9 ms·

Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

124 points by ketzu 1y ago

johndoe0815 1y ago
“Deutsche Bahn, the fully state owned railway company, is a well liked company”. Eh, nope. It’s a horribly mismanaged entity with permanent delays, bad service and outrageous pricing…
- ketzu 1y ago
  Sorry, I have a hard time holding back my sarcasm when writing while being annoyed, I thought the link to the 1.2 trust pilot rating gave it away. As this was mostly written as anger management, the writing is pretty poor. :)
  - thedanbob 1y ago
    Don't worry, some of us got it. That part made me chuckle.
    - PetitPrince 1y ago
      Yes, plus the rest of the article makes it clear this link was done in sarcasm.
  - tombardier 1y ago
    All is clear; I enjoyed that bit :)
  - sneak 1y ago
    It wasn’t you, the sarcasm was obvious. Germans generally don’t understand sarcasm, written or spoken.
    - 1718627440 1y ago
      Most times the issue is that Germans do never break out from being sarcastic.
  - ThePowerOfFuet 1y ago
    >I thought the link to the 1.2 trust pilot rating gave it away. It did. Worry not.
- sammy2255 1y ago
  I recall I was once on a Deutsche Bahn train, it was delayed more than an hour (not that I cared I wasn't in a rush). One worker came around handing out envelopes, since everyone was entitled to a partial refund, I had to sign it, and then mail it back to them? What the fuck? Not even Hitler would've allowed this
  - Hackbraten 1y ago
    This was fixed just a couple of years ago. (Not the delays, but at least the refund process was streamlined.)
    - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 1y ago
      Does a worker now hand out envelopes filled with cash?
      - 1718627440 1y ago
        Now they are not allowed to accept the refund and you can only mail it to their bureaucracy.
  - jasonvorhe 1y ago
    It's an automated process nowadays if you purchase your tickets via their app. (Which in turn acts as KYC and makes it impossible to travel anonymously.)
- thehias 1y ago
  how can you not get this joke and sarcasm lol
- sva_ 1y ago
  Poe's law
Antibabelic 1y ago
And people think the government has their best interests in mind.
- juliangmp 1y ago
  Ironically, the folks here that have made experience with the state operated railway (Deutsche Bundesbahn) back when it existed (until 1993) say mostly positive things, especially compared to today. The modern German railway is a combination of both the state and a private company. So we get a for-profit monopoly that's ripping you off but also gets subsidized by the state. The worst of both worlds. This model of kind-of privatization is used in Germany in a few areas and it's god awful for everyone involved, like with the hospitals. I don't like falling politics especially here on HN but I cannot for the life of me understand why this model is still being defended by some people.
  - mlinhares 1y ago
    Same reason journalists are defending fascism, they stand to make a profit (or think they do). You can always follow the money to find out why people are making decisions that are seemingly stupid.
    - juliangmp 1y ago
      Oh there's definetly people profiting from it but I think there's also plenty of cases where Hanlon's Razor applies.
  - Philipp2398 1y ago
    I think it has less to do with the corporate structure and more to do with the cumulative effects of decades of neglected investments
    - 1718627440 1y ago
      Which happened due to the corporate structure.
Zak 1y ago
Once, long ago, I ended up buying the wrong ticket from Deutsche Bahn. I no longer remember whether this was my fault or theirs, but I do remember that support was completely unhelpful. My credit card provider was considerably more helpful when I solved the problem with a chargeback.
- randomtoast 1y ago
  I once bought the wrong ticket, got checked, and the staff told me I had to leave the train at the next station. The ticket I purchased was actually more expensive than the "SuperSparPreis" for the correct ticket. So, I ended up paying more and twice for this journey.
  - teekert 1y ago
    This is the type of staff that can easily be replaced by computers.
    - aleatorianator 1y ago
      unless there's a union
      - teekert 1y ago
        Yes but I mean, they are so inhuman. My wife was once refused migraine medication because the dokter made some mistake on receipt, they could see her in pain in the car. But computer says no. Sure, they'll be in trouble perhaps when going against the computer, but then if no one can go against the computer, why bother with humans? To be clear: I prefer the humans. But self-thinking ones.
  - hdgvhicv 1y ago
    I bought the wrong ticket for a plane once and they wouldn’t even let me on until I spent an absolute fortune on a walk up fare.
- hobofan 1y ago
brummm 1y ago
It's not fully state owned, it's semi-privatized. You get the worst of both worlds, so to speak.
- ketzu 1y ago
  It is privatized, but it is fully state owned. The country of germany owns 100% of the stock. > Sie [DB AG] befindet sich zu 100 Prozent im Eigentum des Bundes https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardartikel/Themen/Bundesvermoegen/Privatisierungs_und_Beteiligungspolitik/Beteiligungspolitik/deutsche-bahn-ag.html https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardar...
  - xp84 1y ago
    Non-German here. What’s the point of this setup? I guess in some ways this isn’t too different than USPS, which is self-sufficient and doesn’t face tax dollars nor give its profits to the Treasury, but in our case they didn’t bother going as far to separate it as it sounds like DB did.
    - ketzu 1y ago
      After reunification there were two railway companies, and they got reorganized into an AG. At least later, when they restructured the company into a holding and subsidaries, they planned to privatize them completely and disolve the parent company. They never did go through with that however. Why they went with an AG in 1993, I don't know.
    - randomNumber7 1y ago
      The plan was to sell the DB after privatizing but something (if I remember correct financial crisis 2008) went between it so they (politics) decided to keep the stocks.
    - freehorse 1y ago
      It is typically midway to full privatisation. It goes from being a public company (not as in publicly traded but actually of public interest) to being for-profit company but state owning all the shares. Then the state sells the majority of the shares and it becomes actually private. Typically, on the way, there is also a separation between the "good piece" and the "bad piece" of the company, ie the company that operates the trains (and makes profit out of the passengers etc) and the one that maintains the infrastructure. The state then can sell the profit-generating part of the company to the private sector, and continue operating the non-profitable one itself, so the private capital can enjoy the best of both worlds (having a privatised train company, but still having the state eat up the economic burden of maintaining the infrastructure that the former operates on). Not sure where germany stands in this roadmap, but this is what has happened in other places (and no it did not improve the experience of passengers to any degree).
InfinityByTen 1y ago
Oh yeah, I've had one of those several years ago. It was a Bahn25 and I got a new one in 2 months and got sent a bill for it. Then, I called them because I couldn't cancel and I tried to tell them about this. At least at that time, the customer support knew about this sneaky practice, and would, on request, allow you to cancel it manually. I did get a debt collectors post about my unpaid bill and I had to send around emails to them as well that I was pardoned and I didn't use the card at all. I don't remember if I got a confirmation about it and that's why I still have it on my records. After like 7 (8?) years, who knows when they would go under and then come up to me that I owe them like half a million in unpaid debt.
- sva_ 1y ago
  I think after 3 years it is "verjährt."
  - etyhhgfff 1y ago
    But your credit ranking like "Schufa" might still be affected.
- sixtyj 1y ago
  Every cent counts. What is wrong is that this behaviour is being perpetrated by an organisation that one would not expect to see it. Edit: Every 500 euros count… “ Today is about dark patterns that cost me 500€ for nothing.”
  - mr_mitm 1y ago
    When they owe you money, they refuse to pay up if it's less than 4€: https://preview.redd.it/danke-db-es-geht-mir-nicht-um-die-3-35-sondern-ums-prinzip-v0-8a7odc6o58n91.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=c4991905ade128691c1070ff9216d4f7961e2345 https://preview.redd.it/danke-db-es-geht-mir-nicht-um-die-3-... However, if I try to explain to them I cannot purchase tickets costing less than 4€ for reasons I simply keep to myself like they do, they hit me with a 60€ fee.
