Fury at rail firm's 16-25 Railcard prosecutions

Train company Northern has been accused of exploiting 'byzantine' rules on peak time train fares to take young passengers to court over fares worth less than £5.

The state-owned rail firm is hyper-vigilantly policing the use of the 16-25 Railcard 33 per cent discount on 'anytime' tickets used before 10am on weekdays - which is only valid when the fare costs £12 or more.

Confusing rules around when the discount cards can be used in the mornings - such as during July and August and on weekends - mean wayfarers are being caught out without realising the tickets they have bought are invalid.

Northern - which took in £1bn of revenue last year including £648m of government cash it needed to stay afloat - has been accused of a heavy-handed approach to what it calls fare evasion by refusing to let travellers make amends on the spot.

Passengers say staff outright refuse to let them buy a correct ticket and insist treat them in the same way as people who refuse to try to pay their way - a tactic blasted today by a passenger watchdog as 'bleak'.

Those who have fallen victim to Northern's hardline stance say conductors insist on issuing a fine - which can then lead to court cases landing them a criminal record and fines costing hundreds of pounds - for infractions worth pennies.

Bosses have not justified the uncompromising attitude  - which comes months after it and several other rail companies were told to stop using a secretive court procedure to issue three-figure fines to travellers under century-old railway laws.

Northern's accounts published earlier this month show its passenger satisfaction rating has dipped nine percentage points in the space of a year to 60.5 per cent - and its punctuality has worsened. The firm recorded a pre-tax profit of £8.7m.

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Alex Robertson, chief executive of the Transport Focus watchdog, said genuine fare dodgers should be dealt with using the full force of the law. 

But those who have tried to pay their way, he continued, should be 'treated with understanding and not immediately assumed to be guilty'.

Mr Robertson added: 'We know from talking to passengers how confusing the current system is - no one thinks you should have to spend ages checking detailed rules and restrictions before getting on a train.

'While there have been some improvements, the outlook for being caught making a mistake can still be bleak. 

'This is one of the reasons why we have long argued for the need to simplify fares and ticketing. Passengers must be able to trust that penalties are given only to those who deserve them.'

Oxford graduate Sam Williamson, 22, brought the issue to the fore after he shared his situation on X, formerly Twitter.

He bought an 'anytime' ticket through the Northern app, applying his railcard to it as he had throughout the summer, but told MailOnline he was challenged by a ticket inspector who would not let him buy the correct ticket. 

The National Rail conditions of travel say passengers will be 'charged the difference' between their fare and the correct one if they have used a ticket at the wrong time of day. Northern did not give him this option.

Instead, he faces a £150 fine - 7,000 percent more than the fare difference if he had been allowed to pay.

'It's amazing to see how many people have been caught by this. Northern Rail are one of the more rigorous ones when it comes to checking things,' Mr Williamson said.

'The fine is £150. It's hugely disproportionate compared to the difference between the ticket fare.'

After giving his name and address, Mr Williamson was sent a threatening letter from Northern's 'debt recovery and prosecutions unit' demanding an explanation.

His £1.60 error, the letter said, 'could be a serious matter', and demanded a written explanation. 'Only written mitigation will be accepted,' it adds - before threatening to take him to court if he does not respond. 

Worst of all, another passenger on the train who was also challenged about their railcard simply walked away from the inspector and got off at the next stop - no letter, no threat of court action.

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Mr Williamson added: 'It's frustrating. This train line I had been using for most of my life. You used to be able to board the train and buy a ticket on it.

'I think there's an element of being a bit intimidated. I'm not trying to start a scene and cause trouble. It just feels unfair and a disproportionate response.'

MailOnline replicated the process by which he bought his ticket via the Northern website. As he stated, we could attach a railcard to an anytime ticket - and the website promised the ticket was 'flexible...with no time restrictions on when you can travel'.

The terms and conditions added: 'Yes - normal railcard and child discounts (are) available.'

