Irish Rail want €100 from me for paying them the correct fare

partyatmygaff · 27-03-2013 3:28pm #1

Matter being dealt with.

LXFlyer · 27-03-2013 3:47pm

There is quite a difference between the two tickets. The student ticket allowed you to travel across the entire Short Hop Zone rather than just specifically between Castleknock and the city as the adult ticket does (it's a point to point ticket).

How are they to know whether you've been going further or not?

The reality is you had a ticket that you could have been using to/from Maynooth, Balbriggan or Kilcoole without the appropriate ID. Sorry to be blunt about it, but you *could* therefore have been defrauding them (whether you went beyond Castleknock and the city centre is really irrelevant).

dmeehan · 27-03-2013 3:50pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

completely unbeknown to me my student travelcard had expired back in December 2012

:rolleyes:

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 3:58pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Considering I don't want to give a company over €100 for the luxury of being insulted by them and being falsely accused of being a fare evader and more importantly don't want to accept their accusations against my character, I was wondering if anyone knew of a contact in Irish Rail (Perhaps in Management or Customer Services) who'd be better placed to deal with the situation.

It wasn't for fare evasion as Lxflyer said. You were fined for not having the identification required to establish your eligibility for the ticket you were using.

bikeman1 · 27-03-2013 4:03pm

Invalid ID for the ticket you were using. Therefore it was an invalid ticket you were travelling on.

Pay the fine,; move on and buy the correct ticket for your journey. Simple.

Poxyshamrock · 27-03-2013 4:10pm

Has Irish Rail not gotten rid of the need to have a Student Travelcard allowing you to use any valid third level Student Card?

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 4:11pm

You are still avoiding what the actual issue was. They can't have their inspectors cross checking everyone with all the staff at all the stations, it'd be a waste of time. You didn't have valid ID for the ticket you purchased, you shouldn't be travelling on it. Whether or not it was of the same value for point to point as explained earlier is irrelevant. The matter in question is the lack of required identification.

Poxyshamrock wrote: »

Has Irish Rail not gotten rid of the need to have a Student Travelcard allowing you to use any valid third level Student Card?

AFAIK, That was only on specials.

partyatmygaff · 27-03-2013 4:14pm

Poxyshamrock wrote: »

Has Irish Rail not gotten rid of the need to have a Student Travelcard allowing you to use any valid third level Student Card?

For some routes...
http://www.irishrail.ie/cat_offers.jsp?i=4479

Dravokivich wrote: »

AFAIK, That was only on specials.

It's not.

Third level students no longer need a student travelcard to avail of our intercity fares, it is now our official policy to accept valid college ID.

http://www.irishrail.ie/cat_offers.jsp?i=4479

corktina · 27-03-2013 4:14pm

all you can do is pay up, you didn't have the required ID for the ticket you bought. It's not relevant what the fare is

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 4:18pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

It's not.

Eh, the next bit you should bold then,

to avail of our intercity fares, it is now our official policy to accept valid college ID.

Won't cover Commuter/Dart services.

If you want to appeal, the only way you can do that is by providing a valid Student Travel Card.

Edit:
On the link you provided it also stipulates:

This promotion is available until 30th September 2013.

That refers to a "Special"

PRAF · 27-03-2013 4:27pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Allow me to explain how this situation unfolded.

For nearly the past two years, i've been commuting every day from Castleknock to the City Centre on the Maynooth line. Being a student, I got a student travelcard back in first year and very foolishly thought that Irish Rail's student weekly tickets were actually discounted relative to their adult weekly tickets. As it so happens, they're not. Both are €23.50.

Very recently, I was fined €100 and an extra €2.80 as completely unbeknown to me my student travelcard had expired back in December 2012 (I memorised the number back in Sept 2011 and kept it hidden away with my other unused cards). At that point, I stopped using student tickets and found out that adult tickets were the exact same price.

Naturally, I assumed that as the two fares are priced exactly the same and that as no revenue was lost a simple email to the RPU would sort things out. After all, I'm a regular paying customer (And have the evidence for that with past tickets) and it doesn't make any sense to penalise a regular customer who in absolute terms did not do anything wrong (i.e. I paid the correct fare) for running afoul of a messy system that your own company made.

As you can tell from the existence of this thread, the RPU don't really care and have no interest in hearing any of that and just want their €100 (or else).

Considering I don't want to give a company over €100 for the luxury of being insulted by them and being falsely accused of being a fare evader and more importantly don't want to accept their accusations against my character, I was wondering if anyone knew of a contact in Irish Rail (Perhaps in Management or Customer Services) who'd be better placed to deal with the situation.

