South West Train's, the operator of local overground rail services, is attempting to remove the discretion of their employees to let passengers off a penalty fine when they have been unable to buy a ticket before boarding according to an article in a national newspaper.

Up until now guards have generally been lenient as ticket machines are often out of order and sometimes long queues mean that passengers are faced with the choice of missing the train or waiting for a ticket. The Times has obtained a copy of an internal memo which shows that South West Trains are to introduce a system in which even passengers presenting themselves to a guard offering to buy a ticket will be treated as fare dodgers.

The guards are also instructed to sell the most expensive ticket with no railcard discounts. The memo also says that children must be penalised, even at weekends and on Bank Holidays, when cheaper fares are available but ticket offices are often closed because of staff shortages.

South West Trains has told their staff that they will be held accountable if they accept any explanations from passengers. The Times quotes the memo as saying, “From now, your commercial duties will be measured in three main areas: the amount of revenue that you collect; the type of tickets that you sell; and the number of penalty fare warnings issued.”

The company has sent their guards on a training course about the new policy which includes instruction on how to deal with angry passengers.

Although South West Trains franchise obliges them to keep passengers waiting for no more than 5 minutes to buy a ticket queues at kiosks and ticket machines are often far longer. Passenger groups point out that the company is effectively profiting from failing to install enough ticket machines. The revelation is likely to further anger passengers who have recently been asked to pay higher prices for off peak journeys.

South West Trains have denied that there has been a change in policy. In a statement they said, "We are simply enforcing the existing policy that you must have a valid ticket before you board a train. However if a passenger has a legitimate reason for not being able to buy a ticket, such as ticket machines not working or ticket office windows closed because of staff sickness then we tell staff to use their discretion."

The company says that a paging system will allow them to verify whether or not a ticket machine is inoperative at a particular station.

The Department for Transport has said that it is launching an investigation into the policy to see if it breaches regulations. South West Trains is currently making profits of over £1 million a week.