Happy New Year every one at CAG! Well I thought it was probably as good a time as any for an update on this. It would appear from my bank statement that the cheques have been received and processed successfully. I left it what I considered a reasonable period of time (about 30 days or so) just in case there were any outstanding correspondence still in the system to find their way to me, but to my relief nothing else has landed on my doormat so I think that the matter has now been brought to a successful close and the additional charges squashed as originally requested. I would like to thank those of you that took the time to respond to me while I was trying to figure this issue out, and especially thank Old-CodJA whomever you are for your help with my responses to the various authorities concerned. I wish you all the best in the future. Best regards, Nathan

Thank you for your comments Old-CodJA, they are very much appreciated. I have today written to the RPSS as follows:- I also wrote to the IPFAS as follows:- I am hoping to hear nothing further back from either the RPSS or the IPFAS with regards this matter unless it is to apologise for the administration fees and to confirm that they have indeed made a mistake and have removed them. I will post the results should there be any...

Thank you fccwatch for your input, it is much appreciated. My understanding of this situation (and please correct me if I'm wrong) is that because both of my children are over the age of 10 they have reached the age of criminal responsibility in the eyes of the law. The RPSS state they can persue my Daughter for a criminal conviction if they can show that she was aware that what she was doing was seriously wrong. They can also persue my Son for the same but state he would be treated as an adult in court for all but sentencing. It's a wonderfully heavy-handed approach to their correspondence and seems more like scaremongering than anything actually productive. Clearly the letters are designed to garner a prescribed response along the lines of immediate capitulation, full payment and then dropping the matter. They have written to us as parents but as you state, my children are legally culpable and therefore any prosecution would be directed to them would it not? You say that because the RPSS has accepted my appeal in both cases with no caveat or disagreements this works in my favour moving forwards should any further action be sought. I have no intention of paying their administration fees as I consider them to be grossly unfair and disproportionately high considering the relatively small fare amount in question. In fact you'd think they would have waived the fare considering what they have put my children through with all this! Their appeal acceptance letters ask that I pay the outstanding monies or they will add more administration fees to the amount. I have been onto the penalty fares website to try and make payment, but interestingly enough their payment system does not allow the free input of a sum of money. You simply enter the details from the PFN and then your payment details and they will collect whatever the outstanding amount is. I quit out of the site once I reached this point as I do not want them trying to take 2 x £21.20 payments. I will blow the dust off my cheque book over the weekend and send them 2 x £1.20 cheques instead. This brings me on to the crux of my 'what happens next' questioning... When I send the cheques attached to the appeal acceptance letters, what do I do about the administration fees. I want to get them squashed - in fact I need to get them squashed as I have absolutely no intention of paying them. The problem is I have never dealt with the RPSS before, so wouldn't begin to know whether I need to begin by writing to the guy that upheld my appeal, or someone further up the food chain there or what? I could really do with some help or even a half way decent letter template. I would love to be able to go home tonight and tell my children something positive about this - unfortunately the news about the appeal being upheld but them sneaking an administration fee on was a bit of a turd in the punchbowl for them. Thank you in advance for anything anyone can come up with. Regards, Nathan

Hello CAG, I'm a long time follower but first time poster. Firstly I'll give a quick background to the situation... My 15 year old son and my 13 year old daughter travel back on the train service that runs from Meldreth to Royston every day. The fare they pay is £1.20 each for a single ticket. They always have the cash on them to do this as I give them £10 every four days to cover it off. They were both issued with a Penalty Fare Notice by First Capital Connect on the 13th November for failing to present a valid ticket. This was because they were unable to purchase one at Meldreth station. The ticket machine was spitting their coins out and there was not a member of staff manning the ticket office at the point they were at the station, so were forced to board the train and try and purchase a ticket from the member of staff on the train itself. The ticket inspector refused to believe their story nor accept their cash and chose to issue a PFN to each of them instead much to their disbelief. Once I found out about this I composed a letter to send to appeal against both PFNs. I took the liberty of quoting back to them extracts from the First Capital Connect Revenue Protection Policy (the section entitled Penalty Fares):- "In order for us to issue a Penalty Fare, it must have been possible for you to purchase the correct ticket before you boarded. So for example, if the ticket office was closed and the ticket machine was not working, a Penalty Fare will not be issued. Please bear in mind our staff are able to check whether ticket offices are open or if our ticket machines are faulty." And the National Rail Conditions of Carriage document:- "Train Companies must make tickets and reservations available at stations, over the internet or by telephone as appropriate. Where there are no facilities at the station, tickets will be available for sale during or at the end of the journey." I received two emails back from the Revenue Protection Support Services with attached PDFs with regard my appeals. Both are identical, one for each child. They both uphold my appeal against the PFNs and only require that we pay the current outstanding balance. Good news one would think. However there is a problem... There appears to have been a cross-over during the appeals process. Whilst my appeals against the PFNs have been upheld they have seen fit to apply a £20 administration fee against each of the outstanding PFNs. We received two letters in the post from the RPSS on Monday of this week indicating to us that £40 was now outstanding against each PFN and we were expected to pay it within 14 days or they would add a further £20 administration fee on each notice. Obviously I do understand (as they saw fit to outline this in the first paragraph of their rather unnecessarily condescending letters) that, and I quote "any appeal which may have been made is a wholly separate matter from the legal requirement to make payment" but seeing as how the RPSS has just squashed the two fines why have they left the administration fee outstanding? The reason I am posting this is to ask for some advice/guidance about my options moving forward. I understand that the appeal process is separate to the payment of the fine, and so I would like to avoid being told that perhaps I should have just paid the fines in full at the same time as submitting the appeal to avoid this happening, I sent the appeal in early enough to be well within the deadline. It is not my fault that they may take a little while to process things at their end but I do also understand that they would have refunded me any monies owing should this have been the case. However, this is not the case and the situation I find myself in begs the question - what do I do now. Do I have grounds to either refuse to pay the administration fee and only submit the full payment of the travel fares themselves (£2.40 in total)? What about sending them £2.40 plus an additional sum that I consider fair to cover the cost of their automatically generated letters which went into franked envelopes and were sent in the post? Do I pay in full and then try and claim it back through the Small Claims Court process? Fundamentally I believe this fee to be unfair. Are they entitled to recover far beyond the punitive damages caused to them during the process of issuing two PFNs that should never have been issued in the first place? Does the appeal going in my favour have any likelihood of going towards a compelling argument to have the administration fees squashed and for me to simply pay the £2.40 and be done with it? I feel very aggrieved that this is happening. I sent a very well put together (if I do say so myself) letter appealing the whole thing and it was successful, so to have defeat snatched mercilessly from the jaws of victory by expecting me to effectively still part company with £40 along with the original train fare - well it would have just been cheaper to pay the fine and not bother appealing...at least then I would have saved £2.40 plus the cost of a first class stamp! Ideas, suggestions, advice, guidance (possibly complementary brownies) all gratefully received. Many thanks, Nathan