Picture the scene: it’s 8.15am at a busy central London station. Hundreds of people are streaming through the ticket barriers, heading to work after starting the day in their comfy Home Counties houses.
And there, in the midst of this bustling scene, is me – a middle-class, professional woman, being read my rights by a furious ticket inspector. I’ve never felt embarrassment like it.
My crime? Fare-dodging. Or, more specifically, short-faring, a practice I hadn’t even heard of until a friend – and fellow well-paid commuter – suggested it to me. Short-faring is a form of fare evasion where you purchase a ticket for a shorter distance (or cheaper destination) than your intended journey, while secretly travelling further.
In my case, this meant getting on at my small, local station where there are no ticket barriers, then using an app on my phone to buy a ticket to London from a town further down the line. The shorter distance ticket was half the price, and I still got through the barriers in central London with just a swipe of my QR code.
I quietly justified doing this by the fact that ticket prices are extortionate, and the service is often terrible. Coupled with my finances being tight – I’d recently had my second child – it felt like a no-brainer. I also suspected that loads of other people on my train were doing the same. Surely it was ever so slightly on the wrong side of the law, but not committing a huge crime.
I was short-faring for a full year before I got caught.
How did the train company catch me? Well, I got too cocky. On that fateful day, I decided to push my luck, and bought a ticket from a station even closer to London, delighted when I realised it would cost me less than a fiver (the full fare is nearly £50 return).
The only problem was, the train I was on didn’t stop at that station and, when I got off at my final destination, I discovered a fare-evasion crackdown was taking place. The scanner where I would normally tap my QR code at the ticket barrier had been deliberately covered with a sticker, and instead I had to show my ticket to an inspector, who immediately clocked that the station on my ticket was not one I possibly could have come from.
Short-faring is a form of fare evasion where you purchase a ticket for a shorter distance (or cheaper destination) than your intended journey, while secretly travelling further
Essentially, the whole thing cost me £1,150 on top of what I should have paid in fares, says Anonymous
The whole ruse began to unravel as she questioned me at the ticket barriers. She asked to see my driving licence so she could see where I lived, and whether I’d ever short-fared before that day. She told me there was CCTV that the train company could use to check where I boarded the train, and that they could also look at the purchase history on my rail app to find out where I’d been claiming to start my journey, going back months.
I thought about lying, but I clammed up – it was completely mortifying being told off like that in front of so many people. I was also terrified about what might happen as a result of being caught.
When she read me my rights, I started to wonder if I was going to prison. Would I lose my job? How was I going to pay my mortgage? What would happen to my young kids?
The inspector took down my details and said a letter would come in the post, which would give me a right of reply. In full panic mode, I immediately started Googling solicitors, and found a law firm that specialises in helping fare evaders on that particular train network, confirming my belief that this is a very common practice.
When I spoke to the solicitor a couple of days later, she told me she dealt with similar cases all the time. She also explained that if I’d pulled a similar stunt with Transport for London, they’d be looking for a conviction – but she was certain that if I took the appropriate steps, I could get away with simply paying the money I owed back to the train company, plus a small fine.
Those steps were humiliating, however. Once the letter from the train company detailing my fare evasion came through (which took about two weeks), I had to get three character references to show this was not my normal behaviour. The friends and colleagues I asked were shocked when I told them what was going on, but agreed to help me out.
The lawyer also asked me if I was seeing a therapist, or if there was anything stressful going on at the time that could’ve caused my ‘lapse in judgment’. In fact, I was seeing a therapist, so managed to obtain a letter explaining that I was in a stressful period (returning to work after having my second child) and that the emotional and financial implications of that may have tipped me over into committing a crime.
It caused me to consider whether that was the real reason I dodged fares. Certainly, the expense of the trains was annoying for me – I had dependents and money was tight. However, I think the risky element of it all also appealed to me on some level. Even though I’d never done anything dodgy before, I enjoyed that playing-with-fire mentality, and got a small buzz every time I went through the barrier and thought ‘Yes! I’ve made it again!’
That’s obviously not what I said in the apology letter that the lawyer made me write to the train company. Instead, I wrote about how sorry I was and that I understood the knock-on effects of fare-dodging for the train company as a whole.
For their part, the train company were willing to accept this, as long as I paid back all the money I owed – which was £2,500 – plus a £250 fee. The minute that money left my account, all I felt was relief. It had been a month since I had first been caught and the whole experience had been incredibly stressful; I had been in bits.
Paying the money felt like putting an end to the whole episode. I didn’t want the experience near me any more; I didn’t want any sort of criminal conviction. I also had to pay £900 to the solicitor, but by that stage I genuinely felt like she was my saviour. Essentially, the whole thing cost me £1,150 on top of what I should have paid in fares – but the stress of the experience was far more upsetting than the money.
Although I’ve told most of my friends what happened, one person I could never reveal this story to is my mum. She would be absolutely horrified – in fact, after I got caught she watched a programme about fare-dodging on TV, and messaged me saying: ‘I hope you would never do anything like this.’
Other people I told were less judgmental – they couldn’t believe the hoops I was having to jump through to appease the train company.
I still do the same commute several days a week, but I would never fare dodge again. Even now when the ticket inspector walks along the train, I can feel my heart rate increase – it reminds me of the shame, stress and panic I brought on myself when I decided to game the system.
At the time it seemed harmless – justified even – but in truth, I was committing a crime. I just wonder how many other middle-class commuters on my train are doing the same…
