Do you work for a local council authority, by any chance?

I used to travel on commuter trains that were so jammed with 'customers' that a guard/conducter simply couldn't travel along the train checking tickets. There was simply nowhere for the people to go to let him or her through. Needless to say, quite a lot of the people decided that, on the basis that the provider appeared to be making little effort to provide an adequate service, they weren't going to make all that much effort to buy a ticket. Given there were also a lot of unmanned stations along the line, I suspect as a result quite a lot of people didn't generally pay.

The train company would undoubtedly say that they were all rogues and criminals who deserved the full weight of the law thrown against them. The customers would undoubtedly say that they weren't getting anything like a proper service, so why the heck should they pay a proper price for it? And before you say 'well they were still getting where they were going' the fact is quite a lot of the time, you didn't. Trains were routinely cancelled and, when they did turn up, were often only two or three carriages for a busy commuter line so half the people waiting simply couldn't get on. The idea that the train companies had any moral or ethical leverage to charge punitive fines for non-purchase was bordering on the ludicrous.

I've actually read the T&C on the back of train tickets (yes, you can get THAT bored waiting for trains that they only decide to tell you are cancelled when they're already 20 minutes late) and I'm of the considered opinion they're an unenforceably one side contract. Basically, the train company requires you to pay but the T&C say they have no obligation to provide you with a train to make your journey on at all, let alone one that's one time on which you can get a seat. The T&C basically consist of a requirement for you to pay regardless of what you get and a series of exemptions for them to do pretty much anything at all. I very much doubt that, if challenged in court, they would actually be considered to be legally acceptable.

Either way, I have no sympathy at all for a service provider enforcing punitive financial damages on a couple of apparently innocent customers due a contract condition which runs contrary to logic and common sense. To misquote Jeff GoldBlum "Just because you could do it, doesn't mean you should have."

Jon

I wonder if it's down to how the payments are broken down. Who actually runs the station itself? How do they get paid? Certainly not all airports charge the same fees, so it seems likely that some train stations cost more to disembark at.

Yes they broke the rules, but:
A) They're daft rules
B) They had no way of knowing that as they made the decision to get off early on teh train, not when they booked and had the terms and conditions in from of them. It not like the T&C's are availbale to read on the train. I'd have made the same assumption they did.

They need to:
A) Simplify they types of tickets available.
A) Make the same rules about ticket types apply nationwide, not on a per operator basis.

Yes but £30 + and more!

+1 to both.

I don't know about the rest of the country, but down here FGW own the stations AND the routes, so they'd have no excuse.

Here in Machynlleth Arriva Trains Wales owns the station and has is the sole service provider.

Places like Shrewsbury, Birmingham New Street, and Birmingham International, I'm not sure, I assume the station is owned by National Rail and service providers just go through...

that would be the sensible approach.

Rules should be used as guidance, there should always be room for common sense. If we forget that then we all become automatons.

The ticket they bought from Megabus not the rail company was for Southampton to London return (and only that journey no hopping off at an intermedate station as per the conditions of selling that ticket) and thus they were charged the £6, a single from waterloo to Eastleigh off peak is £27.70.
The reason they got charged was that they did not have a valid ticket, this is to stop people buying a single to get to London at the normal rate and also buying a special ticket from Megabus ( not the rail company) and getting a very cheap fare.
If people abuse the system then the rail provider will just remove the megabus facilty on that line and everyone suffers. You have to draw a line somewhere. It is just unfortunate, for them, they got caught.

While I agree that what you say is technically correct to most people the fact that I buy a ticket from Point A to Point C via B and get off at B and then get charged extra is counter intuitive ( and plainly daft).

After all what are they going to do next? Sometimes its cheaper to buy a return than a single – are they going to fine me for not travelling?

SShhhhh don't go giving them ideas.

A lot of the time the single fare is almost the same as a return so it makes sense to buy one even if it is a one way trip.

I'm going to have to bow out of this thread before I mention Nazi germany!