Should Railcards be dematerialized to prevent abuse?

[signed]

In France, you can opt into having your SNCF rail card be fully digitalized. This mean you never need to carry it as it just pops in the ticket inspector's handheld (on TGV only for now) machine, allowing them to have a instant way to see if the card is valid.

With the advent of PRT tickets, I understand that not all TI scan tickets over in the UK, but assuming everyone does, wouldn't it be better to have a unique national database ran by RDG with all the railcard information?

You would link your ticket purchase with your railcard's by entering its number, for the gold card, you would enter a reference about the season.

Hypothetically, that would basically eliminate JobCentre Plus railcard abuse overnight, prevent people that don't have a railcard from applying one, publicise more the use of Gold Cards since it could be auto-applied...

 

[Bletchleyite]

Doesn't work in the UK because we don't have a national ID card. If you just did the rest of it, people could buy Railcard tickets for others with impunity because there'd no longer be a photo to show.

If Labour introduce one, it'd be an option.

 

[signed]

people could buy Railcard tickets for others with impunity because there'd no longer be a photo to show.

You have to register a photo to dematerialize your SNCF railcard

 

[Bletchleyite]

You have to register a photo to dematerialize your SNCF railcard

Are traincrew able to view this photo en-route? What where there is no mobile signal? (The latter is a problem with what I call "true e-ticketing", i.e. where the barcode is just a number and the ticket is wholly in a database - this isn't the case for UK e-tickets, the barcode contains sufficient details to accept it).

 

[signed]

Are traincrew able to view this photo en-route?

Yes, once they scan it, it dumps all the ticket's info and the railcard info on the screen and in my experience they do reference your photo nearly all the time

 

[Bletchleyite]

Yes, they can

So a mobile signal is necessary to check a ticket?

I don't think that would be workable in the UK at present. In ten years maybe it will be.

 

[signed]

So a mobile signal is necessary to check a ticket?

Having no mobile/wifi signal basically never happens on TGV, so I can't confirm what happens

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Oct 2024 ==

Note that I don't know what is actually in a SNCF Aztec code, as it's encrypted, so it is maybe embedded, but I doubt it

 

[Bletchleyite]

Having no mobile/wifi signal basically never happens on TGV, so I can't confirm what happens

Ah. Having no mobile signal on the UK rail system is common, and there aren't any InterCity only Railcards, all Railcards bar the Network are valid in any part of the network (yes, the name seems ironic ) so need to be as checkable at Altnabreac (were it open) as they would be at Kings Cross.

Note that I don't know what is actually in a SNCF Aztec code, as it's encrypted, so it is maybe embedded, but I doubt it

I doubt a regular sized AZTEC code is big enough to encode a photograph, even compressed.

 

[signed]

I doubt a regular sized AZTEC code is big enough to encode a photograph, even compressed.

I doubt that as well

Having no mobile signal on the UK rail system is common, and there aren't any InterCity only Railcards, all Railcards bar the Network are valid in any part of the network (yes, the name seems ironic ) so need to be as checkable at Altnabreac (were it open) as they would be at Kings Cross.

Indeed, figured out as much, so that's a non-starter

 

[negone]

Should all railcards be made available via a registered national database, so you don't have to show them, or does that break data protection rules, a bit too much big brother, so if you book via northern or any toc it defaults to your railcard and checks the database for you, and sells you the right ticket. So when rpi check you ticket, it confirms the railcard details on the ticket. Also this stops opportunist rpi from penalty faring you. As a motorist, dvla already have my mot, insurance and road tax details, and warns me when they're due to expire.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Should all railcards be made available via a registered national database, so you don't have to show them, or does that break data protection rules, a bit too much big brother, so if you book via northern or any toc it defaults to your railcard and checks the database for you, and sells you the right ticket. So when rpi check you ticket, it confirms the railcard details on the ticket. Also this stops opportunist rpi from penalty faring you. As a motorist, dvla already have my mot, insurance and road tax details, and warns me when they're due to expire.

There's no legal bar to doing it, the bar is practical in so much as there are large parts of the network with no mobile signal. That will change over the coming years, though turning off 3G actually made it worse in places.

 

[signed]

people could buy Railcard tickets for others with impunity because there'd no longer be a photo to show.

