ScotRail to introduce first penalty tickets for fare dodgers
ScotRail said it was considering financial measures such as forcing dodgers to pay a 'minimum fare' for the whole route rather than, at present, being required to pay only the fee for the claimed length of their journey.
Fare dodging deprives the rail company of millions of pounds a year. In the past financial year ScotRail recorded 1,644 instances of fare dodging, up from 869 the year before, although this is likely to be an underestimate of the actual number of incidents.
No fares were recovered in more than half of the recorded cases.
In England fare dodgers face £100 fines but this system has not been adopted in Scotland.
However, charging evaders in Scotland a minimum fare is expected to act as a deterrent because passengers who make short journeys that cost less than the minimum will have to pay more.
The problem is most acute when trains are busy and ticket inspectors face difficulties checking all tickets, particularly where travellers make short journeys.
An industry source told Scotland on Sunday: 'This looks like a revenue protection initiative, where a passenger with no ticket on a train or at the end of their journey is obliged to buy a 'minimum fare' ticket.
'This would probably be more expensive than many low-value ScotRail tickets, such as a £3 Mount Florida to Glasgow Central single, and act as an encouragement for passengers to buy a ticket before boarding a train. It's believed to be better than a penalty fares scheme.'
Claire Baker, Scottish Labour's transport spokeswoman, said: 'It is not right that commuters are forced to pay more because a small minority are trying to game the system.'
ScotRail, the state-owned train operator, estimated it lost £10 million a year to ticket fraud. The company identified a minimum fares strategy among key initiatives it was considering in this financial year, subject to approval from Transport Scotland.
The apparent rise in fare dodging, the company says, is mainly because of an increase in revenue protection officers aboard trains rather than a decline in passenger behaviour.
Transport Scotland said: 'ScotRail has a number of ways to make it easy for passengers to buy their tickets before they board, online, via the app, ticket machine or from ticket offices.
'In line with their existing revenue protection policy, additional measures to further reduce ticketless travel are under consideration.'
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