A passenger who thought they could save a few quid by riding the train a few extra stops has been hit with a huge fine, after Iarnród Éireann discovered his scheme on a routine check.
The man had been buying a ticket that got him from Drogheda to Balbriggan in north Dublin, but instead of hopping off there he continued his journey to a Dart station further down the line without paying the extra fare for the next few stops.
It seems that the man enjoyed the trip for about eight months without getting caught until he was discovered while they were out having a station by station blitz on unpaid fares. He was hit with an on the spot fine of €100, but they decided to hang on to his smart card (where the information on where he was traveling to and from is stored) to make some further investigations, when they discovered the extent of his fare dodging.
According to Independent.ie, the man had paid €1,160 for his annual pass, but if he'd paid the correct fare for the stations he was traveling between, it should have been €3,040. As a result, he was hit with a fairly whopping fine of over €5,500, although Iarnród Éireann are fairly clear that they were being lenient enough with it: "While we could have applied a €100 penalty per journey outside the area of validity, we applied the single fare for each instance of travel outside the validity resulting in the penalty of €5,544.25, which was paid in full".
Via Independent.ie