Actually, my brain turned off and I didn't remember that you don't need any photo to buy a SNCF railcard, you can buy it with just name and DOB. You actually need to register a photo to fully dematerialize the card (else you would still need to have the inspector see the card) but the photo is then very much a case of very easy identity check to not have everyone ID themselves

 

[Starmill]

Most TOCs don't even appear to have bothered to connect their devices for retail/payment and scanning to an on-train private network... some may not even have set one up. Shows how much confidence there is in the uplink actually working.

There may be some who have done this.

 

[yorksrob]

In answer to the op, no.

Physical railcards are an easy to use, reliable form of ticketing that many value.

I'd also be interested to see what proportion of fares disputes turn up on these forums related to electronic railcards versus paper ones (rhetorical - not expecting anyone to go through them all).

But my impression is that electronic seems to be more problematic.

 

[signed]

Physical railcards are an easy to use, reliable form of ticketing that many value.

Of course they would never go away

But my impression is that electronic seems to be more problematic.

Because software is sloppier than a piece of paper, which is very much fair

 

[yorksrob]

Because software is sloppier than a piece of paper, which is very much fair

That seems to be true at any ticket barrier !

 

[AlastairFraser]

Are traincrew able to view this photo en-route? What where there is no mobile signal? (The latter is a problem with what I call "true e-ticketing", i.e. where the barcode is just a number and the ticket is wholly in a database - this isn't the case for UK e-tickets, the barcode contains sufficient details to accept it).

Why not download a set of basic railcard info (photo, date of issue and expiry, name, DOB) to the ticket checking device every few hours?

 

[HSTEd]

My own view is that railcards should just be dispensed with.

They allow qualifying groups an effective blanket cost reduction because they are very cheap compared to ticket prices.
Meanwhile people above 30 and below retirement age get nothing at all.

I don't think that the hassle and abuse loopholes are worth the extra income (especially as they are now so cheap that they are paid back very quickly indeed)

 

[signed]

effective blanket cost reduction because they are very cheap compared to ticket prices.

I do agree that we need a railcard for everyone (like SBB HalbTax), but that blanket cost reduction which is (at least in theory) funded by full-fare passengers.

Scrapping railcards would never mean price reductions (that simplification argument), so people that are eligible to one would loose

 

[takno]

Why not download a set of basic railcard info (photo, date of issue and expiry, name, DOB) to the ticket checking device every few hours?

That would be incredibly problematic from a data protection point of view. Ideally it wouldn't even hit persistent memory on the device, but would just display straight to screen.

This idea tbh has a lot more going for it than the existing stupid Railcard apps on users phones. If the ticket checker controls and has responsibility for the device doing the downloading then they just can't check the Railcard. No more people getting chinged up because the apps are useless or their phone is out of battery, and no more people getting away with pretending the app is broken or their phone is out of battery.

If you wanted to go an intermediate stage you could just make the Railcard a (semi) static barcode on the user's phone, which the ticket checker would scan to access a picture and other details from the central database. That way the user wouldn't need a data connection, and wouldn't be at the mercy of a dodgy app, and wouldn't have to mess around inputting the coffee when they bought tickets.

 

[HSTEd]

Why not download a set of basic railcard info (photo, date of issue and expiry, name, DOB) to the ticket checking device every few hours?

There could be millions of cards on issue.
UK passport photos are required to be at least 50kilobytes.

That would be 50GB of photos per million cards. Distributed to thousands of challenge points.

Nevermind the data protection issues!

 

[AlastairFraser]

That would be incredibly problematic from a data protection point of view. Ideally it wouldn't even hit persistent memory on the device, but would just display straight to screen.

It's not ideal, but maybe a hybrid could be a request to confirm your identity using a form of ID IF you choose not to carry the railcard, in conjunction with the database information.

This idea tbh has a lot more going for it than the existing stupid Railcard apps on users phones. If the ticket checker controls and has responsibility for the device doing the downloading then they just can't check the Railcard. No more people getting chinged up because the apps are useless or their phone is out of battery, and no more people getting away with pretending the app is broken or their phone is out of battery.

If you wanted to go an intermediate stage you could just make the Railcard a (semi) static barcode on the user's phone, which the ticket checker would scan to access a picture and other details from the central database. That way the user wouldn't need a data connection, and wouldn't be at the mercy of a dodgy app, and wouldn't have to mess around inputting the coffee when they bought tickets.

Sounds good! I think you may have had a nice cup of morning Joe on your mind when writing the last sentence though!

There could be millions of cards on issue.
UK passport photos are required to be at least 50kilobytes.

That would be 50GB of photos per million cards. Distributed to thousands of challenge points.

Nevermind the data protection issues!