sneak 1y ago
So many subscription-based things in Germany are outright scams that would be criminal elsewhere. Mobile phone contracts, internet service contracts principally among them. Two year contracts that auto renew and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew.
- thesimon 1y ago
  > and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew any examples?
  - sokoloff 1y ago
    Many commercial leases run in 5-year increments with 2 5 year auto-renewals and a 90-180 day window in which to exercise the opt-out of auto-renewal. That window is often not set to end coincident with the end of the lease term for obvious reasons.
  - winged 1y ago
    Parship used to do this (not sure about their current practices, this was years ago): I once had a six-month subscription that would automatically extend by a year if you didn't cancel at least three months in advance (by letter or fax!). Especially dodgy in that line of business, because if you get lucky shortly before subscription runs out, you're literally giving away a year's worth of subscription that you're not going to use at all.
- sva_ 1y ago
  > Two year contracts that auto renew and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew. This is not the case anymore due to an EU law. It can only renew for 1 month at a time after the 24 months now.
- kalleboo 1y ago
  Japan was like that with mobile contracts until about 5-10 years ago, when the government finally put an end to it.
- 1y ago
sshine 1y ago
Last year I got a yearly membership for the Copenhagen Zoo. As time was running up, I was reminded to renew the membership. If I didn't, the membership would get cancelled. If I did, the membership would turn on auto-renewal. So they auto-renew memberships once you've paid twice. This ensures that people who get auto-renewed but forgot about it at least liked renewing once. Auto-renewal of subscriptions supposed to be a feature for veterans of a service, and not something to cheat people out of their money after they never get a good return of investment the first time. Just to give Kagi some credit here: They have a friendly reminder every month that my subscription is about to renew. Every month I'm given the chance to cancel, and every month I'm reminded of what a decent service that is. It surely does mean they'll lose some customers. But it also means that those who stay, stay forever.
- bluGill 1y ago
  Auto-renew should be on first use within the month of the renewal. renewing something that someone doesn't use is bad, but if they are using it that is good. Better yet, if someone didn't use the subscription enough to be worth the yearly fee get confirmation they want to.
- sksksk 1y ago
  I never sign up for subscriptions anymore without using a virtual card. Once I've paid the yearly fee, I immediately cancel the card. When it comes to renew, they'll be very keen to let me know that my card needs updating.
lifestyleguru 1y ago
My favorite trick by various German service providers is impossibility to cancel. Like literally it's impossible. You cancel, you show deregistration from current address but they say "rejected, you can still use our service at the new address". Got fuck yourself and rot in hell.
- netsharc 1y ago
  I wonder if they'll accept registration forms foreign countries, e.g. of "Herr Muller is now a resident of Timbuktu"... Or apparently it's possible to deregister moving to a foreign country with "address unknown", but I guess it'd have to be plausible when you claim "Oh I'm going to cycle around the world for 5 years"...
  - sunaookami 1y ago
    Speaking of experience from a friend that moved from Germany to another country and wanted to cancel his phone provider: No, this doesn't work, you can't cancel prematurely and you must pay the full amount. I think it was Congstar (subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom).
    - lifestyleguru 1y ago
      This make me so happy I moved out of Germany and reminds me to never ever come back.
slybot 1y ago
Couple of years back, I made a mistake on trusting Deutsche Bahn. I took a regional train from Düsseldorf, hoping to get at some connection hub (never reached and don't remember, possibly Cologne), I have to ICE to reach Brussels. It was evening and at some point the train stopped in the middle of nowhere and an announcement followed 20 minutes later, saying the train went through the wrong tracks and it cannot return! And, we need to wait couple of hours before the rails are cleared and then we will need to get of the next station, a tiny town where only few trains run per day and none after 10pm!. Genius idea to leave people there, conductor also puts his unsatisfaction because apparently he also needs to get off there and request a ride. Let alone, I missed my connections. I had to either wait there until morning or get a ride. Never used Deutsche Bahn again, I feel less stressed by driving, even I really enjoy train rides in general. Did I get compensation? Yes I did after four months for the ticket price only (around 40 euros), but after ridiculous process of that I need to send them forms and tickets via regular post, with a stamp that can only post within Germany. Nice try by their side..
- hagbard_c 1y ago
  I use DB a few dozen times per year for international trips and as such have quite a bit of experience with the problems of train travel in the former wirtschaftswunder. Yes, ICE trains are more often than not delayed and time tables are better treated as wish lists than accurate depictions of when you'll get where. Having said this I do not agree with the depiction of the restitution process, probably because I ignore the typically German paper/stamp/copy/snail-mail/triplicate_authorised_stamped_and_approved bureaucratic route and use the DB Navigator app or the bahn.de site for restitution requests for all my (many) restitution requests. Thus far I have had no problems in getting restitution for hotels, alternative transport options and the 25% (> 1 hour delay)/50% (> 2 hour delayed, all to frequent on my longer international trips) ticket price restitutions. DB is far from perfect and the backlog in rail and rolling stock maintenance seems to drag them down more and more but they are a godsend when it comes to booking and managing international train travel. It is both far easier and generally far less expensive to book an international trip through DB than it is through e.g. the Dutch, Danish or Swedish railway operators or one of the middle-man sites like omio.se etc.
notTooFarGone 1y ago
Also you can cancel your Deutschlandticket only before the 15th of the month. And somehow getting a Deutschlandticket not starting at the first of the month is impossible. It's all around scams and it's utterly embarrassing that 210k people are actually employed in Germany for this. There are people who get payed for implementing dark patterns as a government service to get a little bit more money.
- cyxxon 1y ago
  That seems to me to be a direct result of too many actors involved in the creation of the Deutschlandticket actually ebing against this ticket, and so those in favor tried to appease them and created this absolut disaster of a booking process. There is no other reason for this otherwise, and it would be trivial to sort this out by e.g. having a validity period of 31 days, or always going until the end of the month and costing only a percentage. But that would be too easy.
- lxgr 1y ago
  Just get your Deutschlandticket from a more customer friendly reseller. There are a few that let you cancel before the last day of the month, and even let you add the ticket to Apple/Google Wallet so you don't need to depend on some mediocre app having a good enough day to display your ticket during an inspection.
  - sunaookami 1y ago
    Ah yes the DB app where it's adviced to screenshot your ticket because it WILL disappear when you get checked and you will be blamed and are at fault...
Honga 1y ago
They'll send debt collectors and affect your credit rating if you don't pay for your renewal, even though it's not valid until you pay. You have to post a filled form to cancel the membership.
rarisma 1y ago
I went to germany and got a DB card, for some reason despite giving them my card details, they instead asked me to pay them within 14 days (after the ticket has expired) via bank transfer or they would fine me an extra 50eur (I checked, they never took the price of the ticket from my account initally, why not is bizzare)
baphomet88f 1y ago
Was Tablet Magazine syndicated article in the vein of Huxley's somatic aspect of transcription. Alternatively, Wender's credits, for the American Friend was the procuring of a series of gaffers to film the long-shot of Hamburg. [1]:https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/natan-sharansky-doublethink https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/nat...
clippy99 1y ago