Unfortunate situation. I sympathise as it doesn't look like you did an awful lot wrong. Your 'transgression' is pretty tame when you consider that you have lots of others who do far worse and get away with it time and again.

However........I think you should accept that you did make an error here in not having the required photo ID. Better off paying the fine IMHO

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 4:28pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

I'm well aware. I said that earlier in the thread.

Would that actually work? I.e. would sending them a scan of an up to date student travel card sort things out? It seems a lot less hassle.

If you can show it's your card and you just didn't have it on you, it should.

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 4:32pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

I had the old one with me which is what I presented. Does that make a difference?

The old one, being invalid, won't be considered for appeal as it was out of date.

Edit:

re-reading I noticed, thats not what you meant. I'm not sure what level of note taking would be made by the inspector at the time. It'd depend on whether they made a comment of not produced ID, or invalid ID.

Unless you can show that you have a valid ID, there'd be very little grounds for appeal tbh.

serfboard · 27-03-2013 4:41pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

All i'm kindly asking for is whether or not anyone knows of someone they could refer me to who they think may be able to help in this situation.

I don't think anyone in Irish Rail will be able to help in this situation.

Who do you think you are - Luke "Ming" Flanagan?

bbuzz · 27-03-2013 5:48pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

It's a pointless piece of plastic.

Ah now, you get discounts in McDonalds with the Student Travel Card, it's great!

Anyway, you got caught and the rules are pretty clear (says it on the back of the ticket): not only did you not have you student card on you, but it was out of date as well.

Just pay the fine and move on. The new student cards are leap cards as well so you might as well invest in one.

Peppa Pig · 27-03-2013 6:45pm

Going by Irish rail's "No ticket, no travel, no excuse" your ticket was invalid without a valid id so you get issued with a fixed penalty notice. It may seem harsh but from what I've read on here the inspectors seem to be consistent in not accepting any excuse.

I would very much be in the "you were wrong, so pay the fine" brigade but I feel that this case is different in that it was an expired student card not an adult trying to buy a student ticket and save a few quid. There is an email address on the FPN, so just pop them an email and appeal it.

There was a case on here a few weeks back where an unlikely appeal was successful so give Irish Rail the chance to adjudicate on your reasoning before you tar them with the comments you have come out with.

bbuzz · 27-03-2013 6:45pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Indeed. I got caught in the middle of committing the heinous crime of possessing proof that I paid the appropriate fare. I'm such a scumbag.

You got caught travelling without a valid student travel card: Yes.
Is it a crime? No, and I never said it was.

partyatmygaff wrote: »

I'm sick and tired of this "Just pay the fine" line that people on this forum love to repeat as if Irish Rail can do no wrong and have the right to demand lump sums of €100 from their customers for falling afoul of their ridiculous and inconsistent policies.

It says you need a valid STC on the back of the ticket, the website, the terms of carriage, I even got told by staff I needed one the last time I bought one. It also seems pretty sensible to me: People leave University each year and a lot of 3rd level institutions don't put expiry dates on their student cards anymore, so Irish Rail needs a way to make sure you're still a student. If your card's expired, how do they know you haven't left University in the mean time? TBH it's completely the opposite of ridiculous and inconsistent.

If you read the forum you'll see people don't think that Irish Rail "can do no wrong", quite the opposite in fact. The reason you're getting no sympathy, though, is because you were clearly in breach of the rules. If you don't like their rules, then you don't need to use them. But Dublin Bus and the Luas have exactly the same ones.

the groutch · 27-03-2013 7:19pm

Congrats on the 10,000 posts OP.

I know it sucks, but even if it was an honest mistake, the rules have to be there to stop abuse of the system, and this is one you'll just have to put down to experience.

LXFlyer · 27-03-2013 7:27pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Thinking through it logically, it's obvious that couldn't be the case.

If I actually went to any stations further than Castleknock - Pearse either way on the line, why would I have changed to buying Castleknock-Pearse tickets? Why would the staff at both stations recognise me (Well most of them anyway)? If my commute started from Maynooth, why would I buy tickets at Castleknock week in, week out? If my commute ended in Sandymount, why wouldn't I just buy a ticket up to there to avoid trouble getting through barriers? It's not likely to cost that much more after all.

It's a pointless piece of plastic. I memorised the 6 digit ID number back in September 2011, put the card in with a mass of other redundant cards and never looked at it again. What's so hard to believe?

You are completely missing the point. The two tickets are completely different products.

The ticket you had in your possession at the time that you received the standard fare penalty of €100 entitled you to unlimited travel across the entire Irish Rail Short Hop Zone. You did not have the correct ID with which to use that ticket.

The adult ticket that you subsequently purchased only allowed you unlimited travel between Castleknock and the City Centre.

