Fined on Dublin Bus!

rayfitz · 19-10-2005 10:27pm #1

Let me tell ye what happened on monday.
I was on my way into college on my local bus (only because i didn want to drive in as i usually do) where i paid €1.50. checked my ticket upstairs and hed underpaid as was meant to get off before my stop. shrugged and thought id be ok. get to 2 stops before mine and 3 inspectors get on. I saw them at the stop so decided i better get off. One stops me and asks for my ticket, i say its upstairs and he makes me get it. Say il pay the extra 25c but he says no.
Name address phone, etc. Proof of name and address. then phones to check the address. holds up the bus for 5 mins and then gives me a ticket for €30, the reason?
"Passenger had €1.50 ticket for a €1.75 journey"
So pay the fine or court appearance wit possible €500 fine or 3 months imprisionment.

so, has anybody been fined before? what happened? do i have to pay this ridicioulous fine?

thanks,
Ray

aliveandkicking · 19-10-2005 10:35pm

Its not a ridiculous fine, it is a justified fine because you knowingly didn't pay the correct fare. If every passenger on Dublin Bus paid 25 cent less than they were supposed to how many millions would Dublin Bus lose?

rayfitz · 19-10-2005 10:52pm

Why do you assume i "knowingly" didnt pay the correct fare? I thought that for a journey of less than 7 miles the fare would be €1.50 as on the bus i was on it used to be €1.75 into town 12ish miles. Have a car so very rarely get the bus, hence, was unaware of the correct fare. Talked to a few people about this and if they were short an inspector told them to just pay the additional money.

murphaph · 19-10-2005 11:02pm

rayfitz wrote:

Why do you assume i "knowingly" didnt pay the correct fare? I thought that for a journey of less than 7 miles the fare would be €1.50 as on the bus i was on it used to be €1.75 into town 12ish miles. Have a car so very rarely get the bus, hence, was unaware of the correct fare. Talked to a few people about this and if they were short an inspector told them to just pay the additional money.

Sorry for your troubles, but it's a basic premise that ignorance of the law is not an excuse, and the rules that govern fares are laws like any others. You'll have to pay the fine and be more careful in future. I'm glad to see CIE taking a hard line on all fare evasion-intentional or otherwise. It needs the deterrent factor that Luas currently enjoys.

mackerski · 19-10-2005 11:23pm

I'm an infrequent bus user too, so I understand how you mightn't know the fare. You seem to have chosen at random from the possible fares, which isn't an approach I've ever used - I usually state my destination to the driver, which is what Dublin Bus have been telling us to do for years. The fact that you stayed on after realising your mistake may not make you Mountjoy material, but you can't honestly be surprised at the outcome.

Remember that if we're to get a useful integrated ticketing system, it would help immensely if bus ticketing could move closer to a Luas-style honesty system, and that needs the kind of solid revenue protection that you experienced. Unfortunately, the chances of this happening seem about the same as your chances of being excused your fine.

Dermot

Metrobest · 19-10-2005 11:24pm

I don't blame your being angry, Ray. There is no coherent ticket control policy on Dublin Bus - I've seen people wheel out the lamest excuses and get away with just paying for the fare they dodged. You probably caught the inspector on a bad day but that's not good enough for a 21st century bus company, is it? If you feel strongly enough that you were treated unfairly, study up on the law and argue it in the courts. There may be a loophole for you somewhere. I read a story one time about a guy who got caught without a ticket on the Crumlin Road, but the inspector wrote "Iveagh Gardens" or something like that on the ticket. When the case came to court, the judge threw it out on the grounds that there was no bus route on the Iveagh Gardens.

If the system was simplified, these kinds of cases would be stamped out. A simple fare structure would be two zones - central (to canal), inner, and outer (maynooth etc.). Such a zonal system, albeit more complex, operates in Amsterdam. As the tram or bus moves into a new zone, an annoucment is made: "zone border". This completely eliminates the excuse of "I didn't know I had a wrong ticket". When paying for your ticket by coin on the bus, the cost could be 1eur to travel in one zone (valid on all buses in zone for 60 minutes), 2eur to travel in two (90 minutes) and 3eur to travel in three (2 hours). There would be discounts for pre-paid tickets. 1,2,3 .. A,B,C! Easy.

Goodshape · 20-10-2005 12:27am

Dublin bus is a joke if you ask me. With regards your fine - you got caught, stinger. But it's the rules.