I love that subscriptions in the US are (usually) immediately cancellable. Germany is the wild west of predatory subscription plans, and unfortunately the legal framework weighs heavily in favor of the businesses issuing these contracts and not the consumers.
- kalleboo 1y ago
  To elaborate - in the U.S., you can usually get out of a subscription by telling your credit card to cancel the payments (or cancel the card, etc). In Germany, it's not uncommon for them to start sending you to collections if you do that, since, after all, you never cancelled the contract properly. They're not technically wrong but it's still extremely customer-hostile.
  - lxgr 1y ago
    I guess there are some upsides to litigation being horrendously expensive.
illiac786 1y ago
>Deutsche Bahn, the fully state-owned railway company, is a well-liked (Trustpilot: 1.2/5) company running most major long-distance railways in Germany Very confusing, the irony/sarcasm of the second part is not clear: yes it is 100% owned but 1.2 is a really bad score, Germans hate DB. That sentence if even more confusing for a German, because in Germany 1 is a good score and 5 is a fail (at school at least).
- hdgvhicv 1y ago
  Everyone hates db. They’re a laughing stock across Europe. Switzerland have started banning them from running trains due to the knock on affects. If your long distance twin is under 2 hours late that’s a good day. The only people who thing db are good are idiotic Brits who go “privatisation is bad we should run our railway like Germany with twice the subsidise and half the reliability”.
  - OKRainbowKid 1y ago
    DB is privatized though?
    - hdgvhicv 1y ago
      No, it’s not. It gets far more in subsidy that the U.K. system and far worse outcomes. But last minute long distance first class tickets are cheaper so I guess that’s good. Of you’re lucky you’ll arrive within a couple of hours too.
      - OKRainbowKid 1y ago
        Yes it is. It is a stock company owned, but (mostly) not controlled by the state. I don't see how your statements about subsidies relate to that point. Plenty of private companies or sectors get subsidized.
  - turkeywelder 1y ago
    Idiotic Brit here. Not exactly how we think. We're frustrated that our private railway is worse than DB in terms of lateness and cancellations but also hugely, massively more expensive for us to use. We'd be happy if it was publicly owned because then at least the insane profit from ticket sales might possibly just maybe make it into investment in the railway instead of someone's bonus.
outloudvi 1y ago
I'm worried about the situation when Dark Patterns are not widely recognized enough as a malicious practice for users. Half a month ago I see someone on Twitter defending its own product design as "transparent and nothing hidden" - the "$0 now, then $15/month in 14 days" description where all text after "$0" are small and in grey. I don't think it maintains trust between the product and users, and thus it doesn't seem like a good thing.
- ketzu 1y ago
  > "transparent and nothing hidden" That's the response I got on from quite a few people on german speeaking reddit, also calling me an idiot :)
  - zelphirkalt 1y ago
    Don't let reddit idiots gaslight you. There are aot seriously deranged people running around on reddit, who are eating up mainstream corporate propaganda and lies without any questioning at all. I some subreddits they are the majority and paying attention to what those clowns thing can only be a negative for your own health.
- saxenaabhi 1y ago
  For anyone wondering seems to be this post: https://x.com/zilvestro/status/1967567592358289904 https://x.com/zilvestro/status/1967567592358289904
- signatoremo 1y ago
  Without knowing the product in this case, the two scenarios can be different. It one is billed $15 now refundable within 14 days, it’s more likely than not that they would forget to cancel, and therefore lose at least a month of subscription. If it’s $O, then they wouldn’t be billed for 2 weeks, and presumably have a chance to reconsider.
pixelpoet 1y ago
OMG yes this keeps biting me in the ass and is so absolutely infuriating, I feel scammed every time I fail to cancel it (probably needs a blood/urine sample, sent by post). There are no words for how much I hate Deutsche Bahn, Germany's 2nd biggest shame.
mckirk 1y ago
I think 'ending up with an accidental BahnCard and losing a painful amount of money because of it' might be almost a rite of passage at this point. Happened to me as well; I had a 'youth' card for people below the age of 27, even remembered that some cards auto-renew and checked online to see if mine would, because I wanted to make sure I wouldn't just get upgraded to the regular and much more expensive BahnCard... couldn't find a renewal date and thought I'd be fine. But apparently I didn't check thoroughly enough, and only got informed of now having 200€ less and a shiny new BahnCard by email. Also emailed support, also didn't get anywhere. Later I mention this to a friend... and he says 'ah, yeah, same with me'.
scyzoryk_xyz 1y ago
Commenting from neighboring Poland: my sense is that the dark patterns are less a result of deliberate manipulation and more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. It's, like, when the designs are made in a perpetual bureaucratic Kafkaesque then the results are like this. They're only building to specification, there is no UX research. You're not going to not take the train. Not like the ticket experience is going to make a big difference with another train provider.
- ketzu 1y ago
  > more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. I would be more willing to buy that, if their support response would be different, and if it hadn't been an issue for years, including fighting legal battles to keep conditions close to what they are now. One has to assume they are fully aware and unwilling to improve.
  - scotty79 1y ago
    > > more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. > One has to assume they are fully aware and unwilling to improve. Both can be true at the same time.
47282847 1y ago
I recently decided to upgrade to BC50 again after some years of less travel and a subscription of a BC25. I went to the DB site, logged in, manually provided my BC25 card number in the order process even though it’s right there in my profile. And ended up with a second subscription: I now own both a BC25 and BC50 in parallel, which makes no sense as you can of course only use one of the two. …
_pgu 1y ago
This hits so hard. I just looked up my own BahnCard 25, turns out that I'm a week too late for cancellation. Another year it is then.
stockresearcher 1y ago
I was going to be in the Munich area next month and was planning on using the DB Bavarian regional day ticket quite a bit. Is this a bad idea?
- ketzu 1y ago
  No not necessarily. But it might be more cost effective to get the deutschland ticket if you can still get one for this month. (You don't have to get it from DB, some allow cancellation much later.) Ticket sales are generally quite straight forward with DB online and the area tickets are usually a good value compared to local tickets.
  - lxgr 1y ago
    You can always get one for the current month and (except for maybe the last day) immediately cancel it with some sellers.
    - usr1106 1y ago
      D-Ticket is a subscription only sold for calendar months. The basic terms are set by law, but some sellers have more generous terms, that is allowed. You need to cancel before the 10th of the current month in order not having to pay for the next month. If you buy after the 10th you are charged for 2 months right away. Most sellers require a German bank account, but e.g. HVV supports Paypal (worked for me) and in theory credit cards (did not work for me). I don't know any seller that accepts cancellations after the 10th, but I have heard a couple should exist.
      - lxgr 1y ago
        That's not the case with [1], for example. They allow pausing (and then canceling) the subscription any time before the last day of the month. It works as advertised in my experience. [2] seems to be offering the same, but I haven't tried it myself. [3] looks interesting too. [1] https://www.ticket-plus.app/en/ https://www.ticket-plus.app/en/ [2] https://www.mopla.solutions/de/tickets/deutschlandticket https://www.mopla.solutions/de/tickets/deutschlandticket [3] https://deutschland-ticket.store/autobus-oberbayern?lang=en https://deutschland-ticket.store/autobus-oberbayern?lang=en
sarpdag 1y ago
Sadly, Deutsche Bahn has become, for me, a symbol of how Germany is going downhill. I got a BahnCard 25 for 3 months, and one month before it expired, it automatically renewed for a full year. Even though I canceled it, I still had to pay for the entire year. I bought a train ticket to Austria, and they announced strikes just five days before my trip. They didn’t refund my money directly. I had to fill out a form in person at DB, and I only got 80% of the money back. The trains are unreliable; they are often delayed.
