Himel Khandker was infuriated when TTC fare inspectors stopped him on the 501 Queen streetcar last month and gave him a $235 ticket.
It wasn’t just the cost of the fine, which is no small amount for the 25-year-old biomedical engineering student. In part what bothered him was that he had paid for a student Metropass. He showed it to the inspectors, but he didn’t have the required TTC student ID.
The ticket stung, but what really aggravated him was that just two hours later, he watched as inspectors confronted two women on the 504 King streetcar who he said didn’t have proof of payment. According to Khandker, one claimed she had dropped her transfer, while the other had one that was expired.
He was sure he was about to watch them get ticketed, but was incredulous when the inspectors let both off with a warning.
“I was kind of livid,” said Khandker. “Why is the enforcement not uniform?”
He began to wonder why he had been ticketed while others got off. “I’m a brown guy with a big beard. I’m a student, I don’t look like I’m a million bucks. Does that have anything to do with it? I wonder,” he asked.
The TTC launched its proof-of-payment program on streetcars in late 2015, and after a period of “education,” the agency is ramping up enforcement, bringing inspectors into increasing contact with transit riders. Some, like Khandker, have questions about what the TTC is doing to ensure the inspectors treat customers fairly.
Mark Cousins, head of the TTC’s transit enforcement unit, said the agency takes such concerns seriously and that inspectors never target certain groups.
“We don’t just inspect certain individuals based on how they look,” he said.
He says the agency employs rigorous oversight of its inspectors, a key part of which is keeping a close track of public complaints.
Citing privacy concerns, the TTC declined to share details of any of the cases. But asked for an example of a human rights complaint, Paul Manherz, the TTC human resources investigator, said that in one instance an inspector was accused of unintentionally referring to a transgender rider by the incorrect gender.
Manherz is required to investigate and produce a report within 60 days of receiving a complaint.
Last year he determined that just one of the formal complaints was substantiated. In that instance, he found that an inspector shared a rider’s personal information with another employee of the agency.
According to agency spokesperson Brad Ross “appropriate disciplinary action was taken” against the employee. He wouldn’t specify, but possible discipline ranges from a verbal warning to termination of employment.
Given that the TTC conducted almost 2.3 million inspections last year, a little more than 100 complaints is a good record, said Cousins.
He said that the agency’s 72 inspectors are instructed to treat each potential fare evader on a case by case basis and evaluate their explanations on “reasonableness and believability.”
“If you stop someone and the story that they tell seems reasonable” then they may get off with a warning, Cousins said.
That was the outcome in the majority of cases last year. Inspectors handed out 58,638 written or verbal warnings, compared to 12,801 fines.
Cousins said the agency is conscious of the potential for discrimination, which is why inspectors undergo six to seven days of training on diversity, inclusion and mental health issues.
Aside from the fact the TTC estimates fare evasion costs $20 million a year in lost revenue, Cousins said the agency has no incentive to ticket riders aggressively. Inspectors are not given quotas, and the TTC doesn’t keep the revenue from the fines.
Ross, the TTC spokesperson, had a message for anyone wondering why they get a ticket while another rider may not: “Today’s your turn, tomorrow it will be somebody else’s.”
