A MOBILE signal 'deadspot' has lead to a commuter being fined three times on a rural section of the Furness Line. 

Grange rail user David Jackson said that his son has managed to successfully appeal the fines twice. All of the occasions have been between Grange and Cark in the direction of Barrow. 

"It's getting beyond reasonable," Mr Jackson argued. "It's unbelievable. There's no way of payment on the train itself."

Mr Jackson claimed that the ticket machine at Grange was often out of order, forcing commuters to use the rail app. He was unsure if the ticket machines were not working on the specific dates that his son received a fine, including the last time on Monday, 17 June. 

Northern said that tickets were issued from the machine on that day, and they are monitored remotely so if they do have issues engineers can fix them, and the conductors and revenue officers are informed. 

"If somebody gets on the train and they offer to pay - he's not there to dodge fares," Mr Jackson said. "We keep having to appeal for this. They need to have something on the train." 

He also argued that the current system does not work for older passengers who do not use a phone if the ticket machine is broken and the office is closed. 

A spokesperson for Northern said: “Northern has invested in the largest network of digital ticket infrastructure of any train operator in the country, making it easier than ever to buy a ticket via our app, website, one of more than 600 ticket vending machines across the network and ticket offices too.

"The ticket vending machine at Grange over Sands has issued hundreds of tickets over the past couple of weeks – including on Monday 17 June.

"Our ticket vending machines are monitored remotely so we are aware of any issues and, if required, can send engineers to fix them. We have received no reports of the ticket vending machine at Grange over Sands being out of order.”