But seriously, the way they run things is dreadful, slow and ineffecient. As someone who's not in Dublin that much, I get on a bus and there's no indicator as to how much it costs - meaning I have to ask the driver who in my experience never seems best pleased about having to answer my question. There's also not a map in sight to tell me the route, no anouncement to tell me what stop is coming up or what stop I'm at... the bloody bus stops don't even seem to display the place name.

Good transport in a city is about as important as having running water. If people can't get from a to b then there's not going to be any money made - never mind your 'how many millions would Dublin Bus lose?'. They should be allowed to run a good service at a lose, with the government safe in the knowledge that money is being made BECAUSE of it, not in spite of it.

John R · 20-10-2005 12:46am

I don't know if this means they are finally cracking down on fare evasion or the OP was just really unlucky. The former I hope as 90c is the most the vast majority of Dublin scum ever pay for bus journeys of any length.

If they are on their own the inspectors are far more likely to let people off the fine, especially if they are aggressive scangers. When there are several of them they will be much less likely to be lenient.

The whole system is fukked, on the rare times that the scum do get caught and fined they end up going to court where the judges let them off because they are on the dole and have no money.

All that being said, the OP had paid the incorrect fare, it was nobody's fault but his own. He could easily have given the driver his destination to find out the correct fare in the first place.

As for metrobest's zone idea, that is only slightly better than the current one, lazy people will still not bother to find out the correct fare and it still has the time waste factors as the usual types fumble around for change holding up the whole bus.

IMO we should follow the London model and just have one flat cash fare for all bus journeys, and it should be high. €2 would be simple, a small range of pre-pay tickets at heavily discounted rates would cater for those willing to go to a tiny effort to save money.

Of course neither is going to happen as cash fares are under control of the central government, they wouldn't even let DB amalgamate the two lowest fares into one simple €1 fare at euro changeover time.

HelterSkelter · 20-10-2005 10:15am

John R wrote:

IMO we should follow the London model and just have one flat cash fare for all bus journeys, and it should be high. €2 would be simple, a small range of pre-pay tickets at heavily discounted rates would cater for those willing to go to a tiny effort to save money.

Of course neither is going to happen as cash fares are under control of the central government, they wouldn't even let DB amalgamate the two lowest fares into one simple €1 fare at euro changeover time.

That is a bad idea, why should someone going 3 or 4 stops pay the same as someone going from city centre to maynooth for example?? It would discourage people from using the bus. I went into town from Rathmines the other day, fare was 90c each way, if it was €2 each way I would definitely have taken the car instead.

To the OP, hard luck buddy but you should have stated your destination to the driver if you didn't know the fare.

By the way does anybody know the legal position with them keeping you on the bus if you don't have a valid ticket? Surely they can't hold you against your will. If you try to get off and they stop you is it assault?

Hagar · 20-10-2005 10:18am

As an infrequent bus user I always tell the driver my destination and he tells me the fare.
Simple really, only takes a second and nothing further to worry about.

JackieChan · 20-10-2005 12:09pm

Have to agree with others. If you don't know the price of the correct fare then you should ask the driver.

murphaph · 20-10-2005 12:29pm

HelterSkelter wrote:

That is a bad idea, why should someone going 3 or 4 stops pay the same as someone going from city centre to maynooth for example?? It would discourage people from using the bus. I went into town from Rathmines the other day, fare was 90c each way, if it was €2 each way I would definitely have taken the car instead.

I disagree. If you go to a small bit of effort and get yourself a prepais ticket it would be the same cheap fare, if you don't-it's €2 each way. The sheer number of people still paying cash (including myself as an infrequent bus user!) definitely slows the whole operation down for everyone. If 90% of people used prepaid tix and they fit extra card readers (to have 2 readers as you enter the bus) the buses would run more efficiently.

I'd love if we had a more honest population whereby they could have 3 doors on a bus, all opening and allowing boarding with the honesty system-but we have a high 'scumbag per capita' ratio and they ruin it for everyone. The system could still be introduced someday, but fare enforcement will have to be increased a hundred fold and no excuses can be be accepted.

MrPudding · 20-10-2005 1:17pm

You may have made a mistake when paying but......

rayfitz wrote:

Why do you assume i "knowingly" didnt pay the correct fare? I thought that for a journey of less than 7 miles the fare would be €1.50 as on the bus i was on it used to be €1.75 into town 12ish miles. Have a car so very rarely get the bus, hence, was unaware of the correct fare. Talked to a few people about this and if they were short an inspector told them to just pay the additional money.

