Transport for London (TfL) spent almost £22million cracking down on fare dodging across the Tube and bus network over the last year - but only collected £1.3million in penalty charges as a result of that enforcement.
The financial data comes after separate figures revealed that fare evasion across all of TfL’s services fell slightly from an estimated 3.9 per cent of journeys in 2022/23, to 3.8 per cent in 2023/24 - despite total journeys rising by 300million.
Responding to a Freedom of Information request on the topic, TfL said that the harm caused by fare evaders “is much greater than simply the missed cost of a ticket” as the culprits can often be “intimidating or abusive to our colleagues and to our customers”.
The organisation disclosed that between April 2023 and March 2024, it spent £14.2million on a revenue enforcement team on the Underground and a further £7.7million enforcing fares on the capital’s buses.
TfL said it did not know how much had been spent on the London Overground, Tram network or on the Elizabeth line, as those services are operated by franchisees who outsource their enforcement teams.
On the Tube network, penalty fares totalling £638,520 were issued over that same period, with a further £707,272 worth of fines issued on the bus network.
Despite being run by franchisees, TfL said it was also aware that £560,944 of penalty fares had been charged on the Overground, and £756,534 on the Elizabeth line. In a slightly different period spanning June 2023 to June 2024, TfL said that £32,328 of penalty fares were issued on the Tram network.
The transport authority said: “We take fare evasion extremely seriously and our team of revenue inspectors provide a vital deterrent that influences the rate of fare evasion.
“Revenue inspectors operate across our network day and night, using new technology and intelligence to identify anyone travelling without a ticket. We take action against thousands of fare evaders every year.
“Fare evasion takes away vital revenue from us to reinvest in our transport network to keep London moving.”
TfL added: “We have a multi-pronged strategy in place to reduce the risk of fare evasion and have set a target to bring the level of fare evasion below 1.5 per cent.”
The penalty charge for fare evasion is £100, though this is reduced to £50 if paid within 21 days. According to TfL’s policies, the penalty is issued under circumstances “where the offender is considered not to have deliberately set out to avoid the fare”.
Someone suspected of deliberate fare evasion “risks prosecution which may result in criminal conviction, a fine of up to £1,000 and in some cases imprisonment”.
In a report last month, TfL commissioner Andy Lord said staff were “launching a new fare evasion poster on the network”, drawing upon research involving “focus groups of accidental, calculated and chronic groups of fare evaders, which has provided further insight to inform our long-term approach to behaviour change”.
He added: “In the last financial year, our investigations identified 414 individuals who habitually avoided paying for all or part of their journeys, adding up to more than £363,000 of avoided fares.
“One case identified an individual who had failed to correctly validate their contactless payment card 193 times, totalling over £1,200 of unpaid fares. The individual attended court in April and pleaded guilty to all charges.
“We also identified another individual who was avoiding fares by using a bank card that had insufficient funds. Analysis of the card’s usage showed a failure to validate on every journey made in over a year. We used CCTV footage to help find the offender. The individual attended court and pleaded guilty to all offences and was ordered to pay £1,796 to us.”
