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Swedish Fare Dodgers Organize Against Transportation Authorities
An anonymous reader writes "Every transit network has its fare beaters, the riders who view payment as either optional or prohibitively expensive. Many cities, most notably New York, view turnstile-jumpers as a top policing priority, reasoning that scofflaws might graduate to more serious crimes if left alone. But in Stockholm, the offenders seem to have defeated the system. From the article: 'For over a decade, Mr. Tengblad has belonged to a group known as Planka.nu (rough translation: “free-ride.now”), an organization with only two prerequisites for admission: Members must pay a monthly fee of about $15 and, as part of a continuous demonstration against the fare, promise to evade payment every time they ride. If travelers keep their side of the agreement, the group will cover any of the roughly $180 fines that might result. (An unlimited ride pass for 30 days costs about $120.)'"
The fine you get when you're caught dodging the fare is legally not a fine but a punitive ticket price(straffavgift). If you're caught by the police dodging the fare (Sometimes they stand around trying to catch criminals or illegal immigrants) then you get an actual fine (ordningsbot) which is actually not covered by planka.nu and can show up on your permanent record.
Essentially it's important to understand that Sweden makes an extremely clear distinction between those that have the authority to handle criminal matters and those who do not, the metro does not.