More offers, higher prices, no more Bahncard: The new timetable at Deutsche Bahn has been in effect since this Sunday. And that brings with it some changes. Especially on the routes between Berlin and North Rhine-Westphalia and between Berlin and Munich, more offers are being created through additional long-distance connections, as the railway announced. The fault-prone train splitting in Hamm in North Rhine-Westphalia will then only occur half as often as before. Berlin will also receive a second transfer-free ICE connection to Vienna.
Together with the Austrian Federal Railways and other railway companies, the railway also offers a night train connection between Berlin and Brussels and Paris three times a week. The first of the so-called Nightjets will take off from the capital on Monday evening.
The timetable change also brings new offers between Leipzig, Jena and Nuremberg. In the future, five IC connections per day will be offered through the Saale Valley, it was said. So far there has only been one trip each. For the first time, Magdeburg will have a connection to Hamburg as well as more direct connections to Berlin and Rostock.
Tickets for the new timetable have been available since October. However, with the timetable change on Sunday, higher fares also apply. The so-called flex tickets then cost an average of 4.9 percent more. The tickets are called that because they are intended to give passengers a certain degree of flexibility, especially when choosing trains. Nothing will change when it comes to rail saver and super saver prices. The additional offers in long-distance transport are made possible by constant access to new ICE trains.
However, there are further changes to the Bahncard. The frequent traveler discount also becomes more expensive. The price for the Bahncard 25 increases by three euros when the timetable changes. It then costs 62.90 euros annually. With it, owners receive a 25 percent discount on every train journey they book. However, the price for the Bahncard 50, with which single tickets cost half as much, remains the same. However, Bahncard customers will have to do without the distinctive plastic card in their wallet in the future.
Deutsche Bahn wants to soon only issue rail cards digitally and do away with the plastic version. Initially, from the timetable change this Sunday, plastic test BahnCards 25 and 50 will no longer be issued. The changeover of the annual products is planned for the second half of 2024, but customer feedback should be taken into account for the specific design of the digitalization process, a DB spokeswoman told the German Press Agency.
According to DB information, 5.1 million rail cards are issued every year. “A digital rail card saves a lot of plastic,” said Stefanie Berk, marketing director at DB Fernverkehr. In addition, unlike in physical form, the map cannot be forgotten or lost once it has been uploaded to the DB Navigator smartphone app. According to DB, 60 percent of Bahncard customers are already using the digital form of the cards in the DB Navigator app.
