OhNoAPacer
Member
So to avoid fraud we link the ticket to a railcard, to check the person with the ticket is the person with the railcard we check the railcard, how does that differ from the current situation?
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Should railcards be linked/verified to online accounts?
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How would barriers be able to scan physical railcards ?
andy33gmail
Member
Chuck an Aztec code and/or RFID on new ones, gradually roll in over 3+ years
It differs in that it is not possible to claim the discount improperly by accident, because the only thing that matters is that you are entitled to the discount - and have that verified - when you *purchase the ticket*. This makes it dead easy to see people with non-entitled discounts as having done so dishonestly.
This is probably the biggest downside to the current system. In nearly all walks of life, if I forget to renew a subscription or entitlement, I am stopped from being able to use that entitlement. Forgot to pay Netflix? You can't watch it. Cancelled by gym direct debit? Oops, can't go inside. (And, of course, you'd be prompted immediately to rectify the situation)
Railcards are unusual in that if you forget to renew, nothing actually happens, but you can wander into the realms of committing a criminal offence even if you bought a ticket with an innocent mind. This affects younger people and non-drivers more and more because they simply will not expect it to be easy to claim discounts one is not entltled to.
andy33gmail
Member
VED possible another example, depending on how you pay for it
OhNoAPacer
Member
Okay so it might stop inadvertent use of a card, won't eliminate it completely as you might not realise you are in another users account if a family shared devices and don't log out.
It won't stop deliberate fraud attempts, detection of those is still by viewing the railcard as it is now.
I didn't say reduce all fares to the level current Railcards do. I said reduce fares. The level they are reduced by would be determined by calculating the current net cost of administering the current system, policy decisions such as whether to retain age related discounts but simply require proof of age to be carried instead of a Railcard, modelled changes in fare sales following the change, etc.
Given every country with a significant national rail network offers discounted fares to young adults and seniors (for good reason - it gets young adults into the habit and encourages seniors, many of whom are far from rich, to use the railway for discretionary journeys) it would be quite the departure to turn this logic on its head and offer flat fares for all.
I get it that airlines don't care about the age of their passengers (apart from minors), but they're flying planes between major cities; none offer flights from a suburb into a nearby centre so a passenger can go to work, visit friends or do a little shopping, to give just one example.
Sure, and like I say, you can keep discounted fares for young people or seniors, just ditch the Railcard aspect. When Toby Carvery do an over 60s discount they don't require people to pay and sign up for a Senior CarveryCard. 16 year olds getting a cinema discount don't need to pay and sign up for a 16-17 Saver CinemaCard, etc. My mum travelling in a powered wheelchair on Eurostar, TGV, and in Disneyland didn't need to sign up and pay for a Disabled EurostarCard, Disabled TGVCard, Disabled DisneylandCard, etc.
If anything the current setup deters occasional travellers from getting the discounted fares, because they may think the £30 or whatever Railcard fee isn't worth it.
That's fine. At least you can tell who is doing fraud and who isn't, unlike now, where people are unwittingly accused and end up with a bill of thousands of pounds. Which is frankly an embarrassment to everyone involved.
Surely it would simply be better if every ticket inspection required verification of the possession of a valid railcard, either on the train or at ticket barriers. In the latter case a railcard would need to be presented before/after the ticket before the gates would operate (or just force a manual inspection as is done today already). In the former, well, I just don't know why on-train inspections often simply don't bother with railcards anyway.
It wouldn't stop barrier-less inspection-less fraud, but even at my barrier-less local station, it's very likely that my destination will have barriers.
Yes, it would slow down the use of barriers, but to be honest they are often clogged by clueless people anyway standing in the way whilst trying to find their ticket.
Given that railcard fraud seems rife, it would be a small price to pay to ensure that the majority of it gets stopped.
I'm not the target audience, of course, but I usually present my railcard unasked when on a train, and wouldn't object to doing so at a barrier.
It wouldn't stop barrier-less inspection-less fraud, but even at my barrier-less local station, it's very likely that my destination will have barriers.
Yes, it would slow down the use of barriers, but to be honest they are often clogged by clueless people anyway standing in the way whilst trying to find their ticket.
Given that railcard fraud seems rife, it would be a small price to pay to ensure that the majority of it gets stopped.
I'm not the target audience, of course, but I usually present my railcard unasked when on a train, and wouldn't object to doing so at a barrier.
redreni
Established Member
The rejection of a ticket at a barrier because it is Railcard-discounted forces manual intervention, but manual inspection of the Railcard is not forced. In fact it's very rare in my experience. Like, once in 10 years rare. Maybe that's part of the OP's problem?
Yeah, I usually find these threads are struggling to find a technical solution to a non-technical problem. Our rates of ticket checking, and even worse railcard checking, are abysmal in many parts of the network. Whether that's because barrier staff are underpaid, RPIs aren't hired in enough quanties, guards/TMs are properly incentivised like they are on Northern, but the real solution is passengers getting tickets and railcards checked on the majority of their journey. Everything else is plastering over the cracks and leaving vast open holes elsewhere still
Asking passengers to scan a ticket and then a railcards is going to slow gatelines down to a crawl. Totally unfeasible.
Especially at busy terminals. Doing this at somewhere like the upper platforms at St Pancras would be horrendous.
All this points to barriers not being the answer!
Remember that overall, barriers are very much not the norm.
In my view serious revenue blocks, with consequences*, should be considered. They don't need to be ubiquitous, but they need to be common enough that the average traveller will bump into the possibility of one often enough to take seriously.
Then people will self-regulate much more.
If we can't achieve that, the finer points of railcard validity are nowhere near the top of the priority list!