How are we or they to know whether you didn't use that student ticket for a trip elsewhere? We don't and we can't as they're only magnetic stripe tickets.

That's why I'm saying that what you claim you actually did is irrelevant, as you COULD have done far more!

You were using a ticket that offers a significant discount over the comparable adult ticket, i.e. the adult short hop weekly ticket (NOT the adult point to point you subsequently bought) without the appropriate ID that you need to use that ticket - end of story.

P_1 · 27-03-2013 7:35pm

The way I see it is that under their rules you need to be carrying a valid travel card as well as the ticket to travel on that ticket. Just the ticket doesn't seem to cut it for them I'm afraid. Unfortunately when your ticket was checked you didn't have the card on you so it seems that under their rules you have to pay the fine.

I can't see any way to avoid paying the fine apart from appealing it all the way to the courts and even then there's no guarantee that you can win.

Hilly Bill · 27-03-2013 7:41pm

All the contact info you need is in their website Irishrail.ie

1850366222.

Has any of these "Ive been fined" threads been started by someone that wasnt a student?

OP, are you still a student?

LXFlyer · 27-03-2013 7:50pm

Just to make this quite clear - there are NO Student point to point tickets available - only one that covers the entire Short Hop zone.

Hence where you bought it is irrelevant.

jamesbondings · 27-03-2013 7:50pm

If you want to appeal, the only way you can do that is by providing a valid Student Travel Card.

Friend of mine got caught on dublin bus,got the fine and didnt have their student card (travel pass yokie) so went into college during the week and picked one up, as they dont have an issued on date and only an expires in date they let him away with the fine, he just told them it was at home!

id pay the 15 euro for the pass and let that be that!

Hilly Bill · 27-03-2013 8:14pm

You asked for someone that can help you and its them. If its not then who?

"Perhaps it's because of Irish Rail's handling of things that they seem to be the ones who encounter the most hassle? "

The hassle is self inflicted and can be easily avoided if some students didnt think that they knew better.

Dravokivich · 27-03-2013 8:35pm

partyatmygaff wrote: »

A bit of lateral thinking shows that it is incredibly unlikely and not significant. Given the fact that I have a number of point-to-point tickets showing the part of Irish Rail's network that I actually use and how nonsensical it would be to buy such tickets if I actually traveled further than either of those two points, it's patently clear that I do actually travel between those stations and no further.
I'd say the exact opposite. What happened is what matters. What could have happened and every "What if" scenario aren't relevant.

No need for any of that fancy mumbo jumbo, as your previous journeys are irrelevant. The inspector is taking into consideration what they are facing there and then.

You didn't have a valid student travel card at the time and unless you are able produce a valid student travel card, there is no other option for appeal.

Irish Rail can't have an appeals department bogged down in looking up or correlating your consumer history. As that means it'll have to be provided for everyone else that doesn't agree with being fined.

If all of a sudden I decided not to get a ticket to work tomorrow, I don't expect to say, well here, look at all these tickets I used over the last couple of weeks and get off with it.

dissed doc · 27-03-2013 9:15pm

I think you need to have the correct ticket for your journey along with associated correct and valid ID if that is required. If you don't have them, then you are at fault.

You basically want to get away with not producing the precisely correct proof for your journey.

Forgetting it expired is not their problem, it's yours. Just like forgetting your driver license expired, etc., .

partyatmygaff · 27-03-2013 9:24pm

...

MarkyMark22 · 27-03-2013 9:26pm

You have a couple of options..

A) Stop acting like a brat and admit you made a mistake and learn from it.

There is no B.

misslt · 27-03-2013 9:26pm

OP I think you're going to have to suck it up.

The price of the ticket is irrelevant, the fact that its the same price as the adult ticket is irrelevant - they're different tickets. Just because you only used the student one for part of its validity so to speak isn't the issue.

Either way, you had a Student Ticket with an Invalid Student Travelcard - simple as.

Sorry if it sounds harsh, but I'd be very surprised if you successfully appealed it.

partyatmygaff · 27-03-2013 9:31pm

...

Hilly Bill · 27-03-2013 9:33pm

You asked for someone that can help you, i gave you a number to ring.I was wondering if anyone knew of a contact in Irish Rail (Perhaps in Management or Customer Services) who'd be better placed to deal with the situation. How was that a smart response? You can either ring them and plead your case if you feel so strongly or not bother which would mean that you are only looking for a bit of sympathy. Its your choice.
If you have an issue with Irish Rail then you take it up with Irish Rail , nobody else can help you.

Think I know better? What exactly are you implying?

Im implying that you knew what you were doing
.

Irish Rail want €100 from me for paying them the correct fare

Comments