Crew peculation

Employee fraud usually occurs where the ticket issuer or machine holder either takes cash and issues no ticket at all, takes cash and re-issues a previously used ticket, or takes cash and issues a ticket of lower value than the fare tendered. Frauds can also occur where the ticket issuer under-records transaction activity levels, or engages in the miscreant misuse or abuse of ticket issuing equipment for that purpose.

These activities tend to occur at busy times rather than in low use times of day. The accurate and timely completion of ticket sales waybills by the vehicle crew is a basic discipline of most ticket issuing regimes, so that subsequent inspection of passengers can compare the tickets held by passengers with waybill entries.

Employees may attempt to conceal such fraud by using more than one waybill and disposing of any waybill verified by inspection personnel. To counter this, inspectors’ checking records can be cross-checked against conductors’ waybills to ensure that the signed waybill has been handed in. Alternatively, all waybills can be sequentially numbered and their issue recorded such that any missing waybills and their allocation can be identified.

Crew peculation is considered very seriously by operators who will usually summarily dismiss culprits and, where practical, may initiate criminal proceedings to prosecute the offenders.