The time has come, the Germany ticket is valid: After lengthy preparations, the 49-euro ticket for buses and trains can be used from this week. The expectations in advance were high. However, the launch doesn’t seem to go entirely smoothly.
Patient waiting is still required at numerous ticket counters on Tuesday, with long queues forming in many places. And if you want to buy your ticket online, you should be patient: the Deutsche Bahn servers don’t seem to be able to cope with the large rush. “At the moment too many users are accessing our booking system at the same time,” it said on Monday on the page where passengers can buy the new ticket.
The company spoke of delays due to high demand. The disruption continued in some cases on Tuesday as well. Users also report that the purchase of other tickets and country tickets is not possible smoothly in the app.
In addition to Deutsche Bahn, many other transport companies also sell the ticket, which is the successor to the 9-euro ticket from last summer. The Deutschlandticket usually costs 49 euros a month and entitles you to travel on local public transport throughout Germany. It is also available as a monthly cancellable subscription.
According to a projection by the Association of German Transport Companies (VDV), well over three million people have already purchased the new ticket. According to the association, this includes 750,000 people who did not previously have a local transport subscription.
Deutsche Bahn is already declaring the Deutschlandticket a “huge success”
At the request of the SZ, a spokeswoman for Deutsche Bahn declared the start of the new ticket to be an “enormous success” despite the server problems in the meantime. Including the pre-orders received, Deutsche Bahn sold more than 1.3 million tickets in the first month alone. “Following the already high level of customer interest in the first few weeks, demand rose again significantly at the weekend and on May 1st,” the company said.
The booking of the ticket is still possible despite delays and temporary server overload. For customers who have not yet received their ticket, Deutsche Bahn temporarily also recognizes the order confirmation or the previous subscription ticket as a valid ticket for the first few days.
From the point of view of Transport Minister Volker Wissing, the difficulties complained about by some passengers show deficits in digitization. “These are problems that are related to the fact that we do not have sufficient digitization in sales,” said the FDP politician at the start of the new ticket. However, these difficulties were by no means universal.
The VDV and Deutsche Bahn expect 17 million tickets to be sold
The VDV and Deutsche Bahn assume that 17 million people will get the Deutschlandticket in the future. However, because of the ticket, overcrowded trains are not expected in May. “We assume that we will have a noticeable increase in demand with the Deutschlandticket,” said Evelyn Palla, who is responsible for regional transport on the Deutsche Bahn board. “But that will not happen all of a sudden on May 1st.”
The forecast was also confirmed at the start of the week in regional transport: Despite the large rush to the sales outlets, buses and trains were not overcrowded. The demand for the Deutschlandticket will increase continuously over the coming months, said Palla.
The ticket is financed by the federal and state governments. They want to make local public transport more affordable and encourage more people to switch from cars to buses and trains. In the industry, the ticket is also celebrated as the “end of the tariff jungle” – however, the countries have announced their own ideas for this ticket through special rules and additional tickets and have already implemented some of them. For example, some federal states offer discounted tickets for certain groups of people, such as students, trainees or seniors.
It remains to be seen whether the new Deutschlandticket can meet the high expectations attached to it. Not just whether the streets will be emptier and buses and trains fuller, but also whether public transport can cope with the expected increase in travellers.