(15 Aug 2016, 3:08 am)R852 PRG wrote

As aforementioned in the post I made, to which you replied, I stated that bus drivers at Chester-le-Street generally expect to receive a bus ticket when a customer shows a previously purchased ticket to travel, and not a Metro ticket. Irrespective of the validity. At no point did I say that the driver was right for doing what he did, I merely attempted to explain how confusion may have arisen and the subsequent dispute came to fruition. Drivers are not robots; they can and will make errors, just like any other human beings, and it's clear that in this instance, the driver was adamant that South Tyne Lad's ticket was not valid for travel, on the basis that it was a ticket that he'd purchased at a Tyne & Wear Metro station.

I've no doubt that drivers are well aware of what the Nexus CAT, North East Explorer and any other multi-operator tickets are valid for travel on, but on this occasion, the driver was of the understanding that the ticket was invalid for travel. Regardless of the validity of the ticket, drivers at Chester-le-Street will generally see more Nexus CATs printed on bus ticket rolls than produced from ticket machines on the Tyne & Wear Metro. As will be the case at other depots based in County Durham, and not in Tyne & Wear.

At the end of the day, he was permitted travel. And the rather idle ''threat'', if it can really be called that, of not being permitted to travel in a future instance of having the passenger on board his vehicle (which, for the record, is incredibly unlikely to happen. The chances of the driver seeing South Tyne Lad in the future and recognising him as the person he nearly refused travel for attempting to bought with what he thought was an invalid ticket, is very slim indeed) is nothing to lose sleep over.

Let's move on, and not clog up a key news thread with this. Nothing more to say on the matter.