They did. That the OP refused to show it is evidence, along with their purchase history (of however many times they have done exactly the same thing, on CCTV). The claim not to have bought a ticket is a lie, and provably so. They were lying in wait and knew exactly what ticket was being used. The OP is well caught here.
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MarlowDonkey
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The Channel 5 programme about Fare Dodgers seems to imply that they are able to match CCTV images to ticket scans if they are carrying out a detailed investigation.
So they could identify someone entering a station near their home and log the ticket used. They can then also log the same person with a different ticket leaving a station somewhere near their workplace a commuter journey time late. I could imagine that's an expensive business in terms of man hours so they may only do it for suspected high value evasion.
Bones_4411
Member
Need some advice on next steps - Received the letter attached - Not sure if I should ask for CCTV footage to support the excel of tickets purchased? Any advice would be welomed.
Thanks
Thanks
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You will be very unlikely to get anything from CCTV.
Cut to the chase - were you stopped as stated?
If so, are you also guilty of a history of avoiding payment of correct fares?
You don’t have to tell us, but if the answers are ”yes” to both then you have a choice - prosecution, criminal record, fees and costs, or pay them to settle.
It may not seem good news, but they only want to recoup the difference between fares paid and owed. Often they want the full single fare for each journey.
Cut to the chase - were you stopped as stated?
If so, are you also guilty of a history of avoiding payment of correct fares?
You don’t have to tell us, but if the answers are ”yes” to both then you have a choice - prosecution, criminal record, fees and costs, or pay them to settle.
It may not seem good news, but they only want to recoup the difference between fares paid and owed. Often they want the full single fare for each journey.
Bones_4411
Member
Yes I was stopped as stated and I have no previous history of fair evasion.
Fawkes Cat
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That's not quite what you were asked:
Are you saying that you never fare dodged before i.e. that GTR are totally wrong to want money for 180+ other journeys - or are you saying that you have never been caught before?
The answer makes a considerable difference to what you should do next.
Gloster
Veteran Member
By ‘previous history’ do you mean that you have never evaded before this incident or do you mean that you have never been stopped or caught? The railway is very good at digging out information on your purchasing and travelling history, and making an untrue statement will go badly with it.
Haywain
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You mean you haven't been caught in the act before. You clearly have history or you wouldn't have been stopped in the way you were. Unless you can give a plausible rebuttal of any of the journeys that GTR have listed you will need to pay the settlement proposed.
Bones_4411
Member
Im not being untrue - Ive never been caught or stopped before this incident.
The letter is asking for admittance with the only evidence being an excel sheet with dates of purchases and I just thought this would have been supported with video.
Just looking for advice on repayments as Im not sure I can provide the full funds in the time that is being requested.
The letter is asking for admittance with the only evidence being an excel sheet with dates of purchases and I just thought this would have been supported with video.
Just looking for advice on repayments as Im not sure I can provide the full funds in the time that is being requested.
Haywain
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Maybe not but that isn't what you are being asked.
MarlowDonkey
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I should imagine they also have records of your ticket purchases from the retailer and they transcribed this data to the Excel sheet. They are offering a settlement, albeit an expensive one, by which you avoid a prosecution.
And they are doing OP a massive favour by subtracting the amount paid, which they don't normally do.
You can agree to pay but request a payment plan in light of the amount involved. We have seen cases in which this is agreed, whereas in the past it wasn’t. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.
There is no need for “evidence” to support the settlement offer, either you agree to settle on their terms or you get prosecuted, and for the latter there will be evidence from the one time you were stopped.
If I was you I'd be biting their hands off at that settlement offer. We don't normally see TOCs taking into account money already paid, so they're being extremely generous here. Normally repayment plans are not offered or available - but you may be able to negotiate this with the TOC, but expect a hefty up front payment and the plan duration to be short - think weeks rather than months.
If you are suggesting that some of the journeys listed are not cases of fare evasion, you will need to sort them out and tell the TOC. It will be up to them whether they believe you and potentially retract the settlement offer and proceed to prosecution if they think you're having them on. Donutting tickets in particular are easy to detect by the timings of taps / scans of the ticket - it will be obvious that this has occurred if the timings match up to the timetable of the day.
If you are suggesting that some of the journeys listed are not cases of fare evasion, you will need to sort them out and tell the TOC. It will be up to them whether they believe you and potentially retract the settlement offer and proceed to prosecution if they think you're having them on. Donutting tickets in particular are easy to detect by the timings of taps / scans of the ticket - it will be obvious that this has occurred if the timings match up to the timetable of the day.
Fawkes Cat
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Looking back through the merged thread, I see that we expected that this would end up in court, and you would need a solicitor. As things have panned out, the railway are offering you the chance to settle out of court - but if you don't take that chance, they will prosecute after all.
Unless you have convincing evidence that the railway are wrong to think that you fare dodged on a significant number of the occasions that they quote, I think you would be well advised to accept their offer of settlement, and pay up to make the problem go away.
Tetchytyke
Veteran Member
I'm not sure what you are asking here.
Are you asking that GTR ought to supply video evidence of you purchasing those tickets? I shouldn't laugh but, seriously, pull the other one. They already have all the evidence they need to support their settlement offer as they will have got your ticket purchasing history from your ticket retailer.
The only scope for negotiation is if there are any specific lines in the Excel which you don't agree with and you can provide some supporting evidence to show that you either a) bought the correct tickets or b) didn't travel.
Otherwise, you'd best get saving up.
GTR, to their credit, usually do credit the fares actually paid when it comes to these sorts of settlements.
They seem to have staff who take the sensible position that, in any civil enforcement action, they wouldn't get any more anyway.
You are basically a person who was caught stealing, let's say, a wall clock from Dunelm. Fair cop, they were waiting for you, you know you're a big fat clock thief and they've been lying in wait because they've done their research and reckon you're responsible for stealing £4,000 worth of wall clocks from them over the last few years. Then the police come and find your house has 186 other identical wall clocks in it! What a stunning coincidence, officer.
You're well caught here, and fortunate it was the railway you were ripping off and not some other business where they really will just call the police and have them arrest you.
As it stands, I assume you do not dispute the amount or the history. If you want to argue the toss I do not advise doing so unrepresented and I maintain you should have instructed a solicitor immediately. They will be able to handle the matter and judge whether the company's losses are accurate and reasonable (for example whether the fares charged really do reflect the proper fare for the journey made etc).
Bones_4411
Member
Thanks everyone for the advice. Really helpful
Generally a payment plan actually is available. It's just they don't want you to know that because of the difficulty of enforcing one. So if you were to offer to meet the sum with an initial payment of a quarter of it and the rest in monthly payments it'd probably just be accepted. It's their choice what to accept or not.
KNN
Member
Part of the government's programme to tackle obesity?
Whoops, forgot which section this is!
flitwickbeds
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I note the recent letter shared with us from Thameslink starts with "thanks for your response". Might not be helpful if the OP shares with us previous correspondence from GTR, and their response(s)?
It's all in the thread now. OP made a new thread and it has since been merged with the old one.