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Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

ketzu.net

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Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#91

Post by ahartmetz »

lxgr wrote: post #87
ahartmetz wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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…

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.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#92

Post by mytailorisrich »

ketzu wrote: post #83
mytailorisrich wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what your definition of "privatized" is... fully state-owned means it isn't privatised at all. The issue is one of legal status. In most countries you can be a commercial company or essentially a branch of the government (leaving aside coops and charities). So in general you have companies (legal status) but they are fully owned by the state, hence "state-owned company". "Privatized" means the government dec…

> Not sure what your definition of "privatized" is Maybe this is a language barrier issue. Companies organized as AG, GmbH etc. under private law, in opposition to branches of the government or special institutions of public law. This is commonly called "Bahnprivatisierung" in Germany. The Deutsche Bahn was "privatized" in the sense that it was moved from public law to private law based organization.

Yes, that's exactly what I explained in term of legal status, but that's not what "privatized" means.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#93

Post by lxgr »

kalleboo wrote: post #50
clippy99 wrote: post #45

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.

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.

I guess there are some upsides to litigation being horrendously expensive.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#94

Post by lxgr »

ketzu wrote: post #70
stockresearcher wrote: post #69

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?

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.

You can always get one for the current month and (except for maybe the last day) immediately cancel it with some sellers.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#95

Post by kwanbix »

iammjm wrote: post #78

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 "of…

This is a very German thing. Most contracts are yearly contracts the first two years, and you have to cancel at most 3 months before the next year starts.

On the third year, the contracts become monthly contracts. However, if you do any change in the contract, it starts again. For example, if you have internet for 5 years, and request a speed change, it starts again to count the 2 years.

Absolutely crazy from my non-german point of view. In my home country the first year is a full year, and it becomes monthly cancelable afterwards for things like internet, where they subsidize the installation and the modem. But in Germany, I was charged 120 dollars for the installation, and had to pay for the modem.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#96

Post by lxgr »

ahartmetz wrote: post #91
lxgr wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.

Apple's various services do it too, but not consistently, and usually only for free trials (in which case, fair enough to be honest).

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#97

Post by s4mbh4 »

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.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#98

Post by Tarsul »

zb3 wrote: post #85
Tarsul wrote: post #82

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 mon…

If the incompetence works in this direction too, then at least we're sure this is true incompetence and not malice..

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.

Re: Dark patterns: Buying a Bahncard at Deutsche Bahn

#100

Post by sunaookami »

lxgr wrote: post #88
notTooFarGone wrote: post #40

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.

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.

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...
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