Sunday, August 03, 2014

Caught and fined

I have heard various people hinting that they never pay while using the public transport in my city. Passengers are supposed to flash their transport card or punch their ticket once they step into the bus or tramway, or these days you can flash your cellphone where the tickets stored. However, some try their luck, they just climb up without paying.

One day hubby needed my car so I headed to an appointment with both girls in public transport. The tickets can last for one hour, on the way back, by the time we descended the tramway, the time was up, but I still had to take a bus which lasted only 5 minutes. Should I punch another ticket for myself and Aelig? I decided not to since it was just a short distance.

We just settled down in the bus, and we saw the man sitting in front of us getting off, but without success, as the door was shut. He looked very uneasy and sat back where he was. Aelig asked me why this man came back, I was at the point telling her a possible explanation, while three bus officers stood in front of us and asked me for my tickets. We didn't see them climbing up the bus because we sat opposite the driving direction.

No, they didn't fine me for the 5 minutes over the valid usage time, how nice of them. But, the man in front of us got caught. He said frankly that he didn't have any ticket on him. That costed him 46€. He didn't look sorry, but more feeling unlucky that he got caught.

I thought I would feel that he deserved it, but I was actually sympathy with him. His face expression made me felt sorry for what had happened, as if he just paid all he got on the fine. Poor him.


5 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:31 AM

    I'm one of these people... I always have a valid ticket with me but I never actually punch it in unless I see les contrôleurs. It's kind of a French thing, I think, to dodge fare. It's easy in the tramway, less so in the bus. But most of the time I take the tram, it's just for a few stops because it's pouring or something like that. I'm in peace with that :-)

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    1. I'm not in peace if I don't have the ticket punched, I don't want to have to be alert at all times.

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  2. But that man actually wanted to get off the bus. Couldn't he use it as an excuse?

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    Replies
    1. If he wants to get off the bus he has to show his ticket to prove that he paid for the ride.

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  3. We got caught once on a tram with the tickets invalided for 30 mins. Instead of paying 5 złoty for the tickets to our rented apartment, my husband decided to chance it. We got caught. We were forced to disembarked the tram, and pay 200 złoty fine. Ouch.

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