Unless I am reading the following line wrong, you realised a little later you had paid the wrong fare but chose not to pay the difference.

rayfitz wrote:

.......where i paid €1.50. checked my ticket upstairs and hed underpaid as was meant to get off before my stop. shrugged and thought id be ok.

I'm sorry but I fail to see the problem. You may not have knowingly paid the wrong fare but you seem to say yourself that you knowingly travelled on the wrong fare. Fair cop.

MrP

Vokes · 20-10-2005 1:36pm

John R wrote:

IMO we should follow the London model and just have one flat cash fare for all bus journeys, and it should be high. €2 would be simple, a small range of pre-pay tickets at heavily discounted rates would cater for those willing to go to a tiny effort to save money.

This is a good idea for people without pre-paid tickets, but perhaps flat E1.50 would be better.

To add to this then, a customer upon reproducing the ticket again for another bus journey, say within 3 hrs, would pay only an extra 50cent, and then each subsequent journey within the timeframe would be free.

HelterSkelter · 20-10-2005 2:13pm

murphaph wrote:

I disagree. If you go to a small bit of effort and get yourself a prepais ticket it would be the same cheap fare, if you don't-it's €2 each way. The sheer number of people still paying cash (including myself as an infrequent bus user!) definitely slows the whole operation down for everyone. If 90% of people used prepaid tix and they fit extra card readers (to have 2 readers as you enter the bus) the buses would run more efficiently.

Well another time I wanted to go into town, I had no change so I went into a ticket agent to buy a ticket and guess what, you can only buy them in packs of 10!! What a joke. I rarely use the bus, I don't want 10 tickets, I only want to go into town and back home again!!

kenmc · 20-10-2005 4:32pm

What you should have done, is pretend to be asleep.
When the inspector wakes you up you look all flustered that you missed your stop and it wasn't your fault you fell asleep....
Either that or you should have put your hand up to your mouth like you were going to throw up and had to get off the bus, he'd probably have let you get off.
Sorry you got caught.

MrPudding · 20-10-2005 4:35pm

kenmc wrote:

Sorry you got caught.

This seems to be a very typical attitude down here that I am having difficulty coming to terms with. He knowingly did something wrong, why would you feel sorry for him?

MrP

SickCert · 20-10-2005 6:39pm

kenmc wrote:

What you should have done, is pretend to be asleep.
When the inspector wakes you up you look all flustered that you missed your stop and it wasn't your fault you fell asleep....
Either that or you should have put your hand up to your mouth like you were going to throw up and had to get off the bus, he'd probably have let you get off.
Sorry you got caught.

It is a game to some.
But dont worry more pack inspectors will return!

rayfitz · 20-10-2005 7:38pm

"The former I hope as 90c is the most the vast majority of Dublin scum ever pay for bus journeys of any length."

Just to clarify that i dont consider myself as scum. I was getting the bus into a certain university which scummers generally don't attend.

secret_squirrel · 20-10-2005 9:59pm

rayfitz wrote:

Name address phone, etc. Proof of name and address.

Just out of interest do DB inspectors have any power to demand this? Cant you just refuse? Surely only a Guarda can legally demand id from you with no right of refusal.

Also can they legally hold you on the bus?

Dublin buses fares arent the most clear tbh. I regularly get one of 2 routes to the same place that travel fairly different routes to get there. To this day Im not sure if the same fare applies to both. I usually use a rambler to avoid the brain ache.

Plus I notice the new ticket machines on the buses are far more precise about where you got on and got off. Although last time I looked at one I could have sworn that the place it said I boarded was about 2 stops before the one I got on at. If an inspector got me then I would have been screwed.

Bogger77 · 20-10-2005 10:11pm

secret_squirrel wrote:

Just out of interest do DB inspectors have any power to demand this? Cant you just refuse? Surely only a Guarda can legally demand id from you with no right of refusal.

Also can they legally hold you on the bus?

If you don't give under the details or false details when they check over the fone, they are impowered under the by-laws to hold you until the cops arrive.

Bogger77 · 20-10-2005 10:18pm

rayfitz wrote:

Just to clarify that i dont consider myself as scum. I was getting the bus into a certain university which scummers generally don't attend.

and if that's your attitude, I've no sympathy with you. You tried fare evasion, by knowingly paying less than the legal fare.

I've travelled the number 27 quite a bit over the years, and tbh, I can't recall any occasions when the bus was held up due to a scumbag passenger, yet you got that bus held up for 5minutes, by your own admission.

