X-City-WM
Member
Out of interest, I’m wondering what could cause a QR code ticket to be rejected at gate lines, with error code 93 (card corrupt).
Details:
Yesterday, I travelled from Birmingham Moor St to London Marylebone, with my teenage child, on Chiltern.
Purchase: I bought tickets the day before (Tuesday), via Avanti’s app. I applied the 16-17 saver for the teen, who has the (valid) railcard on their phone. Paid via PayPal and added the tickets to my iPhone wallet.
Restrictions: the tickets are off peak returns. Valid only for arrivals in London after 10:00am and routed via High Wycombe. I checked and couldn’t see any evening peak restrictions.
Journey taken:
Outbound: https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:C90770/2026-03-31/detailed#allox_id=0
Return: https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:C90877/2026-03-31/detailed#allox_id=0
Details: On arrival at Marylebone, I scanned my child’s ticket first, to allow them through. It flashed “seek assistance”, so we went to the gate line staff. I presumed it was due to the 16-17 saver being applied. They showed their saver to the guard and he allowed them through. I went to scan myself through with my adult ticket (no railcard applied), and the same thing happened. The guard let me through and we continued our day in London.
On return, I scanned the child’s ticket first - again ‘seek assistance’. In going to the guard I explained about the 16-17 saver. He looked at our tickets and (presumably knowing these railcards aren’t blocked) asked me to scan my adult ticket, so he could see what code is popping up. The gate message was “seek assistance. Code 93”. Gate line staff said he hadn’t seen that one before. He looked it up and apparently code 93 means corrupt card. He let both of us through anyway as neither of us knew what that could mean. That said, I did have to convince him that I knew the train standing at Platform 1 was going to Birmingham, despite it having not been announced in the station yet.
My question is: what could have caused this code 93 card corrupt message? I’m pretty certain we had correct tickets.
Details:
Yesterday, I travelled from Birmingham Moor St to London Marylebone, with my teenage child, on Chiltern.
Purchase: I bought tickets the day before (Tuesday), via Avanti’s app. I applied the 16-17 saver for the teen, who has the (valid) railcard on their phone. Paid via PayPal and added the tickets to my iPhone wallet.
Restrictions: the tickets are off peak returns. Valid only for arrivals in London after 10:00am and routed via High Wycombe. I checked and couldn’t see any evening peak restrictions.
Journey taken:
Outbound: https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:C90770/2026-03-31/detailed#allox_id=0
Return: https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:C90877/2026-03-31/detailed#allox_id=0
Details: On arrival at Marylebone, I scanned my child’s ticket first, to allow them through. It flashed “seek assistance”, so we went to the gate line staff. I presumed it was due to the 16-17 saver being applied. They showed their saver to the guard and he allowed them through. I went to scan myself through with my adult ticket (no railcard applied), and the same thing happened. The guard let me through and we continued our day in London.
On return, I scanned the child’s ticket first - again ‘seek assistance’. In going to the guard I explained about the 16-17 saver. He looked at our tickets and (presumably knowing these railcards aren’t blocked) asked me to scan my adult ticket, so he could see what code is popping up. The gate message was “seek assistance. Code 93”. Gate line staff said he hadn’t seen that one before. He looked it up and apparently code 93 means corrupt card. He let both of us through anyway as neither of us knew what that could mean. That said, I did have to convince him that I knew the train standing at Platform 1 was going to Birmingham, despite it having not been announced in the station yet.
My question is: what could have caused this code 93 card corrupt message? I’m pretty certain we had correct tickets.