SWR Initial Letter after incorrect fare

[anon26]

Hi,

Since my wife lost her job I have stupidly done short faring from Clapham to Vauxhall instead of Sunbury to Vauxhall (including returns, maybe once a week for some time (approx 30-35 short fares)).

I was stopped at Vauxhall once and all my details taken down and was told they will be in touch, so have been very anxious waiting for the letter or email. I received the emai today from SWR....

"On 11th March 2026, you presented ticket number XXXXXXXX at Vauxhall to a member of Revenue Protection. Upon questioning, it was established that you had purchased a Clapham Junction to Vauxhall ticket when you claimed that your actual journey was between Sunbury and London Waterloo. You were issued a Report for Prosecution, number XXXXXXXX.

Further investigation of your online account has highlighted other potential inconsistencies in your ticket purchase history. This suggests that you may not be paying the correct fare for journeys made on the UK rail network.

Given the serious nature of this matter, we have taken this step to contact you and initiate a resolution, prior to escalating the matter to our case management team.

Please respond to this letter via email to: xxxxxx@swrailway.com within 7 days quoting the reference number SWRXXXXXXXX in the subject field."

I would appreciate any advice on how to respond initially.....do I initially just say thanks for getting in touch and ask them to send over any inconsistencies and that I would like to resolve the matter as soon as possible, or do I similar to other letters on this forum and confess to all the other journeys and sincerely apologise and ask for an out of court settlement.

I would really like to get this matter resolved asap to be honest and absolutely avoid any prosecution, as this is totally out of character for me but just tried to save a bit of money until we got back on our feet.

I have been paying the full fare since.

Thanks for your help.

 

[30907]

I would go for the first of your two options - as you know, there are several threads on this topic.

Please post a draft for comment.

 

[anon26]

Yes I have looked at several threads but couldn't work out if the responses were to the initial contact email/letter or later ones.

They obviously can see other inconsistencies in purchase history so what will the next step be, will they send me a list of my account transactions to let them know what ones I short fared?

I wasn't sure if I should just go back straight away to be honest about the short fares etc and how sorry i am and would hope to settle outside of court.

Otherwise should my first response be something like.....

Hi,

Thank you for getting in touch regarding the incorrect fare of Clapham Junction to Vauxhall, which should of been Sunbury to Vauxhall, and sincere apologies for this.

Please could you let me know the next steps so that I can resolve this matter as soon as possible.

Kind regards,

 

[WesternLancer]

Yes I have looked at several threads but couldn't work out if the responses were to the initial contact email/letter or later ones.

They obviously can see other inconsistencies in purchase history so what will the next step be, will they send me a list of my account transactions to let them know what ones I short fared?

I wasn't sure if I should just go back straight away to be honest about the short fares etc and how sorry i am and would hope to settle outside of court.

Otherwise should my first response be something like.....

Hi,

Thank you for getting in touch regarding the incorrect fare of Clapham Junction to Vauxhall, which should of been Sunbury to Vauxhall, and sincere apologies for this.

Please could you let me know the next steps so that I can resolve this matter as soon as possible.

Kind regards,

I think you probably need to expand a bit on that - the general advice on what to include in your response is as follows:

the reply basically needs to mention:

- That you are sorry for what has happened
- What you have learned from the incident and will not do this again - ie you understand this is a serious matter
- That you are keen to settle the matter without the need for court action
- Offer to pay the outstanding fare(s) and the railway company’s administrative costs in dealing with the matter

Since they clearly know you have a dodgy ticket record I don't think there is much point in avoiding mentioning it - but whilst covering the above points you could include something like:

'I would like to co-operate with your investigation, please send me a list of other occasions when you believe there may be irregularities with my tickets so that I can check that against my own records in order to try and resolve this as efficiently as possible' - or some such wording.

Then end up with the offer to pay outstanding fares etc in the hope the matter can be resolved without court action

 

[z444z]

Do post your revised draft so we can review it

 

[anon26]

Thanks for your responses, to be honest I have been worried sick about this, I know I have done wrong and just want to get it sorted without prosecution.
There are genuine tickets on there as my wife and kids use the account but I personally have short fared when needing to go into london mid week, so i just want to be honest and genuine about this to get it resolved and move on.
I dont know whether to be specific in my first email back or not as I want to be clear and genuine and avoid anyone thinking I am misleading them at all.

Maybe something like this.....

Hi,

Thank you for getting in touch regarding the incorrect fare of Clapham Junction to Vauxhall, which should of been Sunbury to Vauxhall.

I very much wish to fully co-operate with your investigation and resolve this without the need for court action.

I am extremely sorry for what has happened and have been very embarrassed, worried and annoyed with myself for not understanding fully the severity of my actions, it's something I never want to put myself or family through again.

Please could you send me a full list of the inconsistencies in my purchase history and allow me to validate and rectify them by paying any outstanding fares and any administrative costs occurred so that we come to a resolution that avoids any court prosecution.

Kind regards,

 

[WesternLancer]

Thanks for your responses, to be honest I have been worried sick about this, I know I have done wrong and just want to get it sorted without prosecution.
There are genuine tickets on there as my wife and kids use the account but I personally have short fared when needing to go into london mid week, so i just want to be honest and genuine about this to get it resolved and move on.
I dont know whether to be specific in my first email back or not as I want to be clear and genuine and avoid anyone thinking I am misleading them at all.

Maybe something like this.....

Hi,

Thank you for getting in touch regarding the incorrect fare of Clapham Junction to Vauxhall, which should of been Sunbury to Vauxhall.

I very much wish to fully co-operate with your investigation and resolve this without the need for court action.

I am extremely sorry for what has happened and have been very embarrassed, worried and annoyed with myself for not understanding fully the severity of my actions, it's something I never want to put myself or family through again.

Please could you send me a full list of the inconsistencies in my purchase history and allow me to validate and rectify them by paying any outstanding fares and any administrative costs occurred so that we come to a resolution that avoids any court prosecution.

Kind regards,

I guess given your concerns about resolving this you could be straight up and more specific - for example say eg

'I regret to say there are other occasions when I travelled without the correct ticket, and this has been a serious error of judgment on my part' - eg insert before the last para.

 

[anon26]

Thanks, yes perhaps its best to say that as I just want to get it resolved and dont want to come across as hiding anything.

 

[WesternLancer]

Thanks, yes perhaps its best to say that as I just want to get it resolved and dont want to come across as hiding anything.

From what we typically see I don't think saying that increases their prospects of opting for court action - so I don't think any particular downside in saying it - SWR regularly data trawl past ticket records to look for suspicious activity after people are caught (I can't think of a case with them where that hasn't happened actually, though you could search SWR cases on here yourself if desired) - so it's pretty much inevitable they will want to charge you for past errors if they can find them as a condition of any settlement.

You will need to be able to convince them tickets bought by your wife and kids on same account are fully legitimate - but cross that bridge when you get their list. The usual advice on that is being able to evidence the reason for the journey to the destination concerned in some plausible way, for example. eg 'my wife travels to x station because her parents live near there and here is some supporting evidence of her parents address near that station' or some such

As a general rule it's probably not a good idea to share accounts like this but of course many people do and probably only leads to later problems when someone using the account starts fare evading and eventually gets caught and then the whole account gets subject to detailed scrutiny either by human investigators or IT algorithms.