Irish Rail and Luas refuse to take passengers money
May 8th 2013
Rail Users Ireland can reveal that both Irish Rail and Luas have not yet updated their ticket machines to accept the new 5 euro note. As a result passengers are left unable to purchase tickets. Tests conducted by Rail Users Ireland members at several ticket machines resulted in a new 5 euro note being rejected every time.
Both Irish Rail and the Rail Procurement Agency are well aware of this issue, but have failed to issue any public notice.
While it is true that self service checkouts at major supermarkets do not accept the 5 euro note either, in those cases there is always a member of staff on hand to accept payment. In the case of Luas and in many cases Irish Rail stations are unstaffed leaving the intending passengers with a dilemma, can they board without a ticket?
Rail Users Ireland has no confidence that ticket checking staff will show appropriate discretion where a passenger through no fault of their own was unable to purchase a ticket as a result of rejection of the new 5 euro note.
This is yet another example of the failure within public transport management in Ireland to plan ahead and to communicate when things are broken. The introduction of the new 5 euro note was well publicised as far back as January 2013.