Richard M Willis wrote:

Why do you use words such as "caught" ? There are only two possibilities:
a) you are suspected of FE, in which case you should be prosecuted
b) you simply board a train without a ticket, in which case the PF is the
only ticket
available to you.

Which is why PFs are a nonsense as they are currently implemented. The
suspicion in the above is left down to the ticket staff, who (according
to recent posts in here) often go down the prosecution route even for
an obvious case of forgetting a season ticket had expired or similar.

We should either;
1. Abolish PFs and take everyone who doesn't pay to court for evasion,
perhaps allowing the normal fare to be charged for obvious non-evasion
cases.
2. Increase the PF and make it the only sanction against someone who
hasn't paid, making fare-evasion a civil matter like unauthorised
parking is. The level of the PF and frequency of checks should be such
that a profit, not a loss, is made from people "choosing" to pay the
PF.

I would strongly favour #2.

Neil