On Feb 10, 2:11 pm, Edward Cowling London UK
wrote:
In message , Wolfgang Schwanke
writes



The part I don't understand is why they do this in the first place. I
thought the LU system is rather "fraud safe". You can't get in or out
of the system without some form of valid ticket (except by climbing
over the gates or taking a detour to a DLR station), so hunting down
fare dodgers should be pointless. What am I missing?

Several times I've been caught by this trick, so perhaps they watch for
it. Everyone hurtles up to the barrier and the person in front of you
offers up their ticket / card. They start striding through the barrier
and you follow up behind and put your Oyster on the reader, just as they
get the "seek assistance" screen. They carry on through (on your card)
and you get left there looking like a lemon.

I now hold back and wait for the person in front to fully exit the
barrier before I put my Oyster anywhere near the reader. On two
occasions I've had people with the "seek assistance" screen look back at
me, and look at my card.... obviously waiting to be let out. Oh no, now
I just glare at them until they go elsewhere.


It's easily done. I once grabbed the wrong ticket out my wallet and by
the time I was getting seek assistance, the woman behind had put her
ticket in and opened the gate. I had no choice but to go through and
then lend her my travelcard to get out with.

On the original point, sometimes I see ticket checks accompanied by
large numbers of police resulting in people being trapped dangerously
in a subway. There is obviously cooperation, but are the police there
to protect the inspectors, or are the inspectors slowing the crowd
down so the police can search for someone they are after?

It often looks much more like the latter.



Then you still get the people who try to keep about an inch away from
you and go through the barrier on your ticket. All extremely annoying
and I'd like to see a few of them named and shamed on bill boards
outside the stations. One main cause of this is the train routes (like
the old WAGN line into Moorgate) where there are still no barriers to
entry or exit !!