iammjm 1y ago
I bought a BahnCard 50 subscription last year, for 12 months. After 11 months (=before the current subscripion expired) they automatically renewed the subscription by additional 12 months. Seeing their confirmation email I contacted them within 30mins of receiving it, politely requesting to please cancel the subscription because it was renewed without my knowledge or confirmation. My request was declined and they "offered" to cancel my BahnCard for the next year, in 13 months! Very annoying, as I even had a calender remainder set, but I didnt think they would renew before the current subscription expires. Who does that?? Also I am a good customer that has already spent thousands of € on DeutscheBahn.
- croisillon 1y ago
  they did the same to me, 20 years ago, i complained and got my money back, i thought this was not leagal anymore
- ahartmetz 1y ago
  The trick is to cancel stuff immediately after signing up if you don't firmly plan to continue using it. It becomes effective after the minimum duration.
  - lxgr 1y ago
    I started doing this for almost all subscriptions a while ago. Presumably in response to this, some services now show a very ambiguous warning when canceling, leaving it open whether the cancellation will become effective immediately or at the end of the first subscription period. Subscription management really ought to be taken away from the companies providing the service to the payment method (not that that's ever going to realistically happen without legislation though, due to the incentives).
    - ahartmetz 1y ago
      I got that from Amazon Prime (free month of Prime, I never paid for it). I don't recall other services doing that, but I've also never subscribed to many of the popular ones like Netflix and such.
meta-level 1y ago
Also, when you buy the BahnCard via PayPal, only the first time you'll be charged via PayPal. You get an invoice later, which looks like advertising but actually tells you to provide your bank details to charge you for the subscription.
Tarsul 1y ago
I actually made money accidentally with a BahnCard subscription. I canceled my BahnCard 50 within the first 14 days (which they have to conform to due to laws) via email (btw: before the starting date so I did not use it). They confirmed and send me back 100Euros too much money. Why 100Euro? I had originally used a coupon code that saved me 100Euro. Good guy as I am I told them via mail that they sent me too much money back. What did they say? No, can't be, Bahncard50 costs are the higher amount, the banking statement that I sent them must be of something else. I was like... alright, no sense in arguing with them anymore.
- zb3 1y ago
  If the incompetence works in this direction too, then at least we're sure this is true incompetence and not malice..
  - Tarsul 1y ago
    Oh, actually it started with incompetence, too: I wanted to order the BahnCard25 but payment didn't went through (and thus, I did not finish the order process). When I tried again, the coupon that I wanted to use for the Bahncard25 was exhausted. (which is why I went for BahnCard50 afterwards) And why did I cancel the subscription anyway? Because the trip that I planned (Hamburg to Paris) and that was listed as buyable was of course everything but buyable. Always failed at the last step of ordering with some indistinct error message. Well, they really did not want my money, that much I can say.
  - lifestyleguru 1y ago
    Yes, somehow landlords are always "incompetent" to their benefit.
- stratocumulus0 1y ago
  To me it's more telling of German mentality: if I follow all the rules, then the outcome has to be correct. Tell them it's not the case, and they won't know what to do now.
- tdeck 1y ago
tgsovlerkhgsel 1y ago
"Soft" factors matter when it comes to public transit attractiveness. A mix of various forms of customer hostility and stupidity (from not providing data about some transit connection to Google Maps to an insanely convoluted ticketing scheme to inflexible fare rules if you don't want to pay insane amounts) resulted in me taking a car for a trip that could and otherwise would have been done by public transit. I hate driving (why would I spend an hour doing work/paying attention when I could read a book), and would still consider doing it again for that connection just to avoid dealing with the bullshit. Meanwhile, in Switzerland one ticket mostly gets you from A to B, even if that involves a boat, a tram, a train, and a bus. Oh, and they'll be on time too.
s4mbh4 1y ago
FYI: Unlike what you expect: bahncard50 only gives you a 50% discount on the 'flex price' and not the 'sparpreies' class of price(there it's still 25%). Flex adds some cancellation and other conveniences but is generally more expensive. Thank you for reminding me to cancel my bahn card.
elcapitan 1y ago
Thanks for the reminder to cancel my Bahncard, last time I forgot.
1718627440 1y ago
My personal two cents: They refused to send my an invoice, so I didn't payed after their auto-removal on time. I did pay later. Then they send me to some random collections company AFTER they received my payment, according to their own data. Now they refuse to hand out a ticket to me that I payed for. I needed to travel and had already bought a ticket that relied on the Bahncard. Therefore I bought a second Bahncard, because provisional Bahncards can be handed out by the staff directly, but it's not valid for the whole direction I bought it. I expect them to still refuse to hand me my ticket and they also didn't confirm that I canceled my first Bahncard.
junto 1y ago
I was caught out in the same way. I now take out a BahnCard subscription online and immediately cancel it. I know I have the BahnCard for one year, and have the security that it should not automatically rollover without me having the choice.
scotty79 1y ago
How much of this could be prevented by having pre-paid visa card that usually has 0 euro on it, and you charge it just before paying for something, so if something accidentally turns out to be a subscription it won't be able to auto-renew?
- ketzu 1y ago
  German companies usually will send you to collections in the case of failure to pay for renewal with the provided process. I don't know how successful they are at it though.
enigma101 1y ago
i swear the biggest gangsters on the planet are deutsche bahn
kmoser 1y ago
> Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate your requested date, as termination is only possible up to four weeks before the end of the term. The phrase "up to four weeks before the end of the term" is misleading and can be reasonably interpreted different ways. Let's say you buy a ticket today (October 10, 2025) and it renews October 11, 2026 (one year later). Four weeks before the end of the term would be September 13, 2026 (i.e. October 11, 2026 - 4 weeks). Since we just established that "four weeks before the end of the term" is September 13, 2026, then "Termination is only possible up to four weeks before the end of the term" can be interpreted to mean "Termination is only possible up to September 13, 2026" which means I should be able to terminate any time between now and September 13, 2026, i.e. I have a max of 11 months after date of purchase to terminate the auto-renew.
- dandersch 1y ago
  What other interpretation is there?
  - kmoser 1y ago
    If you interpret "up to" to mean "no more than," then "up to four weeks before the end of the term" could be interpreted as any time between September 12, 2026 (four weeks before the October 10, 2026 end of the term), and October 10, 2026 (the end of term).
    - dandersch 1y ago
      Oh, you're right. I guess I default to the less customer-friendly interpretation when it comes to subscriptions.
lifestyleguru 1y ago
I didn't expect, and you probably don't imagine how difficult is to buy Deutsche Bahn ticket. For sanity I was buying with cash at the ticket office. The queue was long, the service was rude, but at least I bought the right ticket. For international travel I was always buying online on the website of the other railways - magically it was not only easier but also cheaper.
constantcrying 1y ago
The part about them being a company "with no reputation to loose" really hits home. If you know your customer is going to hate you, because you suck at being a reliable service provider, then them hating you also because you scammed them for 500 Euros is no loss at all. The actual difference in reputation is marginal. They also do not really suffer any financial damage. They do not have competition and no matter how badly run their business is, their losses are paid for by the tax payer.
rebouny 1y ago
Here near Cologne we are just calling dealing with Deutsche Bahn (DB) "DBakel" https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/debacle https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/debacle