Why didn't the inspectors let you pay the amount you under paid?
cos you lied and tried to dodge them.

pity the standard isn't more, but then again, pointing at the OP , it's usually the lower classes that fare evade.

Trampas · 21-10-2005 11:28am

The new ticket machines on buses will have the price for everystop on the route from the stop you get on.

No excuses for not having the right fare.

Pay your fine and stop complaining

HelterSkelter · 21-10-2005 12:43pm

secret_squirrel wrote:

Although last time I looked at one I could have sworn that the place it said I boarded was about 2 stops before the one I got on at. If an inspector got me then I would have been screwed.

This happens a lot. A good few times when I looked at my ticket it said I should have got off a few stops before the one I got on at!!

HelterSkelter · 21-10-2005 12:44pm

Bogger77 wrote:

If you don't give under the details or false details when they check over the fone, they are impowered under the by-laws to hold you until the cops arrive.

How can they hold you? What if you just try to walk away and get off the bus. Surely they can't pin you down and hold you until the cops arrive???

murphaph · 21-10-2005 1:08pm

HelterSkelter wrote:

How can they hold you? What if you just try to walk away and get off the bus. Surely they can't pin you down and hold you until the cops arrive???

I wouldn't expect they'd try-would you try to pin some scumbag down while the ferral tracksuitwearing burbery topped knacker is trying to bite you?

We need a tansport police to back the inspectors an drivers up. The transport police in germany are armed and are respected. I'd love if they could have linked the new digital CCTV on buses to a central facial recognition database-checking everyone getting on and comparing them to a database of known fare evaders. Inspectors could take photographs of those caught evading their fares and the driver of the bus could be alerted automatically that a known scumbag is boarding. Casinos and department stores use it to alert them that card counters and shoplifters have just entered their premises.

daymobrew · 21-10-2005 1:13pm

HelterSkelter wrote:

How can they hold you? What if you just try to walk away and get off the bus. Surely they can't pin you down and hold you until the cops arrive???

The General Information page doesn't specify the permissible means of restraint.

Dublin_Bus_Info wrote:

Passengers who fail to give a correct name and address, or who give a false or misleading name and address, shall be detained by the Inspector until the arrival of the Garda Siochana (S.7 Dublin Transport Authority (Dissolution) Act 1987).

You can read Section 7 of that Act. It doesn't detail the permissible means of restraint either. Maybe pinning someone down would be acceptable though I guess it would be done as a result of an assault on the inspector as the passenger tried to escape.

rayfitz · 21-10-2005 4:47pm

Bogger77 wrote:

and if that's your attitude, I've no sympathy with you. You tried fare evasion, by knowingly paying less than the legal fare.

I've travelled the number 27 quite a bit over the years, and tbh, I can't recall any occasions when the bus was held up due to a scumbag passenger, yet you got that bus held up for 5minutes, by your own admission.

Why didn't the inspectors let you pay the amount you under paid?
cos you lied and tried to dodge them.

pity the standard isn't more, but then again, pointing at the OP , it's usually the lower classes that fare evade.

lower classes yeah? You back that up with what? Fair points raised but i think that was out of order. could almost guarentee that i am higher up the class scale than you.

LegacyUser · 21-10-2005 5:03pm

I usually tell the driver which stop I am getting off at and let him work out the price.

Funnily enough .. I only use CIE a few times a year (car getting serviced etc) .. the last time I noted it was different going into town as it was coming out.

Bogger77 · 21-10-2005 5:20pm

rayfitz wrote:

lower classes yeah? You back that up with what? Fair points raised but i think that was out of order. could almost guarentee that i am higher up the class scale than you.

Are you? Strangely enough, I own, in my own name, land and property worth 500,000 euro, at the last valuation. Where does that place me on your scale.

I've never been fined for Fare Evading, you have.
Since you're so smart, I'll let you do the figuring out where that places you on the scale. I mean, you couldn't even get down for a decent effort of fraud, attempting to defraud Dublin Bus of less than a euro and getting caught for it. You're going to the laughing sock,when Fionn and Oisin and the rest of the rugger boys hear.

It'll be fun watching you in district court if you don't pay. And you'll even get you name listed in the Irish Times as a fare evader. Fame for you at last!

SteM · 21-10-2005 5:55pm

rayfitz, you come across as being a tw@t by your actions on the bus and what you've posted here since.

Pay your deserved fine or enjoy your day in court - I'm hoping you go for the court option myself but I'm sure your daddy will pay the fine for you.

Fined on Dublin Bus!

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