Some of this doesn't add up from what has been reported. I don't quite understand how having an Oyster card has helped him. I travel from Battle, three stops beyond Stonegate, and we have our tickets checked at least once each journey, morning and night. I assume he has too so if he hadn't had a ticket then he'd have had to have bought one on the train. It's perfectly okay to board without a ticket as you are able to purchase on board as ticket office could easily be busy when you arrive. Seeing as most trains are fast from High Brooms to London Bridge during rush hours you can't even say you got on at Orpington, for example, to reduce the price you pay. Interesting too that he paid back over 42k. A season ticket from Stonegate costs £4,500 a year so over five years, allowing for year on year price increases, he could have bought season tickets for say 21.5k. I assume they have calculated what he owed on him having made single, maybe return, daily journeys.
Personally, he's a scumbag. I hate people who are not prepared to pay their way, think they can get one over on the train company and us, the passengers, who suffer fare rises because of knobs like this. I'm glad he has had to repay this money but not that he remains anonymous. I think he should be made to wear a sign round his neck saying 'I'm the fare paying cheat' for a year and hopefully that will shame him into not doing it again. He's lucky his employers don't know, I don't a hedge fund company would want to employ someone so dishonest.
I am puzzled too at how he got away with it.
That is to say, why did he not get blocked by the barriers in London?
Surely the system (if he was using an Oyster as reported) would have picked it up as being invalid because he had not 'checked in' elsewhere on the system?
Also, surely the barriers at London mainline stations must have some way of realising a 'short journey' Oyster card as being suspicious in the morning rush as trains arrive from the Home Counties?
Some of this doesn't add up from what has been reported. I don't quite understand how having an Oyster card has helped him. I travel from Battle, three stops beyond Stonegate, and we have our tickets checked at least once each journey, morning and night. I assume he has too so if he hadn't had a ticket then he'd have had to have bought one on the train. It's perfectly okay to board without a ticket as you are able to purchase on board as ticket office could easily be busy when you arrive. Seeing as most trains are fast from High Brooms to London Bridge during rush hours you can't even say you got on at Orpington, for example, to reduce the price you pay. Interesting too that he paid back over 42k. A season ticket from Stonegate costs £4,500 a year so over five years, allowing for year on year price increases, he could have bought season tickets for say 21.5k. I assume they have calculated what he owed on him having made single, maybe return, daily journeys.
Personally, he's a scumbag. I hate people who are not prepared to pay their way, think they can get one over on the train company and us, the passengers, who suffer fare rises because of knobs like this. I'm glad he has had to repay this money but not that he remains anonymous. I think he should be made to wear a sign round his neck saying 'I'm the fare paying cheat' for a year and hopefully that will shame him into not doing it again. He's lucky his employers don't know, I don't a hedge fund company would want to employ someone so dishonest.
Wife travels up from Hastings and tells me the same re having her ticket checked...and your dead right the figures don't add up.
Some of this doesn't add up from what has been reported. I don't quite understand how having an Oyster card has helped him. I travel from Battle, three stops beyond Stonegate, and we have our tickets checked at least once each journey, morning and night. I assume he has too so if he hadn't had a ticket then he'd have had to have bought one on the train. It's perfectly okay to board without a ticket as you are able to purchase on board as ticket office could easily be busy when you arrive. Seeing as most trains are fast from High Brooms to London Bridge during rush hours you can't even say you got on at Orpington, for example, to reduce the price you pay. Interesting too that he paid back over 42k. A season ticket from Stonegate costs £4,500 a year so over five years, allowing for year on year price increases, he could have bought season tickets for say 21.5k. I assume they have calculated what he owed on him having made single, maybe return, daily journeys.
Personally, he's a scumbag. I hate people who are not prepared to pay their way, think they can get one over on the train company and us, the passengers, who suffer fare rises because of knobs like this. I'm glad he has had to repay this money but not that he remains anonymous. I think he should be made to wear a sign round his neck saying 'I'm the fare paying cheat' for a year and hopefully that will shame him into not doing it again. He's lucky his employers don't know, I don't a hedge fund company would want to employ someone so dishonest.
I am puzzled too at how he got away with it.
That is to say, why did he not get blocked by the barriers in London?
Surely the system (if he was using an Oyster as reported) would have picked it up as being invalid because he had not 'checked in' elsewhere on the system?
Also, surely the barriers at London mainline stations must have some way of realising a 'short journey' Oyster card as being suspicious in the morning rush as trains arrive from the Home Counties?
You are right, there is no way to get out of London Bridge. So he must get through the barriers behind someone and then come back through and check in using oyster, or lean over the barrier and swipe from the entrance side.
If he tried to just swipe out at Cannon Street then his oyster wouldn't work as at no point on his inward journey has he swiped in.
The article clearly states he never checked in and therefore when he checked out he was charged the minimum.oyster fare for not checking in, which was £7.20.
The article clearly states he never checked in and therefore when he checked out he was charged the minimum.oyster fare for not checking in, which was £7.20.
I always thought that If you don't check in with Oyster the barrier doesn't work when you check out and SE staff usually give you a £20 fine.
I know that if you check in and then don't check out you get charged the minimum £7.20.
Seems far fetched but I heard a suggestion / rumour on the radio that it had been made up by the train companies as a deterrent for people doing it.
Can't believe that myself but I had a look at Stonegate station on google earth. Absolutely nothing around there. If you really wanted to identify him surely it wouldnt be that arduous.
