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Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

zdnet.com

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Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#21

Post by Scoundreller »

rasz wrote: post #12
slededit wrote: post #3

> Next, she heard that her court case had happened and she'd been found guilty. If she missed her court date then I don't know what she expected... You will lose by default if you don't go.

In Poland people have learned about lost court cases from Court debt collector in the middle of freezing their assets. All because there is no Service of process procedure, courts just send ordinary letter to the registered legal residency address.

Heh, I had an account with HSBC for monthly AdSense payments.

When I moved, I guess only the mailing address got changed, not the « registered » address.

So I continued getting monthly statements and all was well.

Tax time comes and I realize I hadn’t gotten statements in some months.

I go to the branch and they said the accounts been closed. Uh oh.

Turns out they sent all those communications and a draft for 5 figures to the registered address I didn’t live at anymore.

Ugh.

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#22

Post by dv_dt »

htfu wrote: post #7
zaroth wrote: post #4

You know what irks me? Besides the fact that the fine for not paying is atrociously high, besides the fact that such a transgression can even show up on a Visa query, besides the fact that this couldn’t be resolved without a court, besides the fact that the reporter missed their court date... What irks me is that some company spent millions of taxpayer dollars designing this contactless payment system and couldn’t be…

In my reading that's how it would've worked if she'd registered, am I off? Not sure how it'd be possible so sort out on the spot without that. But of course ridiculous that it took such hoops to fix after the fact.

I find it ridiculous that the payment was accepted if the requirement was that the source of payment needed to be registered and that somehow, if you had the app or phone on you, that is valid without registration of the source, but if later you're trying to avoid a fine that payment isn't valid without registration.

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#23

Post by milankragujevic »

gnode wrote: post #6
milankragujevic wrote: post #2

Eh. In Easter Europe passengers beat up inspectors. Also, it's illegal not to have an ID with you at all times. So people usually carry wallets. I carry cash all the time. Better to get robbed (small chance) than get stuck somewhere without money (i.e. CC doesn't work because the bank is having "software issues" or the POS terminal is broken or whatever...)

This isn't about being caught without cash. Whenever I've gone to London I've used my contactless credit card to pay for transport, not because I don't carry cash, but because it's convenient -- you just hold it near the gate and go through; no need to visit a ticket machine. A problem with this convenience is that you don't get any kind of physical receipt to prove you paid. Perhaps in my case, a ticket inspector co…

It helps to have cards that are bought and topped up online, that last for a month and cost 10€ and you can ride anywhere everywhere unlimited for a month. You just need to carry the card and "tap it" on the NFC reader, and have an ID in case of inspection. Or you can use a phone to buy a "temp" card, except it causes so much trouble nobody uses it, including for reasons of bad chips in the readers that refuse to work with some phones, bad app, bad infrastructure (i.e. no 3G signal and the reader in the bus can't validate your ticket so it refuses it, but the phone app already took your money)...

Technology is great when it's thought out. If not... may the deity of choice be on your side in the bureaucratic maze of modern society intertwined with digital/electronic and paper/human-based data carriers.

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#24

Post by kretor »

pjlegato wrote: post #9
ryanlol wrote: post #5

The original FT story https://www.ft.com/content/e8a177d4-dfae-11e9-9743-db5a37048... Frankly, this remark by a zdnet journo was rather bizarre: >She's a writer for The Financial Times. Please don't let any personal thoughts about that get in the way of her story.

Many people with leftist and anti-capitalist political views attach a strong negative bias to anyone who works for an entity they deem supportive of the capitalist economic system, such as major financial media.

But then there's also this -- leftists preferring the Financial Times: https://www.cjr.org/special_report/why-the-left-cant-stand-t...

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#25

Post by fortran77 »

zaroth wrote: post #4

You know what irks me? Besides the fact that the fine for not paying is atrociously high, besides the fact that such a transgression can even show up on a Visa query, besides the fact that this couldn’t be resolved without a court, besides the fact that the reporter missed their court date... What irks me is that some company spent millions of taxpayer dollars designing this contactless payment system and couldn’t be…

Why do you have to stick your neck out for Apple Pay?

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#27

Post by fortran77 »

pjlegato wrote: post #9
ryanlol wrote: post #5

The original FT story https://www.ft.com/content/e8a177d4-dfae-11e9-9743-db5a37048... Frankly, this remark by a zdnet journo was rather bizarre: >She's a writer for The Financial Times. Please don't let any personal thoughts about that get in the way of her story.

Many people with leftist and anti-capitalist political views attach a strong negative bias to anyone who works for an entity they deem supportive of the capitalist economic system, such as major financial media.

FT is fairly left-leaning. More left than I am.

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#28

Post by nabdab »

dv_dt wrote: post #22
htfu wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my reading that's how it would've worked if she'd registered, am I off? Not sure how it'd be possible so sort out on the spot without that. But of course ridiculous that it took such hoops to fix after the fact.

I find it ridiculous that the payment was accepted if the requirement was that the source of payment needed to be registered and that somehow, if you had the app or phone on you, that is valid without registration of the source, but if later you're trying to avoid a fine that payment isn't valid without registration.

Think of it this way. If you buy a ticket you can show the ticket and it’s valid even though you never provide proof of identity, and the person checking is just verifying that the human entity in front of them have a piece of cardboard. No problem there. Buying a ticket with Apple pay just puts the “cardboard ticket” in your phone.

Now you could also buy a monthly travel card, and register it to your identity, which is great because now if you forget the card, but can prove your identity then no problem, since they have the records.

The issue here is that she has a non-identified cardboard ticket on her dead phone. Which doesn’t enjoy the benefit of being tied to her Identity.

Apple pay isn’t really any different from the coins4cardboard tech here. If you buy a cardboard ticket with a credit card and throw it away, then you can’t show bank statements to get out of a fine. The expectation of the cardboard ticket is that you keep it on you to prove you have it. If that had been the case and she’s dropped a ticket out the pocket of her coat, would they be blaming the coat brand?

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#29

Post by londons_explore »

deogeo wrote: post #19

> she was charged with, well, not providing proof of payment. How is this not guilty until proven innocent? You have to prove you paid, otherwise you're assumed guilty.

There is a specific law in the UK requiring production of a ticket to a railway inspector. Doesn't matter if you paid - you are convicted if you are unable to produce a ticket when asked.

Considering that, I'm very surprised this reporter had her conviction quashed - it looks like she broke the law, even if she didn't intend to. (Intent is not required for a conviction for this law).

Re: Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal

#30

Post by perl4ever »

pjlegato wrote: post #9
ryanlol wrote: post #5

The original FT story https://www.ft.com/content/e8a177d4-dfae-11e9-9743-db5a37048... Frankly, this remark by a zdnet journo was rather bizarre: >She's a writer for The Financial Times. Please don't let any personal thoughts about that get in the way of her story.

Many people with leftist and anti-capitalist political views attach a strong negative bias to anyone who works for an entity they deem supportive of the capitalist economic system, such as major financial media.

Regarding ZDNet:

"ZDNet is a business technology news website published by CBS Interactive, along with TechRepublic. The brand was founded on April 1, 1991, as a general interest technology portal from Ziff Davis and evolved into an enterprise IT-focused online publication owned by CNET Networks."

I'm confused about why one would expect them to have "leftist and anti-capitalist views" extending to general opposition to "the capitalist economic system".

I rather thought most people into enterprise IT were down with the whole corporate capitalist system and stuff.

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