Ticket Machines - machines missing or broken, and penalty fare implications (merged topics)

[whole diary]

[Nibat]

Three different explanations:

- Coin jam, leaving the coin counter out of action.  It could have been taken notes for a while until the machine simply run out of change.

- Same as above, but without the coin jam bit.  The machine simply run out of change.  Should be taking exact ammount, though, so not the most feasible explanation...

- It has been set up that way because some kind of fraud is going on.  They've done it before when they have detected a number of extrange transactions have taken place.  Usually the other way around anyway, the card option and with it the ToD's are disconnected.

In my experience I would say there is some kind of jam and that part of the TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) has automatically been disabled (the machine itself detects something is wrong, so shuts down that component).

[Nibat]

That said, a lot of machines around London and Bristol are set as card only due to vandalism and some thefts as Oxman says.  Usually if the TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) cannot be emptied every day, they just won't risk it...

[vacman]

None of the West machines should be card only as far as i'm aware, it may just be a fault with the coin/note mechanisms or the cash boxes may be full, just a note, it's only Train Managers, Assistant Ticket Examiners (ATE)'s and Conductors that get commission, no staff that issue PF^▸ (Penalty Fare)'s get any form of commission with First Great Western (FGW^▸ (First Great Western)).


Edit: VickiS - Clarifying Acronyms

[Chris from Nailsea]

Thanks, vacman.

However, I have been told, by FGW^▸ (First Great Western), that both TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) at Nailsea & Backwell have been set to accepting 'card only' purchases for about a year now - due to previous incidents of damage caused during attempted theft of cash from them.

In fact, I've been campaigning for FGW to get stickers added to these two machines, to make this clear - partly to save people wasting their time repeatedly trying to pay by cash, and partly to inform potential ram-raiders that there is no point, because these machines don't contain any cash!

CfN. 

[TheLastMinute]

Yes, it's always amused me that FGW^▸ (First Great Western) seem to fully expect that when these scrotes turn up with their 30 kg sledge hammers to smash up a TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine), before causing any damage they will first pause and take a moment to check that they can actually buy a Cheap Day Return to Bristol with cash. 

[Chris from Nailsea]

Big sign on each machine - There is no cash in this machine - what's the problem with that ??

If it saves ^20,000 machines being trashed for no purpose, I'm all in favour of it.

[TheLastMinute]

But on the other hand, as far as I'm aware the Nailsea machines haven't been done over since they went "Card Only" a year ago. Makes you wonder if the gangs raiding the TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) already knew it wasn't worth visiting Nailsea. 

[Chris from Nailsea]

Hmm.  Next time I see him, I'll ask Jacob when the machines went 'card only', and when they were last attacked, to see if there's anything in that.

[vacman]

yes, most machines in the Central and East areas are currently card only until a permenent solution can be found for sorting out that vandalism problems.

[ChrisB]

THey were sold to FGW^▸ (First Great Western) as secure & valdal-proof - so I reckon the manufacturwers are doing this work FOC^▸ (Freight Operating Company).

[old original]

valdal-proof -

Harry potters arch enemy strikes at TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) now?

Is there no depths to which he wouldn't sink???

 

[Chris from Nailsea]

Hmm. 

On the wider subject of the general 'robustness / suitability for purpose' of the Scheidt & Bachmann TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) - see a previous discussion, at http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=3327.msg26161#msg26161

[Chris from Nailsea]

1.  How to do it wrong  Install two ticket machines at a station, and then, due them being attacked, disable them from accepting cash transactions but do not make it clear on the machines that they do not contain cash - as at Nailsea, for example:



2.  How to do it right  Install ticket machines at a station, but then, due to them being attacked, disable them from accepting cash transactions and make it clear on the machines that they do not contain cash - as at Tilehurst, for example:



3.  What happens when you do it wrong  This happens:



I arrived at Nailsea & Backwell yesterday morning at 09:00, to see that sorry sight.  The relief station staff, who had also just turned up, due the non-availablility of our regular staff member, apparently had not been informed of the situation regarding the two machines.  Indeed, when he contacted his depot at Weston, they knew nothing about it either.

It therefore appears that the machines were attacked sometime over the weekend: one assumes the police attended - hence the upside-down tape barrier - but nobody seems to have informed FGW^▸ (First Great Western).

What I find particularly annoying about all this is the fact that I have been suggesting to various members of FGW for some considerable time now that, particularly in the absence of any CCTV^▸ (Closed Circuit Tele Vision) coverage for these poor machines, it would be a good idea to make it quite clear on both machines that they do not contain cash.

[inspector_blakey]

I suspect a lot of the damage inflicted on the Scheidt and Bachmann machines is mindless vandalism, rather than any serious attempt to get cash out of them. Those screens (the only really vulnerable point on those machines, apart from obvious stuff like plugging up the coin or card slot with chewing gum) are just too tempting a target for the knuckle-draggers. Not sure that a sticker stating that there is no cash in the machines is likely to deter that sort of attack.

There are possible solutions: apparently SWT^▸ (South West Trains)'s machines have a more robust screen that is more resistant to being kicked in. Although if they're like the screens on the MTA New York subway then that could be a mixed blessing. The MTA screens look like they could resist a bullet, and indeed they may even have been designed to do so. However, they're so thick that the touch screen can be quite (no pun intended) touch and go in terms of how responsive they are, and the optics can get a bit distorted as well.

[johoare]

A "no cash" sign has deterred the low-life of Maidenhead from attacking the ones at the rear entrance to the station (Shoppenhangers road) for quite a while now