement regarding what rail staff can do in relation to their ticket checking duties. Now you say there's not so it's just vacuous waffle.
Saying they are "legally entitled to ask" gives the reader the impression that there's some formal basis supporting the statement regarding what rail staff can do in relation to their ticket checking duties. Now you say there's not so it's just vacuous waffle.
There’s no need for this tone: the summary given by @duffield is a perfectly acceptable (albeit brief) narration of the position at common law.
There are some potential nuances, but the general principle set out holds true in most circumstances i.e. unless you can point to a legal basis which would prohibit an RPI from ‘asking the question’ then it is lawful for him so to do.
And the “formal basis” for the RPI’s action is the common law.
Saying they are "legally entitled to ask" gives the reader the impression that there's some formal basis supporting the statement regarding what rail staff can do in relation to their ticket checking duties. Now you say there's not so it's just vacuous waffle.
The basic principle of English law is generally "that which is not specifically forbidden is permitted". So it's quite simply true to say that they are legally entitled to ask just about anything they please, and apart from the specific requirements of the various railway acts, you are equally entitled to refuse.
You may think it's "vacuous waffle", I think it's an important point of clarity, which you appeared to be disputing. You appeared to be stating that there was some legal barrier to them even asking. I'm very sorry if I misunderstood your point, which I now take to be "there is no specific or general power in railway law for them to require you to show or allow them to see your ticket history, or anything else on your phone apart from your actual ticket", since I entirely agree with that.
The basic principle of English law is generally "that which is not specifically forbidden is permitted". So it's quite simply true to say that they are legally entitled to ask just about anything they please, and apart from the specific requirements of the various railway acts, you are equally entitled to refuse.
You may think it's "vacuous waffle", I think it's an important point of clarity, which you appeared to be disputing. You appeared to be stating that there was some legal barrier to them even asking. I'm very sorry if I misunderstood your point, which I now take to be "there is no specific or general power in railway law for them to require you to show or allow them to see your ticket history, or anything else on your phone apart from your actual ticket", since I entirely agree with that.
Further to that I think it could contravene the Computer Misuse Act for them to look at anything other than the ticket if you did hand your phone to them and did not specifically give permission for such a search.
However it doesn't prevent them asking if they can, and if you give consent (verbal would be enough) or hand the phone over having been asked if they can then it's fine.
Further to that I think it could contravene the Computer Misuse Act for them to look at anything other than the ticket if you did hand your phone to them and did not specifically give permission for such a search.
An Act to make provision for securing computer material against unauthorised access or modification; and for connected purposes.
www.legislation.gov.uk
(1)A person is guilty of an offence if—
(a)he causes a computer to perform any function with intent to secure access to any program or data held in any computer [F1, or to enable any such access to be secured];
(b)the access he intends to secure [F2, or to enable to be secured,] is unauthorised; and
(c)he knows at the time when he causes the computer to perform the function that that is the case.
Unless the person has given the inspector permission to trawl through the phone, and certainly if the phone was handed over with an explicit instruction that it was to view the ticket, it is unauthorised access. And a mobile phone is without any doubt a "computer system" in 2025.
Nothing in any railway legislation I know of gives blanket permission for that kind of action to the railway to look through the phone itself (they may be able to obtain the data from Trainline under the DPA, but that's not accessing the phone itself).
The basic principle of English law is generally "that which is not specifically forbidden is permitted". So it's quite simply true to say that they are legally entitled to ask just about anything they please, and apart from the specific requirements of the various railway acts, you are equally entitled to refuse.
You may think it's "vacuous waffle", I think it's an important point of clarity, which you appeared to be disputing. You appeared to be stating that there was some legal barrier to them even asking. I'm very sorry if I misunderstood your point, which I now take to be "there is no specific or general power in railway law for them to require you to show or allow them to see your ticket history, or anything else on your phone apart from your actual ticket", since I entirely agree with that.
Yes, I think we're in agreement but coming from different directions!!
I also think we're in the territory again where the railway and it's unfit for purpose laws are so out of date with modern travel. 95% of my travel is "ticketless" as it's on Oyster and cost isn't decided until TfL's computer tallies up the days takings!
I've also just completed a GWR survey that focussed heavily on tickets - a totally alien concept for a Londoner!
It does not automatically follow that looking through the phone is an offence.
In any event, having observed quite a lot of this type of interaction through my work, my professional judgment is that the vast majority of this type of ‘trainline trawl’ by an RPI is (in legal terms) done with consent and therefore does not constitute unauthorised access for the purposes of this Act.
Nothing in any railway legislation I know of gives blanket permission for that kind of action to the railway to look through the phone itself (they may be able to obtain the data from Trainline under the DPA, but that's not accessing the phone itself).
I am not aware of any reported court case touching on this point, but my professional view is that the Byelaws and RORA section 5(1) are sufficiently drafted in order to permit an RPI:
To require that a mobile phone being used to display an e-ticket be physically handed over (albeit for only brief temporary period); and
If more than one ticket is stored on or accessed from that phone, to examine them on the phone.
I am not aware of any reported court case touching on this point, but my professional view is that the Byelaws and RORA section 5(1) are sufficiently drafted in order to permit an RPI:
To require that a mobile phone being used to display an e-ticket be physically handed over (albeit for only brief temporary period); and
If more than one ticket is stored on or accessed from that phone, to examine them on the phone.
To me the implications of this are absolutely chilling despite my committing no such offences. It does make one wonder if a better way to use e-tickets is to print them out, thus avoiding the potential gross breach of privacy this would entail.
I am seriously unhappy with the suggestion that anyone outside the Police and similar forces (e.g. customs on entering the UK, though I'd be wary of the US at present) might have any right to take possession of and search my phone, on which all manner of confidential matters like my banking information reside. This is massively concerning, particularly given how some staff seem to conduct themselves, particularly agency RPIs.
I am seriously unhappy with the suggestion that anyone outside the Police and similar forces (e.g. customs on entering the UK, though I'd be wary of the US at present) might have any right to take possession of and search my phone, on which all manner of confidential matters like my banking information reside.
I am seriously unhappy with the suggestion that anyone outside the Police and similar forces (e.g. customs on entering the UK, though I'd be wary of the US at present) might have any right to take possession of and search my phone, on which all manner of confidential matters like my banking information reside. This is massively concerning, particularly given how some staff seem to conduct themselves, particularly agency RPIs.
Not relevant to you, of course, but teachers can confiscate and search pupils' mobile phones if they reasonably believe it may contain harmful or illegal material. "Harmful" in this case could include evidence via social media or photos of bullying, for example.
My gut feeling is that you just made that up. Can you provide the relevant legal requirements you cite?
My made up opinion is that their scope is limited to a "ticket" the current journey and nothing else. There's no such thing as "your ticket history" since the passenger may purchase from multiple retailers for themselves and/or multiple other passengers.
But if your ticket is your phone it falls under the regulation of the railways act 1889 therefore you can hand over your phone if necessary and this would be to check previous purchases if you got nothing to hide I can’t really see a problem but I doubt no inspector wants to handle your phone unless you’re getting defensive and the fact you don’t actually need an account with trainline to use it only an email address.
Just to add.
When oyster cards are scanned to check they automatically show all the latest journeys. Whether it was that day or another day. ie showing the history of travels.
We are aware of an issue with emails from the Forum to Microsoft-based email accounts (hotmail/outlook/live.com email addresses). This is being looked into currently, thanks for your patience meanwhile.