50GB shouldn't be an issue if the data is stored on an SD within the ticket checking device (usually a glorified Android smartphone), but I agree that downloading would be problematic. Could the photos be compressed when downloading to save space?

 

[HSTEd]

50GB shouldn't be an issue if the data is stored on an SD within the ticket checking device (usually a glorified Android smartphone), but I agree that downloading would be problematic. Could the photos be compressed when downloading to save space?

The fifty kilobytes is for a jpeg file, which despite its age is a remarkably efficient compression algorithm.

You might do a bit better with a modern format but you will not get much below the jpeg figure.

 

[takno]

It's not ideal, but maybe a hybrid could be a request to confirm your identity using a form of ID IF you choose not to carry the railcard, in conjunction with the database information.

Sounds good! I think you may have had a nice cup of morning Joe on your mind when writing the last sentence though!

50GB shouldn't be an issue if the data is stored on an SD within the ticket checking device (usually a glorified Android smartphone), but I agree that downloading would be problematic. Could the photos be compressed when downloading to save space?

Yes... Coffee, it's always coffee.

The lowest you could get and still have a remotely recognizable photo is probably 5k. And actually if you're getting down to that I'm not sure you couldn't just include the whole picture in a decent-sized signed barcode... Now there's a thought

 

[signed]

Having the PII (personally identifiable information) of the majority of the country, on some unsecured handheld or server in the train that could easily be breached/stolen is a major no-no.

If that were to happen, it would need to be on a secure central server, like in France, which, with the current mobile signal on the UK railway may be an issue.

Surely something could be found as a stopgap, loading the full Railcard info on a smartcard, only allowing loading a ticket on a Railcard-registered smartcard and encouraging people to use smartcards would be easy. And people who want to use e/paper-tickets, they would still have to show the Railcard.

 

[AlastairFraser]

The fifty kilobytes is for a jpeg file, which despite its age is a remarkably efficient compression algorithm.

You might do a bit better with a modern format but you will not get much below the jpeg figure.

Fair enough.

Yes... Coffee, it's always coffee.

The lowest you could get and still have a remotely recognizable photo is probably 5k. And actually if you're getting down to that I'm not sure you couldn't just include the whole picture in a decent-sized signed barcode... Now there's a thought

Knowing the technological pace of British institutions, we may see the latter proposal in 20 years, I guess. Lol

Having the PII (personally identifiable information) of the majority of the country, on some unsecured handheld or server in the train that could easily be breached/stolen is a major no-no.

If that were to happen, it would need to be on a secure central server, like in France, which, with the current mobile signal on the UK railway may be an issue.

Surely something could be found as a stopgap, loading the full Railcard info on a smartcard, only allowing loading a ticket on a Railcard-registered smartcard and encouraging people to use smartcards would be easy. And people who want to use e/paper-tickets, they would still have to show the Railcard.

Issuing the railcard as a NFC smartcard, on which you could load validity and renewals onto using a smartphone as well as the traditional channels (ticket office, post etc.) may be a solution to enable paper railcard withdrawal, and I think people would be less likely to lose or misplace a more substantial plastic smartcard.
A sticker could also be applied to a space on the front of the smartcard, detailing the expiry date with a reminder to renew.

 

[Ashley Hill]

Railcards should start being issued in smart card form,possibly with a way of having your photo on. That way you will need to scan it to get a discount at an TVM etc ,and once expired it stops working. The railcard on phone option is open to abuse. Ive seen at least two of these where the photo is female but the name when scanned was male-her photo on a screenshot of partners railcard.

 

[signed]

Railcards should start being issued in smart card form,possibly with a way of having your photo on. That way you will need to scan it to get a discount at an TVM etc ,and once expired it stops working. The railcard on phone option is open to abuse. Ive seen at least two of these where the photo is female but the name when scanned was male-her photo on a screenshot of partners railcard.

The main issue I see is, has the ITSO standard allowed for such things to happen

 

[Ashley Hill]

The main issue I see is, has the ITSO standard allowed for such things to happen

I don’t know but I don’t see why it shouldn’t.

 

[Narrowgauge725]

So surely it is very simple if you choose to use your phone for your railcard then YOU take responsibility for that phone being charged. Both myself and wife manage to have our phone charged we have Senior railcards and my wife is not overly good with tech but has coped. We do only buy from the official railcard site.

As for doing away with railcards as some suggest, well that would mean we wouldn’t use the train. There are always seats available on trains we travel on so that income would disappear.