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Moving about in Britain - by any transport method - is getting too tricky by half. With so many different systems and rules it's a wonder anyone bothers, writes Guy Bird
I'm potentially £80 down and have the right hump. Two fines in as many weeks illustrate how needlessly difficult it can be to travel in this overly devolved and complicated country.
The first one related to not having the right ticket to travel on a train despite the fact the ticket office was shut before 6pm on a weekday and that I've always been allowed to pay at the other end.
I have better things to do than fare-dodge £2.10. But having the means to pay in hard notes and also being in possession of a fully paid-up Oyster card (useable on some lines but not all) was not enough to stop me being treated like a criminal by 'Mr. Inspector'. He wouldn't let me step the final four yards to his station's excess fare booth, which of course - unlike the office at my starting destination - was open.
After an appeal to his huge supervisor/bouncer's human nature, I was allowed to pay the £2.10 and dispute the £20 fine. I'm not holding out much hope of a fair result.
Parking in a residential street should have been easier - a doddle even - for a seasoned driver like me who actually knows how to pay the congestion charge by text. Seemingly not. On arrival, late Saturday afternoon, I spot specific 'two wheels on pavement, two wheels off' parking stipulations and manoeuvre carefully within the vaguely outlined box to make sure not even my car's overhangs are overhanging outside the allotted space. Then I spy 'permit or pay and display' signs and I'm fretting again. Not having a penny on me (though I did have a bottle of wine for the host) I rush to get my young kids to the front door of the party down the street in the hope someone has change to pay for the 1.5 hours left before the restrictions lift.
Fortunately the homeowner is on the ball and hands me a 'visitor parking permit'. I duly scratch off the right day and month for with my key and rush back to car to and place it on my dashboard. Four hours later there's a £60 ticket on the windscreen "for displaying an invalid permit" because I had failed to write in the vehicle's registration number. Last time I used such a parking permit in another borough I don't remember needing to do such a thing. And I can't dispute the fine until it's reached the full £60 to really pile on the pressure and nudge me toward paying the lesser but still ridiculously disproportionate £30 early and moving on.
Every town, city, bus, train and underground company seems to have different rules. Which makes me wonder: do they really want my original fare or are they concentrating more on the lucrative fines? It really is time for more joined-up transport rules. Looking forward to nationwide road-charging already.
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