Yorkshire high school named in the top five secondary schools for student fare evasion by Northern Rail

The train operator is currently working with the schools listed to urge parents to buy the existing, widely popular and heavily discounted (up to 75 per cent off) Educational Season Tickets when schools return in September instead of giving their child money for the fare. Some students decided to pocket and take the risk of travelling without a ticket.

Many fare evasion incidents took place when students were travelling relatively short journeys between rural and suburban stations that are not barrier-controlled.

Due to the high numbers of students on trains and the restricted journey time, conductors can’t always carry out a full ticket inspection, which results in students ‘risking it’.

Northern is now deploying revenue protection teams to undertake random ticket checks to try and resolve the problem.

Here are the top five high schools for student fare evasions.

1 - Rainhill High School, Prescot, Merseyside

2 - Honley High School, Holmfirth, West Yorkshire

3 - Wilmslow High School, Cheshire

4 - Turton School, Bromley Cross, Greater Manchester

5 - Wade Deacon High School, Widnes, Cheshire

Here are the examples of the big savings available for each school, based on a child’s return fare being used on the 195 days that schools are open per year.

Rainhill High School

A Child’s Anytime Day Return cost £2.20

An Annual Educational Season Ticket cost £78

An Annual Educational Season Ticket (Return price per school day) cost £0.40

Honley High School

A Child’s Anytime Day Return cost £2.80

An Annual Educational Season Ticket cost £80

An Annual Educational Season Ticket (Return price per school day) cost £0.41

Wilmslow High School

A Child’s Anytime Day Return cost £3.30

An Annual Educational Season Ticket cost £78

An Annual Educational Season Ticket (Return price per school day) cost £0.40

Turton School

A Child’s Anytime Day Return cost £2.80

An Annual Educational Season Ticket cost £98

An Annual Educational Season Ticket (Return price per school day) cost £0.50

Wade Deacon High School

A Child’s Anytime Day Return cost £2.40

An Annual Educational Season Ticket cost £101

An Annual Educational Season Ticket (Return price per school day) cost £0.52

Mark Powles, commercial and customer director at Northern, said: “Everyone has a responsibility to buy a ticket before they travel. Unfortunately, some students think that rule doesn’t apply to them - and routinely fare evade on our services.

“It’s important they know that fare evading is a criminal act and in the future they could end up with a criminal record for the sake of paying the - heavily discounted - student fare.

“With the end of the school year almost upon us, we are urging parents from September not to give their child money with the hope they will buy a ticket, but to save money by ensuring their child has a ticket by buying it for a cheaper rate in advance.”

Northern is investing in the largest network of ticket infrastructure of any train operator in the UK. Customers can buy tickets from Northern’s app, website, ticket offices or one of more than 600 ticket machines across the network.