* - The consequences should be civil, not criminal (with suitable exceptions for major fraud - to be prosecuted by CPS) but serious enough to hurt, and with a national mechanism for recording infractions, with increasing hurt for increasing violation.
I appreciate that this is scoff territory, but I think worthy of consideration.
Remember that overall, barriers are very much not the norm.
In my view serious revenue blocks, with consequences*, should be considered. They don't need to be ubiquitous, but they need to be common enough that the average traveller will bump into the possibility of one often enough to take seriously.
Then people will self-regulate much more.
If we can't achieve that, the finer points of railcard validity are nowhere near the top of the priority list!
* - The consequences should be civil, not criminal (with suitable exceptions for major fraud - to be prosecuted by CPS) but serious enough to hurt, and with a national mechanism for recording infractions, with increasing hurt for increasing violation.
I appreciate that this is scoff territory, but I think worthy of consideration.
If having a valid railcard is a requirement, as it is, then presenting a valid railcard at a barrier along with a ticket should also be a requirement. Simple. If railcard fraud is endemic, then this would fix it.
Put an Aztec code on railcards to enable this.
If this is impractical, then something else should change.
Put an Aztec code on railcards to enable this.
If this is impractical, then something else should change.
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RyanOPlasty
Member
This is impractical because if both the railcard and the tickets are on a phone, then there is a significant delay in switching between the two at the gateline.
redreni
Established Member
My commuting life is one long story of being delayed at gatelines by people who like having their phone requisitioned by the transport operator as the medium to hold their ticket, and then don't seem to be able to coordinate using the phone to present the ticket without interminable delay.
Letting people have their Railcard on their phone is a choice. If it causes too much delay at gatelines, the industry could choose not to offer it as an option. I know this is sacrilege and the future is supposed to lie in ever more intrusive ways of tracking people and charging them whatever fare the operator deems appropriate, but I don't see why it isn't reasonable to issue Railcards as a type of ITSO Smartcard and encourage passengers to have their tickets issued to the Smartcard (subject to what I said above about preserving the ability to shop around for tickets, i.e. any retailer should be able to issue tickets to any Smartcard).
Wallsendmag
Established Member
Railcard checks at gates aren’t the answer , validation at most purchase points is on the horizon
Given that one can purchase tickets with railcard validity at ant TVM without having to prove the railcard is held, it would seem bizarre to require validation when purchasing online. The answer is surely to be more robust in asking for railcards during ticket checks. I have only been asked to show my railcard once in an on-train ticket checks over the past year. For some reason, asking for railcards seems to have gone off the radar for staff when checking e- tickets when they would have asked for them as a matter of routine with physical tickets.
redreni
Established Member
A Railcard check during ticket checks onboard or at a revenue block en route or at the destination is rather late, from the point of view of somebody who inadvertently overlooked the expiry of their Railcard.
At point of purchase could be way too early, unless the rules on validity change so that a Railcard-discounted ticket is valid in conjunction with a Railcard that was valid on the date of purchase (rather than the date of travel).
At a gateline before you start your journey is a good time to check, because anyone with an expired Railcard can be turned back and directed to the ticket office (if it is open), or their preferred retailer's app, to sort it out. They may experience great inconvenience, particularly if the time it takes them to sort themselves out causes them to miss their train (especially if it is an Advance). Depending on the Railcard type and any evidence needed on renewal, it might not be possible to sort it out straight away. But it's better than being caught travelling without a valid ticket, and this is where you'd hope discretion would be shown to excess away the Railcard discount and allow the customer to get on with their journey.
I'm sure the TOCs are only thinking about what mode of enforcement is most convenient for them, however, rather than looking at it from the passenger's point of view, and how to prevent abuse while helping honest people avoid mistakes and pay the right fare.
At point of purchase could be way too early, unless the rules on validity change so that a Railcard-discounted ticket is valid in conjunction with a Railcard that was valid on the date of purchase (rather than the date of travel).
At a gateline before you start your journey is a good time to check, because anyone with an expired Railcard can be turned back and directed to the ticket office (if it is open), or their preferred retailer's app, to sort it out. They may experience great inconvenience, particularly if the time it takes them to sort themselves out causes them to miss their train (especially if it is an Advance). Depending on the Railcard type and any evidence needed on renewal, it might not be possible to sort it out straight away. But it's better than being caught travelling without a valid ticket, and this is where you'd hope discretion would be shown to excess away the Railcard discount and allow the customer to get on with their journey.
I'm sure the TOCs are only thinking about what mode of enforcement is most convenient for them, however, rather than looking at it from the passenger's point of view, and how to prevent abuse while helping honest people avoid mistakes and pay the right fare.
philthetube
Established Member
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The extra steps could be removed after the first viewing with a don't show this again message
andy33gmail
Member
That’s just a lack of imagination. There’s no reason you couldn’t have a single Aztec code in your Apple wallet that proves you have both the ticket & railcard at once
Ideally, if a railcard database existed, eTickets or PRT should embed a signed reference to the Railcard. eTickets and PRT with a Railcard discount are already by the nature of them nominative.
bcarmicle
Member
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No they're not; I can buy a Network Railcard discounted eTicket for myself, be taken ill and send it to a colleague to use.
And I can buy a Senior Railcard discounted ticket and pass it to another Senior Railcard holder rather than use it myself.
I could also buy a 16-25 discounted ticket, which I clearly am not entiltled to use myself, and pass it to a railcard holding grandchild as a present.
Plenty of other examples as well.
I think most people don't feel very intruded upon for a rail industry system somewhere to know that they travelled from Middlesbrough to Eaglescliffe yesterday. I don't think most people walk around with that kind of concern, and rightly want choice and convenience.
RyanOPlasty
Member
I'd be happy with that, but whilst it sounds simple, I'm sure there would be practical difficulties to make this work in all cases.
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