Train tickets sent by MMS to your mobile phone
Many mobile phone owners use those little devices for everything from an alarm clock to a calculator and checking emails. Now Germany’s Deutsche Bahn will use popular technology for the ease of their customers who will be able to use their mobile phones as a transportation ticket.
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Customers will be able to order train tickets starting immediately. They will receive their ticket in the Form of a 2-D-Barcode via MMS (Multi Media Message). The code will then be scanned like an online-ticket from the telephone screen by the conductor. The new ticket form can be ordered up to ten minutes before train departure.
The road to paperless mobile phone-tickets begins with a registration at the online portal of Deutsche Bahn www.bahn.de/Handy-ticket where a user account is established with a personalized pin number for the customer’s corresponding mobile phone number. To book a train ticket by mobile phone, the customer must then connect to http://mobile.bahn.de and click on Auskunft or information. There you can book tickets and seat reservations with your pin number.
The tickets are paid for by direct debit from a bank account or by credit card. The customer will receive the ticket via an MMS on their handy and a confirmation will be sent by e-mail. The customers will not be able to receive special discounts or Sparpreise 25 & 50 with this service, however.
To test if your mobile phone can receive the MMS, you can log onto the Bahn website above to receive a test MMS. In the event that your handy battery goes out before the ticket was read or if the MMS was not received for some unknown reason, you are also protected. Although you'll have to buy a ticket on the train it will be refunded after the customer submits the ticket from his or her online-account.
The tickets will also be available for associated transportation systems in Frankfurt, Hamburg, Essen, and Düsseldorf. They have already been in existence in Cologne since 2004. A registration on the transportation company homepage will be required for every ticket purchase, however. A confirmation with bar code will be sent either by MMS or as a simple code by SMS for the time and route of the ticket. The payment options vary.
