I would like some advice please. I was stopped in July at Vauxhall station for having a short fare ticket from Clapham to Vauxhall, I was asked where i got on and in my panic I said I got on at New Malden, which was actually incorrect as I got on at Claygate. I am afraid this wasn't the only time I have short fared a journey.
I received an email from SW Trains a couple of days ago requesting "If you consider that there are any explanations or mitigating factors that may influence our investigation, you are invited to respond to this email".
Following previous advice given on this forum, I replied by expressing my apologies for my poor judgement and requested the opportunity to settle out of court etc. I did not however admit in my response that I had short fared a number of times and I didn't explicitly say it was the only time I had short fared. It didn't ask which station I actually got on at so I didn't add that information, i kept the response just to answering their questions.
However, I received a very prompt reply to my email with a spreadsheet (with info pulled from Trainline) showing a number of journeys 133 in total that they are investigating, requesting to know the start and finish stations, whether the journey was single or return and if I travelled with a ticket with a Railcard discount.
A number of the queries seem to be regarding a Railcard, I did and do have a valid Railcard, but in my haste on Trainline, didn't always add it to the ticket, so I can see why they are querying that, so on some journeys I added a Railcard and on others I didn't so I can see that it looks like I didn't have a valid Railcard. To compound the issue slightly on a couple of occasions I selected the incorrect Railcard ie the 16-17 saver rather than the 16-25.
There are also a couple of occasions where I have a bought a ticket twice as the phone signal dropped out and the Trainline history shows two tickets for the same journey although for different start locations, but I have paid the full fare as well as a short fare. There are however around 50 out of the 133 that I did short fare and I have updated their spreadsheet and have admitted to those. For the remaining 83 that they are querying they are all correctly paid for although with the exception of choosing the wrong discount card on a couple of occasions. I have responded and expressed my apologies once more and requested to pay all penalties etc.
I should add that for the journey in July that I was stopped for, that is highlighted on the spreadsheet, I was honest and gave the correct start station, but in my first email I didn't state that because they didn't ask the start station.
During that period as well as using Trainline for ticket purchases, I also used my South West Trains Tap2Go card a number of times when I paid the full fare, ie my short fares were only through trainline.
Would it be worth pulling my payment history and sending it over to the investigating team to demonstrate that I did on many occasions pay the full fare which, and my percentage history for short fare was actually lower than it seems when looking at Trainline data alone and was only for a short period of time that I short fared via Trainline when I was under a lot of external stress and really wasn't thinking straight.
I have received a response to my email when I completed the information they requested as follows:
Thank you for your prompt reply. I confirm that we have received your email and note its contents and the information you have provided. We will process this information and update the case file accordingly.
If we require any further details during the course of our investigation, we will be in touch. Once the case has been processed, we will send a confirmation email outlining the next steps.
Any advice gratefully received - I'm really stressed!
I received an email from SW Trains a couple of days ago requesting "If you consider that there are any explanations or mitigating factors that may influence our investigation, you are invited to respond to this email".
Following previous advice given on this forum, I replied by expressing my apologies for my poor judgement and requested the opportunity to settle out of court etc. I did not however admit in my response that I had short fared a number of times and I didn't explicitly say it was the only time I had short fared. It didn't ask which station I actually got on at so I didn't add that information, i kept the response just to answering their questions.
However, I received a very prompt reply to my email with a spreadsheet (with info pulled from Trainline) showing a number of journeys 133 in total that they are investigating, requesting to know the start and finish stations, whether the journey was single or return and if I travelled with a ticket with a Railcard discount.
A number of the queries seem to be regarding a Railcard, I did and do have a valid Railcard, but in my haste on Trainline, didn't always add it to the ticket, so I can see why they are querying that, so on some journeys I added a Railcard and on others I didn't so I can see that it looks like I didn't have a valid Railcard. To compound the issue slightly on a couple of occasions I selected the incorrect Railcard ie the 16-17 saver rather than the 16-25.
There are also a couple of occasions where I have a bought a ticket twice as the phone signal dropped out and the Trainline history shows two tickets for the same journey although for different start locations, but I have paid the full fare as well as a short fare. There are however around 50 out of the 133 that I did short fare and I have updated their spreadsheet and have admitted to those. For the remaining 83 that they are querying they are all correctly paid for although with the exception of choosing the wrong discount card on a couple of occasions. I have responded and expressed my apologies once more and requested to pay all penalties etc.
I should add that for the journey in July that I was stopped for, that is highlighted on the spreadsheet, I was honest and gave the correct start station, but in my first email I didn't state that because they didn't ask the start station.
During that period as well as using Trainline for ticket purchases, I also used my South West Trains Tap2Go card a number of times when I paid the full fare, ie my short fares were only through trainline.
Would it be worth pulling my payment history and sending it over to the investigating team to demonstrate that I did on many occasions pay the full fare which, and my percentage history for short fare was actually lower than it seems when looking at Trainline data alone and was only for a short period of time that I short fared via Trainline when I was under a lot of external stress and really wasn't thinking straight.
I have received a response to my email when I completed the information they requested as follows:
Thank you for your prompt reply. I confirm that we have received your email and note its contents and the information you have provided. We will process this information and update the case file accordingly.
If we require any further details during the course of our investigation, we will be in touch. Once the case has been processed, we will send a confirmation email outlining the next steps.
Any advice gratefully received - I'm really stressed!