124 points by ketzu 1y ago

“Deutsche Bahn, the fully state owned railway company, is a well liked company”. Eh, nope. It’s a horribly mismanaged entity with permanent delays, bad service and outrageous pricing…

ketzu 1y ago
Sorry, I have a hard time holding back my sarcasm when writing while being annoyed, I thought the link to the 1.2 trust pilot rating gave it away. As this was mostly written as anger management, the writing is pretty poor. :)
- thedanbob 1y ago
  Don't worry, some of us got it. That part made me chuckle.
  - PetitPrince 1y ago
    Yes, plus the rest of the article makes it clear this link was done in sarcasm.
- tombardier 1y ago
  All is clear; I enjoyed that bit :)
- sneak 1y ago
  It wasn’t you, the sarcasm was obvious. Germans generally don’t understand sarcasm, written or spoken.
  - 1718627440 1y ago
    Most times the issue is that Germans do never break out from being sarcastic.
- ThePowerOfFuet 1y ago
  >I thought the link to the 1.2 trust pilot rating gave it away. It did. Worry not.
sammy2255 1y ago
I recall I was once on a Deutsche Bahn train, it was delayed more than an hour (not that I cared I wasn't in a rush). One worker came around handing out envelopes, since everyone was entitled to a partial refund, I had to sign it, and then mail it back to them? What the fuck? Not even Hitler would've allowed this
- Hackbraten 1y ago
  This was fixed just a couple of years ago. (Not the delays, but at least the refund process was streamlined.)
  - Am4TIfIsER0ppos 1y ago
    Does a worker now hand out envelopes filled with cash?
    - 1718627440 1y ago
      Now they are not allowed to accept the refund and you can only mail it to their bureaucracy.
- jasonvorhe 1y ago
  It's an automated process nowadays if you purchase your tickets via their app. (Which in turn acts as KYC and makes it impossible to travel anonymously.)
thehias 1y ago
how can you not get this joke and sarcasm lol
sva_ 1y ago
Poe's law

Antibabelic 1y ago

And people think the government has their best interests in mind.

juliangmp 1y ago
Ironically, the folks here that have made experience with the state operated railway (Deutsche Bundesbahn) back when it existed (until 1993) say mostly positive things, especially compared to today. The modern German railway is a combination of both the state and a private company. So we get a for-profit monopoly that's ripping you off but also gets subsidized by the state. The worst of both worlds. This model of kind-of privatization is used in Germany in a few areas and it's god awful for everyone involved, like with the hospitals. I don't like falling politics especially here on HN but I cannot for the life of me understand why this model is still being defended by some people.
- mlinhares 1y ago
  Same reason journalists are defending fascism, they stand to make a profit (or think they do). You can always follow the money to find out why people are making decisions that are seemingly stupid.
  - juliangmp 1y ago
    Oh there's definetly people profiting from it but I think there's also plenty of cases where Hanlon's Razor applies.
- Philipp2398 1y ago
  I think it has less to do with the corporate structure and more to do with the cumulative effects of decades of neglected investments
  - 1718627440 1y ago
    Which happened due to the corporate structure.

Zak 1y ago

Once, long ago, I ended up buying the wrong ticket from Deutsche Bahn. I no longer remember whether this was my fault or theirs, but I do remember that support was completely unhelpful. My credit card provider was considerably more helpful when I solved the problem with a chargeback.

randomtoast 1y ago
I once bought the wrong ticket, got checked, and the staff told me I had to leave the train at the next station. The ticket I purchased was actually more expensive than the "SuperSparPreis" for the correct ticket. So, I ended up paying more and twice for this journey.
- teekert 1y ago
  This is the type of staff that can easily be replaced by computers.
  - aleatorianator 1y ago
    unless there's a union
    - teekert 1y ago
      Yes but I mean, they are so inhuman. My wife was once refused migraine medication because the dokter made some mistake on receipt, they could see her in pain in the car. But computer says no. Sure, they'll be in trouble perhaps when going against the computer, but then if no one can go against the computer, why bother with humans? To be clear: I prefer the humans. But self-thinking ones.
- hdgvhicv 1y ago
  I bought the wrong ticket for a plane once and they wouldn’t even let me on until I spent an absolute fortune on a walk up fare.
hobofan 1y ago

brummm 1y ago

It's not fully state owned, it's semi-privatized. You get the worst of both worlds, so to speak.

ketzu 1y ago
It is privatized, but it is fully state owned. The country of germany owns 100% of the stock. > Sie [DB AG] befindet sich zu 100 Prozent im Eigentum des Bundes https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardartikel/Themen/Bundesvermoegen/Privatisierungs_und_Beteiligungspolitik/Beteiligungspolitik/deutsche-bahn-ag.html https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/Content/DE/Standardar...
- xp84 1y ago
  Non-German here. What’s the point of this setup? I guess in some ways this isn’t too different than USPS, which is self-sufficient and doesn’t face tax dollars nor give its profits to the Treasury, but in our case they didn’t bother going as far to separate it as it sounds like DB did.
  - ketzu 1y ago
    After reunification there were two railway companies, and they got reorganized into an AG. At least later, when they restructured the company into a holding and subsidaries, they planned to privatize them completely and disolve the parent company. They never did go through with that however. Why they went with an AG in 1993, I don't know.
  - randomNumber7 1y ago
    The plan was to sell the DB after privatizing but something (if I remember correct financial crisis 2008) went between it so they (politics) decided to keep the stocks.
  - freehorse 1y ago
    It is typically midway to full privatisation. It goes from being a public company (not as in publicly traded but actually of public interest) to being for-profit company but state owning all the shares. Then the state sells the majority of the shares and it becomes actually private. Typically, on the way, there is also a separation between the "good piece" and the "bad piece" of the company, ie the company that operates the trains (and makes profit out of the passengers etc) and the one that maintains the infrastructure. The state then can sell the profit-generating part of the company to the private sector, and continue operating the non-profitable one itself, so the private capital can enjoy the best of both worlds (having a privatised train company, but still having the state eat up the economic burden of maintaining the infrastructure that the former operates on). Not sure where germany stands in this roadmap, but this is what has happened in other places (and no it did not improve the experience of passengers to any degree).

InfinityByTen 1y ago

Oh yeah, I've had one of those several years ago. It was a Bahn25 and I got a new one in 2 months and got sent a bill for it. Then, I called them because I couldn't cancel and I tried to tell them about this. At least at that time, the customer support knew about this sneaky practice, and would, on request, allow you to cancel it manually. I did get a debt collectors post about my unpaid bill and I had to send around emails to them as well that I was pardoned and I didn't use the card at all. I don't remember if I got a confirmation about it and that's why I still have it on my records. After like 7 (8?) years, who knows when they would go under and then come up to me that I owe them like half a million in unpaid debt.

sva_ 1y ago
I think after 3 years it is "verjährt."
- etyhhgfff 1y ago
  But your credit ranking like "Schufa" might still be affected.
sixtyj 1y ago
Every cent counts. What is wrong is that this behaviour is being perpetrated by an organisation that one would not expect to see it. Edit: Every 500 euros count… “ Today is about dark patterns that cost me 500€ for nothing.”
- mr_mitm 1y ago
  When they owe you money, they refuse to pay up if it's less than 4€: https://preview.redd.it/danke-db-es-geht-mir-nicht-um-die-3-35-sondern-ums-prinzip-v0-8a7odc6o58n91.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=c4991905ade128691c1070ff9216d4f7961e2345 https://preview.redd.it/danke-db-es-geht-mir-nicht-um-die-3-... However, if I try to explain to them I cannot purchase tickets costing less than 4€ for reasons I simply keep to myself like they do, they hit me with a 60€ fee.

