SEPTA's latest rate headache: Refunds

SEPTA's latest consumer-relations headache - rail passengers stuck with suddenly worthless tickets - has proved a boon for at least one rider.

Steve Driska, an associate professor at Temple University's School of Medicine, mailed in two $3 rail tickets for a refund - and got back a voucher for $1,507.

"I guess I could drive up in a truck and say, 'Fill it with tokens,' " Driska said with a laugh. "But the reality is I just want my $6."

Other riders have been less fortunate. And less sanguine.

They are the ones who missed the Sept. 9 deadline for returning old tickets for a refund. When SEPTA raised fares July 9, it gave riders two months, instead of the usual six, to use the old tickets or get a refund.

SEPTA's chief financial officer, Joseph Casey, said yesterday that the deadline for riders to mail in tickets for refunds (1234 Market St., Philadelphia 19107) would be extended "indefinitely." SEPTA spokesman Jim Whitaker said the old tickets would be eligible for a refund for "at least six months" from their issue date.

That reprieve came too late for riders like Driska, who turned his tickets in before the Sept. 9 deadline, and Jon Blazer, who waged a private battle to get his money back after the deadline.

"The conductor told me, 'You might as well throw your tickets out,' " said Blazer, a lawyer who takes the R7 or R8 Regional Rail train from Mount Airy several times a week and said he had no clue the old tickets expired Sept. 9.

"The first I heard about it was on the train on Sept. 10 when I tried to use one of those tickets," Blazer said. He said he and his girlfriend had about $200 worth of pre-July 9 tickets.

Regional Rail tickets normally are valid for 180 days.

Passengers upset with SEPTA for not honoring their old tickets had plenty of company, as the transit agency has made a number of unpopular moves this year.

There are people upset with the July 9 general fare increase. There are bus and subway passengers upset with SEPTA's effort to eliminate paper transfers. There are rail riders upset with a new "onboard" surcharge for not buying tickets at stations that don't sell them. There are passengers upset with an Oct. 3 fare increase for tokens and transfers.

Blazer said he had taken his battle for a refund to a ticket agent at 30th Street Station and then to SEPTA headquarters on Market Street. At every step, he said, he was told nothing could be done. Not until he reached a "very nice and very helpful" supervisor named Charles Miller did he get some satisfaction.

Miller sent him a voucher for about $170 for the old tickets (some had passed the regular six-month expiration date and could not be redeemed). But then, Blazer said, a ticket agent at the Mount Airy station balked at honoring the voucher.

Eventually, a supervisor instructed her to issue the refund.

"It took five or six steps to take care of what should have been taken care of pretty quickly by a good customer service organization," Blazer said.

Driska, the physiology professor with the sudden windfall, said he enjoyed taking the R5 train in from Oreland. But now, how to turn that $1,507 voucher into $6?

"In good conscience, I couldn't take the money, and even if I did try to cash it in, it seems like it would be fraud to knowingly try to collect on what is an obvious mistake," Driska said.

If Driska takes the voucher to SEPTA headquarters, he will get a $6 refund, Casey said yesterday.

Casey said a SEPTA clerk apparently had transposed the tracking number assigned to Driska's claim with the refund amount.

"The clerk picked up the wrong number," Casey said. "Apparently, someone wasn't as vigilant as they should have been."

And SEPTA clerks have been inundated with requests for refunds. The volume of requests has been 13 or 14 times normal, Casey said.

"But the good news is that it [the voucher] never would have been honored anyway," Casey said. "The number was just too big."