Didn’t the German trains have such incredible reliability that they issued apology notes for workers when they arrived late, because bosses wouldn’t believe that’s why someone was tardy?
My husband just reminded me what this actually is. It’s not for people being late for work, it’s for people demanding their money back from DB. And it’s only issued after the train was late for a certain time, an hour at least, iirc - because if they did this for shorter delays, they wouldn’t get around to doing anything but issue delay certificates. (Note that you only get the entire cost back when the train was delayed significantly, for several hours, otherwise it’s a partial refund at best.)
Not because our trains are usually so very reliable though. On the contrary, if DB has actually managed to implement a mechanism like that (I personally haven’t heard of it), that’s because they get so many complaints and people kept demanding some kind of documentation to show their higher-ups to explain why they’re always late.
And in true German fashion, they privatized it only half-way, combining the disadvantages of a privately run enterprise with the drawbacks of a state-owned company.
Didn’t the German trains have such incredible reliability that they issued apology notes for workers when they arrived late, because bosses wouldn’t believe that’s why someone was tardy?
That’s Japan, unfortunately.
It also is Germany (and France, Malaysia, and Singapore). At least according to Wikipedia.
It’s possible Wikipedia is relying on outdated info though.
Delay Certificate
My husband just reminded me what this actually is. It’s not for people being late for work, it’s for people demanding their money back from DB. And it’s only issued after the train was late for a certain time, an hour at least, iirc - because if they did this for shorter delays, they wouldn’t get around to doing anything but issue delay certificates. (Note that you only get the entire cost back when the train was delayed significantly, for several hours, otherwise it’s a partial refund at best.)
Not because our trains are usually so very reliable though. On the contrary, if DB has actually managed to implement a mechanism like that (I personally haven’t heard of it), that’s because they get so many complaints and people kept demanding some kind of documentation to show their higher-ups to explain why they’re always late.
They used to be fairly reliable. Then privatization happened…
And in true German fashion, they privatized it only half-way, combining the disadvantages of a privately run enterprise with the drawbacks of a state-owned company.