sneak 1y ago

So many subscription-based things in Germany are outright scams that would be criminal elsewhere. Mobile phone contracts, internet service contracts principally among them. Two year contracts that auto renew and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew.

thesimon 1y ago
> and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew any examples?
- sokoloff 1y ago
  Many commercial leases run in 5-year increments with 2 5 year auto-renewals and a 90-180 day window in which to exercise the opt-out of auto-renewal. That window is often not set to end coincident with the end of the lease term for obvious reasons.
- winged 1y ago
  Parship used to do this (not sure about their current practices, this was years ago): I once had a six-month subscription that would automatically extend by a year if you didn't cancel at least three months in advance (by letter or fax!). Especially dodgy in that line of business, because if you get lucky shortly before subscription runs out, you're literally giving away a year's worth of subscription that you're not going to use at all.
sva_ 1y ago
> Two year contracts that auto renew and can only be cancelled in small windows a long time before auto-renew. This is not the case anymore due to an EU law. It can only renew for 1 month at a time after the 24 months now.
kalleboo 1y ago
Japan was like that with mobile contracts until about 5-10 years ago, when the government finally put an end to it.
1y ago

sshine 1y ago

Last year I got a yearly membership for the Copenhagen Zoo. As time was running up, I was reminded to renew the membership. If I didn't, the membership would get cancelled. If I did, the membership would turn on auto-renewal. So they auto-renew memberships once you've paid twice. This ensures that people who get auto-renewed but forgot about it at least liked renewing once. Auto-renewal of subscriptions supposed to be a feature for veterans of a service, and not something to cheat people out of their money after they never get a good return of investment the first time. Just to give Kagi some credit here: They have a friendly reminder every month that my subscription is about to renew. Every month I'm given the chance to cancel, and every month I'm reminded of what a decent service that is. It surely does mean they'll lose some customers. But it also means that those who stay, stay forever.

bluGill 1y ago
Auto-renew should be on first use within the month of the renewal. renewing something that someone doesn't use is bad, but if they are using it that is good. Better yet, if someone didn't use the subscription enough to be worth the yearly fee get confirmation they want to.
sksksk 1y ago
I never sign up for subscriptions anymore without using a virtual card. Once I've paid the yearly fee, I immediately cancel the card. When it comes to renew, they'll be very keen to let me know that my card needs updating.

lifestyleguru 1y ago

My favorite trick by various German service providers is impossibility to cancel. Like literally it's impossible. You cancel, you show deregistration from current address but they say "rejected, you can still use our service at the new address". Got fuck yourself and rot in hell.

netsharc 1y ago
I wonder if they'll accept registration forms foreign countries, e.g. of "Herr Muller is now a resident of Timbuktu"... Or apparently it's possible to deregister moving to a foreign country with "address unknown", but I guess it'd have to be plausible when you claim "Oh I'm going to cycle around the world for 5 years"...
- sunaookami 1y ago
  Speaking of experience from a friend that moved from Germany to another country and wanted to cancel his phone provider: No, this doesn't work, you can't cancel prematurely and you must pay the full amount. I think it was Congstar (subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom).
  - lifestyleguru 1y ago
    This make me so happy I moved out of Germany and reminds me to never ever come back.

slybot 1y ago

Couple of years back, I made a mistake on trusting Deutsche Bahn. I took a regional train from Düsseldorf, hoping to get at some connection hub (never reached and don't remember, possibly Cologne), I have to ICE to reach Brussels. It was evening and at some point the train stopped in the middle of nowhere and an announcement followed 20 minutes later, saying the train went through the wrong tracks and it cannot return! And, we need to wait couple of hours before the rails are cleared and then we will need to get of the next station, a tiny town where only few trains run per day and none after 10pm!. Genius idea to leave people there, conductor also puts his unsatisfaction because apparently he also needs to get off there and request a ride. Let alone, I missed my connections. I had to either wait there until morning or get a ride. Never used Deutsche Bahn again, I feel less stressed by driving, even I really enjoy train rides in general. Did I get compensation? Yes I did after four months for the ticket price only (around 40 euros), but after ridiculous process of that I need to send them forms and tickets via regular post, with a stamp that can only post within Germany. Nice try by their side..

hagbard_c 1y ago
I use DB a few dozen times per year for international trips and as such have quite a bit of experience with the problems of train travel in the former wirtschaftswunder. Yes, ICE trains are more often than not delayed and time tables are better treated as wish lists than accurate depictions of when you'll get where. Having said this I do not agree with the depiction of the restitution process, probably because I ignore the typically German paper/stamp/copy/snail-mail/triplicate_authorised_stamped_and_approved bureaucratic route and use the DB Navigator app or the bahn.de site for restitution requests for all my (many) restitution requests. Thus far I have had no problems in getting restitution for hotels, alternative transport options and the 25% (> 1 hour delay)/50% (> 2 hour delayed, all to frequent on my longer international trips) ticket price restitutions. DB is far from perfect and the backlog in rail and rolling stock maintenance seems to drag them down more and more but they are a godsend when it comes to booking and managing international train travel. It is both far easier and generally far less expensive to book an international trip through DB than it is through e.g. the Dutch, Danish or Swedish railway operators or one of the middle-man sites like omio.se etc.

notTooFarGone 1y ago

Also you can cancel your Deutschlandticket only before the 15th of the month. And somehow getting a Deutschlandticket not starting at the first of the month is impossible. It's all around scams and it's utterly embarrassing that 210k people are actually employed in Germany for this. There are people who get payed for implementing dark patterns as a government service to get a little bit more money.

cyxxon 1y ago
That seems to me to be a direct result of too many actors involved in the creation of the Deutschlandticket actually ebing against this ticket, and so those in favor tried to appease them and created this absolut disaster of a booking process. There is no other reason for this otherwise, and it would be trivial to sort this out by e.g. having a validity period of 31 days, or always going until the end of the month and costing only a percentage. But that would be too easy.
lxgr 1y ago
Just get your Deutschlandticket from a more customer friendly reseller. There are a few that let you cancel before the last day of the month, and even let you add the ticket to Apple/Google Wallet so you don't need to depend on some mediocre app having a good enough day to display your ticket during an inspection.
- sunaookami 1y ago
  Ah yes the DB app where it's adviced to screenshot your ticket because it WILL disappear when you get checked and you will be blamed and are at fault...

