A pair of scammers who used cloned credit cards to steal more than £150,000 worth of rail passes to sell on the black market have been jailed.

Jucius Marcinkevicius, 22, and Ruslan Dymarchuk, 21 part of a gang used the fake cards at south London rail stations including Streatham, Sutton, Crystal Palace and Wandsworth Common over nine months, buying weekly travel passes and handing them to their bosses to sell on the black market.

The scam cost rail operator Southern Trains £156,000 and forced the company to change its customer policy by limiting purchases to those with chip and pin cards.

Stations targeted by the thieves included Streatham, New Cross Gate, Forest Hill, Sydenham, North Dulwich, East Dulwich, Peckham Rye, Tolls Hill, Sutton, Crystal Palace, Norwood Junction, West Norwood, Chipstead, Gypsy Hill, Wandsworth Common and Purley Oaks.

Lithuanian Marcinkevicius and Ukranian Dymarchuk were arrested when police caught them redhanded at Honor Oak Park station on April 28 this year.

The pair, both of Burgess Road, Stratford, east London, admitted conspiracy to defraud at Southwark Crown Court.

Marcinkevicius claimed he was given a pound for every travel card passed on to his gang master - earning up to £2,000 by the time of his arrest.

He was jailed for 21 months while foot soldier Dymarchuk, who only been involved in the fraud since February, received 15 months.

Judge John Price recommended that both men be deported once they had served their sentences.

"This caused the travel company very real problems, and eventually they tried to solve it by inconveniencing the public, limiting those who did not have chip and pin to withdrawing a maximum of £20 per day," Judge Price said.

"They were part of a sophisticated fraud. The loss was substantial."

A statement issued by Southern said: "Southern is pleased that the fraudsters have been caught and sentenced but regrets that it has become necessary to inconvenience some law-abiding passengers who are now unable to use non chip and pin' cards."