More than 460 people have been stopped and 156 penalty fares issued under Operation Vector, with police also seizing weapons and drugs.
A joint crackdown by Transport for London (TfL) and British Transport Police (BTP) has led to 24 arrests in its first month, with plain-clothes officers targeting persistent fare evaders at stations across the capital.
TfL said 467 people had been stopped, 156 penalty fares issued and 175 reports made for possible prosecution since Operation Vector launched last month.
The arrests, made by British Transport Police, relate to offences including fare evasion and wider criminal activity.
The operation brings together plain-clothes police officers, TfL revenue inspectors and uniformed enforcement staff to target repeat offenders who routinely force their way through ticket barriers without paying.
Officers are also being deployed beyond ticket barriers, using coordinated communications to identify and intercept suspected offenders.
BTP said the operation had helped officers identify people suspected of more serious offences, with weapons and drugs also seized.
Chief Inspector Daniel Rushall, of BTP, said: “In its first month, this operation has already provided us with valuable opportunities to identify and apprehend criminals and high harm offenders using London’s transport network, including the seizure of weapons and drugs.”
TfL said enforcement teams were targeting locations where fare evasion and people forcing their way through ticket barriers were particularly prevalent.
Checks are being carried out at ticket barriers, onboard services and within stations, with enforcement tactics regularly changed to make it harder for repeat offenders to avoid detection.
Siwan Hayward, TfL’s director of security, policing and enforcement, said: “The vast majority of our customers pay the correct fare, and it is only right that those who deliberately avoid paying are identified and held to account. Fare evasion and gate pushing creates an intimidating atmosphere for our staff and customers, and is something we are determined to tackle.”
She said the operation had already delivered promising results, with plain-clothes police and enforcement teams working together to make it harder for repeat offenders to avoid detection.
Separately, bus drivers on route 149 have told London Bus Forums News that fare evasion remains a frequent problem, with some questioning the level of enforcement on London’s buses.
Image: iStock
One driver estimated that he reports around 100 incidents a week through the ‘Fare Evasion’ function on his in-cab iBus Mobile Data Terminal (MDT), but said he rarely sees revenue protection inspectors on the route.
He said he felt let down by the apparent lack of enforcement and claimed some colleagues had stopped submitting reports because they felt insufficient action was being taken.
Since April 2026, more than 2,400 people have been reported for barrier misuse across the network.
TfL’s revenue enforcement teams have also issued more than 33,000 penalty fares and reported more than 11,000 people for prosecution consideration over the same period.
TfL estimates fare evasion costs around £190 million a year. Its latest annual figures show that 3.5 per cent of journeys across the network were made without the correct fare in 2025/26.
The crackdown forms part of TfL’s wider strategy, launched in April 2025, to reduce fare evasion to 1.5 per cent or less by 2030/31.