Honga 1y ago

They'll send debt collectors and affect your credit rating if you don't pay for your renewal, even though it's not valid until you pay. You have to post a filled form to cancel the membership.

rarisma 1y ago

I went to germany and got a DB card, for some reason despite giving them my card details, they instead asked me to pay them within 14 days (after the ticket has expired) via bank transfer or they would fine me an extra 50eur (I checked, they never took the price of the ticket from my account initally, why not is bizzare)

baphomet88f 1y ago

Was Tablet Magazine syndicated article in the vein of Huxley's somatic aspect of transcription. Alternatively, Wender's credits, for the American Friend was the procuring of a series of gaffers to film the long-shot of Hamburg. [1]:https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/natan-sharansky-doublethink https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/nat...

clippy99 1y ago

I love that subscriptions in the US are (usually) immediately cancellable. Germany is the wild west of predatory subscription plans, and unfortunately the legal framework weighs heavily in favor of the businesses issuing these contracts and not the consumers.

kalleboo 1y ago
To elaborate - in the U.S., you can usually get out of a subscription by telling your credit card to cancel the payments (or cancel the card, etc). In Germany, it's not uncommon for them to start sending you to collections if you do that, since, after all, you never cancelled the contract properly. They're not technically wrong but it's still extremely customer-hostile.
- lxgr 1y ago
  I guess there are some upsides to litigation being horrendously expensive.

illiac786 1y ago

>Deutsche Bahn, the fully state-owned railway company, is a well-liked (Trustpilot: 1.2/5) company running most major long-distance railways in Germany Very confusing, the irony/sarcasm of the second part is not clear: yes it is 100% owned but 1.2 is a really bad score, Germans hate DB. That sentence if even more confusing for a German, because in Germany 1 is a good score and 5 is a fail (at school at least).

hdgvhicv 1y ago
Everyone hates db. They’re a laughing stock across Europe. Switzerland have started banning them from running trains due to the knock on affects. If your long distance twin is under 2 hours late that’s a good day. The only people who thing db are good are idiotic Brits who go “privatisation is bad we should run our railway like Germany with twice the subsidise and half the reliability”.
- OKRainbowKid 1y ago
  DB is privatized though?
  - hdgvhicv 1y ago
    No, it’s not. It gets far more in subsidy that the U.K. system and far worse outcomes. But last minute long distance first class tickets are cheaper so I guess that’s good. Of you’re lucky you’ll arrive within a couple of hours too.
    - OKRainbowKid 1y ago
      Yes it is. It is a stock company owned, but (mostly) not controlled by the state. I don't see how your statements about subsidies relate to that point. Plenty of private companies or sectors get subsidized.
- turkeywelder 1y ago
  Idiotic Brit here. Not exactly how we think. We're frustrated that our private railway is worse than DB in terms of lateness and cancellations but also hugely, massively more expensive for us to use. We'd be happy if it was publicly owned because then at least the insane profit from ticket sales might possibly just maybe make it into investment in the railway instead of someone's bonus.

outloudvi 1y ago

I'm worried about the situation when Dark Patterns are not widely recognized enough as a malicious practice for users. Half a month ago I see someone on Twitter defending its own product design as "transparent and nothing hidden" - the "$0 now, then $15/month in 14 days" description where all text after "$0" are small and in grey. I don't think it maintains trust between the product and users, and thus it doesn't seem like a good thing.

ketzu 1y ago
> "transparent and nothing hidden" That's the response I got on from quite a few people on german speeaking reddit, also calling me an idiot :)
- zelphirkalt 1y ago
  Don't let reddit idiots gaslight you. There are aot seriously deranged people running around on reddit, who are eating up mainstream corporate propaganda and lies without any questioning at all. I some subreddits they are the majority and paying attention to what those clowns thing can only be a negative for your own health.
saxenaabhi 1y ago
For anyone wondering seems to be this post: https://x.com/zilvestro/status/1967567592358289904 https://x.com/zilvestro/status/1967567592358289904
signatoremo 1y ago
Without knowing the product in this case, the two scenarios can be different. It one is billed $15 now refundable within 14 days, it’s more likely than not that they would forget to cancel, and therefore lose at least a month of subscription. If it’s $O, then they wouldn’t be billed for 2 weeks, and presumably have a chance to reconsider.

pixelpoet 1y ago

OMG yes this keeps biting me in the ass and is so absolutely infuriating, I feel scammed every time I fail to cancel it (probably needs a blood/urine sample, sent by post). There are no words for how much I hate Deutsche Bahn, Germany's 2nd biggest shame.

mckirk 1y ago

I think 'ending up with an accidental BahnCard and losing a painful amount of money because of it' might be almost a rite of passage at this point. Happened to me as well; I had a 'youth' card for people below the age of 27, even remembered that some cards auto-renew and checked online to see if mine would, because I wanted to make sure I wouldn't just get upgraded to the regular and much more expensive BahnCard... couldn't find a renewal date and thought I'd be fine. But apparently I didn't check thoroughly enough, and only got informed of now having 200€ less and a shiny new BahnCard by email. Also emailed support, also didn't get anywhere. Later I mention this to a friend... and he says 'ah, yeah, same with me'.

scyzoryk_xyz 1y ago

Commenting from neighboring Poland: my sense is that the dark patterns are less a result of deliberate manipulation and more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. It's, like, when the designs are made in a perpetual bureaucratic Kafkaesque then the results are like this. They're only building to specification, there is no UX research. You're not going to not take the train. Not like the ticket experience is going to make a big difference with another train provider.

ketzu 1y ago
> more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. I would be more willing to buy that, if their support response would be different, and if it hadn't been an issue for years, including fighting legal battles to keep conditions close to what they are now. One has to assume they are fully aware and unwilling to improve.
- scotty79 1y ago
  > > more a result of crappy publicly funded tendered software development. > One has to assume they are fully aware and unwilling to improve. Both can be true at the same time.

47282847 1y ago

I recently decided to upgrade to BC50 again after some years of less travel and a subscription of a BC25. I went to the DB site, logged in, manually provided my BC25 card number in the order process even though it’s right there in my profile. And ended up with a second subscription: I now own both a BC25 and BC50 in parallel, which makes no sense as you can of course only use one of the two. …

_pgu 1y ago

This hits so hard. I just looked up my own BahnCard 25, turns out that I'm a week too late for cancellation. Another year it is then.

stockresearcher 1y ago

I was going to be in the Munich area next month and was planning on using the DB Bavarian regional day ticket quite a bit. Is this a bad idea?

ketzu 1y ago
No not necessarily. But it might be more cost effective to get the deutschland ticket if you can still get one for this month. (You don't have to get it from DB, some allow cancellation much later.) Ticket sales are generally quite straight forward with DB online and the area tickets are usually a good value compared to local tickets.
- lxgr 1y ago
  You can always get one for the current month and (except for maybe the last day) immediately cancel it with some sellers.
  - usr1106 1y ago
    D-Ticket is a subscription only sold for calendar months. The basic terms are set by law, but some sellers have more generous terms, that is allowed. You need to cancel before the 10th of the current month in order not having to pay for the next month. If you buy after the 10th you are charged for 2 months right away. Most sellers require a German bank account, but e.g. HVV supports Paypal (worked for me) and in theory credit cards (did not work for me). I don't know any seller that accepts cancellations after the 10th, but I have heard a couple should exist.
    - lxgr 1y ago
      That's not the case with [1], for example. They allow pausing (and then canceling) the subscription any time before the last day of the month. It works as advertised in my experience. [2] seems to be offering the same, but I haven't tried it myself. [3] looks interesting too. [1] https://www.ticket-plus.app/en/ https://www.ticket-plus.app/en/ [2] https://www.mopla.solutions/de/tickets/deutschlandticket https://www.mopla.solutions/de/tickets/deutschlandticket [3] https://deutschland-ticket.store/autobus-oberbayern?lang=en https://deutschland-ticket.store/autobus-oberbayern?lang=en

sarpdag 1y ago

Sadly, Deutsche Bahn has become, for me, a symbol of how Germany is going downhill. I got a BahnCard 25 for 3 months, and one month before it expired, it automatically renewed for a full year. Even though I canceled it, I still had to pay for the entire year. I bought a train ticket to Austria, and they announced strikes just five days before my trip. They didn’t refund my money directly. I had to fill out a form in person at DB, and I only got 80% of the money back. The trains are unreliable; they are often delayed.