The prosecutions are being brought under the Regulation of Railways Act 1889 - an obscure set of laws that doesn't even mention railcards, which did not exist for another 85 years. 

Train operating companies can privately prosecute passengers who pay the wrong fare, but can also choose to settle out of court or take no further action.

Embarking on a prosecution, however, gives them an opportunity to squeeze a far larger fine out of customers than a tiny fare difference or the cost of a new ticket - including, as Northern threatens in its letters, £150 of court costs.

Jack Fifield, a journalist with local newspaper The Bolton News, has highlighted several cases in recent months that saw young people prosecuted for buying discounted tickets.

Among them was a 23-year-old who was fined £462 - for a £4.80 fare they had 'avoided' by using a railcard - and a 27-year-old fined £462.80 after travelling during peak-time on an off-peak ticket. The replacement ticket would have been £4.80.

Cerys Piper, the 23-year-old fined £462, said she did not even receive a letter from Northern Rail asking her to explain why she 'dodged' her fare.

She bought her ticket from a ticket office at Daisy Hill station, and staff there did not tell her it would be invalid before 10am.

Ms Piper is still paying off the fine, which was covered by her mother, from the proceeds of her £11.44-an-hour job.

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She said: 'It shows you really do mean nothing to them, at all, to do that, but it is what it is.'

Consumer rights lawyer Gary Rycroft said restrictions on railcards should be made clearer to travellers when they buy the discount passes and every time they buy tickets.

The Consumer Rights Act 2015 also makes clear that terms and conditions are not enforceable if not explained at the time of purchase - suggesting Northern's hardline stance may not hold up if challenged in court. 

He told the Telegraph: 'This saga makes me think more than ever we need real people in ticket offices who will explain this minutia to rail users.

'The resources rail companies have should be to enforce those who do not pay at all, rather than those who make a genuine error because the rules are byzantine.'

The fury over Northern's handling of well-intentioned 'fare evasion' comes just two months after it and three other train companies were to stop using a secretive fast-track court system to prosecute alleged fare-dodgers.

Northern apologised for using the Single Justice Procedure (SJP) to prosecute offences under the Regulation of Railways Act 1889 - the same law it has used to challenge Mr Williamson, the Oxford graduate.

SJPs were brought in a decade ago to fast-track minor offences such as not paying for TV licences or car insurance. They require only written evidence and no hearing, and are dealt with by a single magistrate for efficiency.

But train companies have been using them for years to pursue alleged fare dodgers - creating a sizeable money pot for successful convictions.

But in August, chief magistrate Judge Paul Goldspring issued a bombshell judgement against train companies using it for fare evasion, concluding that parliament had 'did not envisage these offences being prosecuted through the SJP'.

He added: 'They should never have been brought through SJP in the first place.'

As many as 74,000 offences are in the process of being quashed and the costs returned to those incorrectly convicted.

Sources at Northern insist that it is not using SJP for new prosecutions of alleged fare evasion. 

MailOnline contacted Northern to ask if it has a policy of instructing ticket inspectors to insist on completing fare evasion reports instead of allowing passengers to buy replacement tickets.

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The firm previously took an uncompromising position on its approach to cases such Mr Williamson's and Ms Piper's, telling news outlets that everyone 'has a duty to buy a valid ticket'.

But a spokesperson told us today that it was undertaking a review of some of its most recent cases of alleged fare evasion, dealing with them on an 'individual basis'.

They would not comment on why passengers were not given the opportunity to pay the difference in fares, as outlined under the Network Rail conditions of travel.

The spokesperson said: 'Tens of millions of passengers travel with us every year to destinations across the North of England and we are committed to providing them with the right tickets at the right prices.

'We will work with the industry and the Department for Transport with the aim to simplify ticketing for customers.'

A Department for Transport spokesperson said: 'Ticketing has become far too complicated, which is why we have committed to simplifying it for customers, as part of the biggest overhaul of our railways in a generation.

'We expect Northern to ensure their policy on ticketing is clear and fair for passengers at all times and have instructed the operator to review the details of these cases urgently.'