A commuter train firm has announced a massive increase in revenue from penalty fines handed to fare dodgers after targeting persistent offenders.c2c, which operates between Fenchurch Street station in London and Grays, Southend Central and Shoeburyness in Essex, has issued more than 8,000 fines – each with a face value of £100 - and recovered more than £470,000 this year.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Fair evasion is one of the biggest issues facing the rail industry.
00:04I've come here to Fenchurch Street station to find out what the rail company C2C is doing to crack down on fair dodgers.
00:13So in 2024 from the 1st of January we've caught over 8,000 fair evaders.
00:18We've made just under a half million pounds from recouping fares from those and people that
00:24have done that previously. Compared to previous years that's an increase. We feel like we're
00:30getting better at catching those individuals because we're using the data more wisely,
00:35we've got access to a lot more data and going to the right places at the right time enables us to
00:39be there to do that. We've got plainclothes revenue protection officers, we've got uniform
00:44revenue protection officers, also behind the scenes we've got the data side of it where we're
00:48looking at the spreadsheets, we're looking at what's being sold, we're looking at travel patterns,
00:52making sure that we're going to the right places. So we believe it's worth millions of pounds not
00:56just to ourselves but obviously the wider rail industry as well because people that travel with
01:00us may also then be traveling on London Underground or a different train operating
01:04company as well so we need to make sure that we recoup everything that's owed to the rail industry.
01:09So today we are helping customers, passengers learn more about the tactics that C2C are using
01:16to reduce fare evasion. So in order to get people more aware of what's going on it's been
01:22gamified. We have a wheel here, I will demonstrate what happens, you spin the wheel and then a
01:29question related to where the wheel ends is asked to the customer. There's no pressure to get the
01:34answer correct but we will let them know what the answer is and there's a little bit of merchandise
01:39to take on the way. So again it's just to help build up an idea to the customers that something
01:45is being done to help with regards to fare evasion.