iammjm 1y ago

I bought a BahnCard 50 subscription last year, for 12 months. After 11 months (=before the current subscripion expired) they automatically renewed the subscription by additional 12 months. Seeing their confirmation email I contacted them within 30mins of receiving it, politely requesting to please cancel the subscription because it was renewed without my knowledge or confirmation. My request was declined and they "offered" to cancel my BahnCard for the next year, in 13 months! Very annoying, as I even had a calender remainder set, but I didnt think they would renew before the current subscription expires. Who does that?? Also I am a good customer that has already spent thousands of € on DeutscheBahn.

croisillon 1y ago
they did the same to me, 20 years ago, i complained and got my money back, i thought this was not leagal anymore
ahartmetz 1y ago
The trick is to cancel stuff immediately after signing up if you don't firmly plan to continue using it. It becomes effective after the minimum duration.
- lxgr 1y ago
  I started doing this for almost all subscriptions a while ago. Presumably in response to this, some services now show a very ambiguous warning when canceling, leaving it open whether the cancellation will become effective immediately or at the end of the first subscription period. Subscription management really ought to be taken away from the companies providing the service to the payment method (not that that's ever going to realistically happen without legislation though, due to the incentives).
  - ahartmetz 1y ago
    I got that from Amazon Prime (free month of Prime, I never paid for it). I don't recall other services doing that, but I've also never subscribed to many of the popular ones like Netflix and such.

meta-level 1y ago

Also, when you buy the BahnCard via PayPal, only the first time you'll be charged via PayPal. You get an invoice later, which looks like advertising but actually tells you to provide your bank details to charge you for the subscription.

Tarsul 1y ago

I actually made money accidentally with a BahnCard subscription. I canceled my BahnCard 50 within the first 14 days (which they have to conform to due to laws) via email (btw: before the starting date so I did not use it). They confirmed and send me back 100Euros too much money. Why 100Euro? I had originally used a coupon code that saved me 100Euro. Good guy as I am I told them via mail that they sent me too much money back. What did they say? No, can't be, Bahncard50 costs are the higher amount, the banking statement that I sent them must be of something else. I was like... alright, no sense in arguing with them anymore.

zb3 1y ago
If the incompetence works in this direction too, then at least we're sure this is true incompetence and not malice..
- Tarsul 1y ago
  Oh, actually it started with incompetence, too: I wanted to order the BahnCard25 but payment didn't went through (and thus, I did not finish the order process). When I tried again, the coupon that I wanted to use for the Bahncard25 was exhausted. (which is why I went for BahnCard50 afterwards) And why did I cancel the subscription anyway? Because the trip that I planned (Hamburg to Paris) and that was listed as buyable was of course everything but buyable. Always failed at the last step of ordering with some indistinct error message. Well, they really did not want my money, that much I can say.
- lifestyleguru 1y ago
  Yes, somehow landlords are always "incompetent" to their benefit.
stratocumulus0 1y ago
To me it's more telling of German mentality: if I follow all the rules, then the outcome has to be correct. Tell them it's not the case, and they won't know what to do now.
tdeck 1y ago

tgsovlerkhgsel 1y ago

"Soft" factors matter when it comes to public transit attractiveness. A mix of various forms of customer hostility and stupidity (from not providing data about some transit connection to Google Maps to an insanely convoluted ticketing scheme to inflexible fare rules if you don't want to pay insane amounts) resulted in me taking a car for a trip that could and otherwise would have been done by public transit. I hate driving (why would I spend an hour doing work/paying attention when I could read a book), and would still consider doing it again for that connection just to avoid dealing with the bullshit. Meanwhile, in Switzerland one ticket mostly gets you from A to B, even if that involves a boat, a tram, a train, and a bus. Oh, and they'll be on time too.

s4mbh4 1y ago

FYI: Unlike what you expect: bahncard50 only gives you a 50% discount on the 'flex price' and not the 'sparpreies' class of price(there it's still 25%). Flex adds some cancellation and other conveniences but is generally more expensive. Thank you for reminding me to cancel my bahn card.

elcapitan 1y ago

Thanks for the reminder to cancel my Bahncard, last time I forgot.

1718627440 1y ago

My personal two cents: They refused to send my an invoice, so I didn't payed after their auto-removal on time. I did pay later. Then they send me to some random collections company AFTER they received my payment, according to their own data. Now they refuse to hand out a ticket to me that I payed for. I needed to travel and had already bought a ticket that relied on the Bahncard. Therefore I bought a second Bahncard, because provisional Bahncards can be handed out by the staff directly, but it's not valid for the whole direction I bought it. I expect them to still refuse to hand me my ticket and they also didn't confirm that I canceled my first Bahncard.

junto 1y ago

I was caught out in the same way. I now take out a BahnCard subscription online and immediately cancel it. I know I have the BahnCard for one year, and have the security that it should not automatically rollover without me having the choice.

scotty79 1y ago

How much of this could be prevented by having pre-paid visa card that usually has 0 euro on it, and you charge it just before paying for something, so if something accidentally turns out to be a subscription it won't be able to auto-renew?

ketzu 1y ago
German companies usually will send you to collections in the case of failure to pay for renewal with the provided process. I don't know how successful they are at it though.

enigma101 1y ago

i swear the biggest gangsters on the planet are deutsche bahn

kmoser 1y ago

> Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate your requested date, as termination is only possible up to four weeks before the end of the term. The phrase "up to four weeks before the end of the term" is misleading and can be reasonably interpreted different ways. Let's say you buy a ticket today (October 10, 2025) and it renews October 11, 2026 (one year later). Four weeks before the end of the term would be September 13, 2026 (i.e. October 11, 2026 - 4 weeks). Since we just established that "four weeks before the end of the term" is September 13, 2026, then "Termination is only possible up to four weeks before the end of the term" can be interpreted to mean "Termination is only possible up to September 13, 2026" which means I should be able to terminate any time between now and September 13, 2026, i.e. I have a max of 11 months after date of purchase to terminate the auto-renew.

dandersch 1y ago
What other interpretation is there?
- kmoser 1y ago
  If you interpret "up to" to mean "no more than," then "up to four weeks before the end of the term" could be interpreted as any time between September 12, 2026 (four weeks before the October 10, 2026 end of the term), and October 10, 2026 (the end of term).
  - dandersch 1y ago
    Oh, you're right. I guess I default to the less customer-friendly interpretation when it comes to subscriptions.

lifestyleguru 1y ago

I didn't expect, and you probably don't imagine how difficult is to buy Deutsche Bahn ticket. For sanity I was buying with cash at the ticket office. The queue was long, the service was rude, but at least I bought the right ticket. For international travel I was always buying online on the website of the other railways - magically it was not only easier but also cheaper.

constantcrying 1y ago

The part about them being a company "with no reputation to loose" really hits home. If you know your customer is going to hate you, because you suck at being a reliable service provider, then them hating you also because you scammed them for 500 Euros is no loss at all. The actual difference in reputation is marginal. They also do not really suffer any financial damage. They do not have competition and no matter how badly run their business is, their losses are paid for by the tax payer.

rebouny 1y ago

Here near Cologne we are just calling dealing with Deutsche Bahn (DB) "DBakel" https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/debacle https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/debacle