Thanks, I will keep you posted. I have a horrible feeling that I may have thrown out my old season tickets (to make room for the new carnets and oyster card in my wallet!) but I did have a few of them. But don't the TOCs keep their own records, as I know they have reissued cards to me before when the magnetic strips stopped working?

BazzaS - please don't think that I am railing against those who have posted - that's not my intention and I thank everyone for their comments so far. What really gets to me is that I do genuinely feel that I have acted reasonably and in good faith here, and yet it seems that nonetheless I'm at risk of getting hung out to dry. Whether that's more a comment about the one sided relationship we have with the TOCs, I don't know, but I hope you can appreciate I am feeling somewhat bruised right now, especially if this could be hanging over me for months before I even know any more. One thing is for certain, I am going back to annual tickets today. Perhaps carnets work well for those well versed in the regulations, but for a newbie like me that has been badly stung after less than a week, it's a big no thank you. RC

In terms of the discussion with the inspector: He asked the standard questions that are on the form, my (good faith) answer to the 'do you have a valid ticket for travel' was 'yes', and he wrote that. He also wrote a supplemental question around whether the ticket had been 'altered' and wrote my answer that it had been 'corrected'. The discussion was largely around the fact that I had put an incorrect date on the ticket and was simply correcting it for the date that it was intended to be used on. I also made several points about the fact that it could clearly be demonstrated that I did not travel on the original dates and that the ticket was unused. I also showed him the past few days worth of used carnet tickets, although he did not take them, and pointed out that this was my first week of using them since moving from an annual ticket. I also said that to the best of my knowledge, there was no reason that I could not make such a correction on an unused ticket, and he said nothing that indicated that this was incorrect. Interestingly, when I protested that by confiscating my return ticket he was putting me out of pocket, he wrote me a slip at the bottom of the form he completed that said that it would be good for that journey. Unfortunately now I look at it, it was only good for the inbound journey this morning.

Well I'm astounded. And I thought the idea of a carnet was to provide flexibility over travel dates. So basically what I am hearing is that regardless that I had no intent to defraud or deceive anyone, despite the fact that I have faithfully paid my way over the past 18 years, and despite the fact that noone suffered financial loss here, I'm somehow a serious criminal? This has really made my day. Thank you.

Thanks for the welcome HB... as you can tell, this has rather wound me up! I suspect I have little comeback on the inspector's absolute right to confiscate the tickets, given that I am sure that there is language to the effect that the 'ticket remains the property of the TOC' somewhere, but it's this automatic presumption of deception/fraud that seems to be endemic in the public transport system that really gets me. Yes, I realise there is a genuine issue with evasion, and even with us 'white collar' lot, given the recent case with the ex-MD of a big fund manager. But based on the rules as I am reading them, I can't see any prima facie reason for this action being taken. Of course it doesn't help that the whole carnet process is pretty archaic and needs to be more oyster-like, but that in itself doesn't justify the approach taken - if they want to haul people up for correcting a ticket when it's not specifically proscribed, then they need to be able to have reasonable grounds for suspecting fraud, such as you would get with inspectors oyster readers on the tube that can determine if you have 'touched in'. Frankly I want to go on the offensive here with Great Northern over the return ticket they took from me; rather than have it festering for weeks/months wondering what if anything they will do... 2nd Rant over! RC

Hi there, new to these forums, but I googled the issue I faced this morning, and saw a couple of related threads here, so hoping I might be able to get some advice, or at least confirmation of what I believe! My situation is that after 17 years of using annual season tickets between my Hertfordshire home and work in the city, I switched to the carnet + oyster method, because I often do not need to travel to the office and it would save money. 1 week later, and I now have had to deal with an inspector this morning that wrote me up for altering the date on my ticket. I don't dispute that I did that, however I also don't believe I have done anything wrong here. Facts as I see them: 1) I had originally put in yesterday's date on the peak 'into london' ticket, however at the last minute, I did not travel that day, and the ticket was not used. 2) I subsequently corrected the day written on the ticket to today 3) I also corrected the date on the off peak 'return' carnet ticket that I was intending to use this evening 4) The inspector that looked at my ticket refused to accept it, and confiscated it. 5) When I showed him the return ticket I was intending to use (I did this to try and demonstrate that I had simply made a correction in advance of travel), he confiscated that as well! I believe my position in law here is that I have not broken any rules in correcting the date on an otherwise unused Carnet ticket. I looked at a post on here quoting the rail bylaws, and while there is commentary on ticket alteration, it is qualified: - No person shall alter any ticket in any way with the intent that an Operator shall be defrauded or prejudiced. Now given that they can themselves determine that the ticket was never used on the original date, plus I have plenty of work colleagues, family etc that can attest to the fact that I was at home (should it really come to that!), then it would seem that it was perfectly ok to alter the ticket in this case. Secondly, when you buy a Carnet, it comes with a seperately printed ticket card with its own conditions, and whilst it refers to the need to validate the ticket with the date in permanent ink, there is no reference to corrections or alterations being prohibited. Sorry if this sounds like a bit of a rant, but frankly it was hugely annoying to be in this situation. I'm glad to say that I at least remained calm and polite throughout (even when he handed out a veiled threat that there was a plain clothes police officer observing, and then backtracked when I insisted on speaking with them), but not only do I feel I have done nothing wrong here, but I've also had my 'return' ticket confiscated, which I fully believe I should be able to use - so in addition to having to wait for whatever letter they will send me, I also am out of pocket on the return. Any thoughts/advice appreciated. Maybe I should just go back to annual passes! RC