The likelihood is that if the case had gone to court, Southeastern would have struggled to prove that he had travelled without a fare on more than a few occasions (certainly in the face of expensive cross-examination). They would have needed to trawl through CCTV evidence and even that in itself would only prove he travelled, not that he didn't have a valid ticket (which he could have claimed to have purchased for cash on a day-by-day basis).
However as has been noted it would not be in this person's interest to have the case in the public domain given the 'integrity' issue so a forty grand settlement is likely an extremely good result for Southeastern.
He gets the train from Stonegate (East Sussex). Should be named and shamed. How many of us could afford the £43,000 payback! My daughter and son-in-law both travel from there and are fuming he has virtually got away with this. But there again he is a Hedge Fund manager!
The article clearly states he never checked in and therefore when he checked out he was charged the minimum.oyster fare for not checking in, which was £7.20.
You're right, the story linked in the article gives a fuller explanation....
.....that is clearly a major flaw in the system, I'd have thought that an alert should be raised if an Oyster continually 'defaults' like this to the £7.20 payment.
Traditional standards of morality are no longer a consideration in 21st Century Britain as exemplified by the actions of the parasitical scum whom masquerade as MPs and MEPs.
What nonsense. The political classes were way more rapacious and corrupt on the "good old days" than they are now.
Rotten boroughs, sales of peerages (Lloyd-George & Wilson to mention just two). The Marconi scandal, the Shell crisis, Suez, the list goes on and on.
Miller's little bit of accountancy wouldn't even have registered in the old days. Who now remembers that Chruchill secretly took £5,000 (millions today) from Burmah oil to lobby for concessions in Persia.
Skin him alive and roll him in salt. Rich bastard should be named, shamed. Then shot.
End of.
You're too soft!
Hang him upside down on a meat hook in a disused warehouse where nobody can hear him. Then flog him with a cat o'nine tails each with a razor blade on the end that's been dipped in sulphuric acid. If he surives that, he gets a complimentary season ticket from Lee to Hither Green.
he couldve hopped off, checked in in orpington (don't they have oyster terminals on the platforms, so if you come from outside london and have an oyster you can check in) and then checked out when he got to london. But it says he never checked in, weird.
The article clearly states he never checked in and therefore when he checked out he was charged the minimum.oyster fare for not checking in, which was £7.20.
I always thought that If you don't check in with Oyster the barrier doesn't work when you check out and SE staff usually give you a £20 fine.
I know that if you check in and then don't check out you get charged the minimum £7.20.
Correct, I witnessed somebody arguing the toss over this at CX this morning. She hadn't checked in, and got caught, £20 fine straight away.
As I said earlier, we aren't getting the full story on this.
If nothing else, the train company have been negligent in not checking whether he was traveling on a valid ticket for an inordinate amount of time. Wouldn't look good in court.
So, there we have it - banned for life from working in financial services. Interesting quote, too, from the FCA that he should have been a role model in the light of other recent matters relating to a club in Sheffield.
So, there we have it - banned for life from working in financial services. Interesting quote, too, from the FCA that he should have been a role model in the light of other recent matters relating to a club in Sheffield.
However he added that "the size of the settlement [with Southeastern] could be said to have led to a distorted perception of the scale of my wrongdoing".
No mate, you really don't get it do you. Millions of fare paying passengers earning a fraction of what you have earned in your life, paying their fares, going to work, plugging away. You on the other hand, were a knob head who can actually afford the ridiculous train fares charged without it impacting your life financially, yet you still chose to take the piss.
Comments
That is to say, why did he not get blocked by the barriers in London?
Surely the system (if he was using an Oyster as reported) would have picked it up as being invalid because he had not 'checked in' elsewhere on the system?
Also, surely the barriers at London mainline stations must have some way of realising a 'short journey' Oyster card as being suspicious in the morning rush as trains arrive from the Home Counties?
If he tried to just swipe out at Cannon Street then his oyster wouldn't work as at no point on his inward journey has he swiped in.
I know that if you check in and then don't check out you get charged the minimum £7.20.
Can't believe that myself but I had a look at Stonegate station on google earth. Absolutely nothing around there. If you really wanted to identify him surely it wouldnt be that arduous.
However as has been noted it would not be in this person's interest to have the case in the public domain given the 'integrity' issue so a forty grand settlement is likely an extremely good result for Southeastern.
Should be named and shamed. How many of us could afford the £43,000 payback!
My daughter and son-in-law both travel from there and are fuming he has virtually
got away with this. But there again he is a Hedge Fund manager!
It makes me SO ANGRY!
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-27011497
.....that is clearly a major flaw in the system, I'd have thought that an alert should be raised if an Oyster continually 'defaults' like this to the £7.20 payment.
Obviously not!
Grrrrr!
Who, other than herself, benefited from the actions of Maria Miller and the countless others of her ilk?
Hang him upside down on a meat hook in a disused warehouse where nobody can hear him. Then flog him with a cat o'nine tails each with a razor blade on the end that's been dipped in sulphuric acid.
If he surives that, he gets a complimentary season ticket from Lee to Hither Green.
As I said earlier, we aren't getting the full story on this.
If nothing else, the train company have been negligent in not checking whether he was traveling on a valid ticket for an inordinate amount of time.
Wouldn't look good in court.
I don't condone what he did.
And he wears women's clothing under his suit when he travels illegally on the train.
bbc.com/news/business-30475232 And he has been.
No mate, you really don't get it do you. Millions of fare paying passengers earning a fraction of what you have earned in your life, paying their fares, going to work, plugging away. You on the other hand, were a knob head who can actually afford the ridiculous train fares charged without it impacting your life financially, yet you still chose to take the piss.