South Western Railway says it has uncovered widespread abuse of digital train tickets on one of Britain’s shortest rail journeys, with up to 95% of barcode tickets bought between Vauxhall and London Waterloo believed to be used fraudulently.
SWR trains at Waterloo station (c) ianVisits
The scam involves passengers from further out of London catching a train without a ticket, then buying a cheap ticket only for the final section of their journey – such as Vauxhall to Waterloo – and using the barcode ticket to pass through the barriers at Waterloo.
South Western Railway (SWR) estimates that the practice, known as short-faring, is putting around £1 million a year of revenue at risk and, in response, launched a targeted enforcement operation at Waterloo in June, using operational and ticketing data to identify suspected offenders.
They say that the results have been immediate.
During the first four weeks, revenue protection officers identified 153 cases of short-faring, compared with just seven during the same period last year. The railway says the crackdown has also protected around £45,000 in revenue. It believes the operation is already changing passenger behaviour, with around a third of those previously identified now buying the correct ticket.
However, fare dodgers have also started changing tactics.
After checks increased on Vauxhall-Waterloo tickets, purchases of barcode tickets from another London station rose by 89%, suggesting some passengers attempted to move the scam elsewhere. SWR says its monitoring allows it to identify and respond to these changing patterns.
The Vauxhall operation forms part of a wider revenue protection strategy across the SWR network. The company says fare evasion has fallen by 67% since 2017, with a further 11% reduction over the past year.
Despite that, SWR estimates that around 6.5 million journeys are still made each year without a valid ticket, costing the company almost £40 million in lost revenue.
Recent prosecutions include a passenger who allegedly avoided more than £11,000 in fares over four years by repeatedly travelling from Hampshire to London without the correct ticket, and another who is accused of evading £20,000 over three years on journeys between Surrey and London while also fraudulently using a 16–17 Railcard.
The railway’s revenue protection officers also feature in the new series of Fare Dodgers: At War with the Law, on Channel 5.