Germany life hacks. I wish I knew it before!
When you move to Germany — a lot of things seem very complex, cost- and time-consuming. But after some years you realise that they are actually smooth and painless if you know how to proceed. Germany is full of tricks and I will share things I discovered. The list will be extended when I remember/discover something.
How to keep a good mood and avoid troubles❗️
Gutefrage
Have a question and Google doesn’t bring an answer? Gutefrage will help you in most of the cases. Huge and very helpful community answers any kind of questions: laws, cars, language, whatever. Highly recommended! The only disadvantage — it’s German speaking 🙂
Fahrradcodierung (bike coding)
It happened so my bike was stolen within our first year in Germany. “Was it coded?” the policeman asked. This is how I learned about bike coding.
Police does the coding, they “deep scratch” the bike ID on its frame (similar to cars). Even if the thief removes that ID — the damage on the frame will indicate that the bike is stolen, and complicate its sale. That’s why coded bikes are being stolen much less often, the police said. The coding costs ~20€ and takes ca. 10 minutes. Check the police appointments for it.
Überweisung Rückruf (transfer recall)
Once I sent some significant amount of money to the wrong recipient (made a typo in IBAN). I realised my mistake only after some days (when the transaction was already out) and started annoying my bank support. This is what I learned from them:
- The recipient name doesn’t mean anything, only IBAN matters. You can write any recipient name and it won’t affect the transaction
- Neither bank nor police won’t tell the name of the account owner by IBAN
- It is possible to prevent the transaction within ca. 1 business day
- After that the only way is to try recalling a transfer
The transfer recall costs money (in my bank it was ~20€) and doesn’t give any guaranty. Here’s how it goes: my bank “asks” the recipient bank to undo the transaction, recipient bank “asks” the recipient to undo the transaction. Only if recipient confirms it — it works.
I was lucky and got my money back, I hope my post will help you if such situation happens to you.
Social Monitoring
When you rent your first apartment you don’t think a lot about its neighbourhood. But then you realise that there’re “good” and “bad” districts in the city. Moreover, big cities regularly do so called “social monitoring” study and publish reports like this.
The good news: if you’re not a fan of reading huge boring German documents — you can go to nachbaria.de and check the condition of your district within few seconds. Currently Berlin, Hamburg and Munich are available. Btw it’s my hobby-project so share and feedback are highly welcome ❤️
Pfand
The bottle direction matters! The bottleneck should be pointing at you, otherwise some pfand-machines won’t accept the bottle. Pfand-machines of discounters (Lidl, Penny etc.) accept only “own” bottles, pfand-machines of Rewe, Edeka etc. accept “foreign” bottles as well.
How to save some time ⏰
DHL
If you print DHL stickers — stop doing it. When you purchase a DHL stamp online — they send you a QR code which you show to the Post employee when you hand in the package. The employee prints a sticker and puts it on the box. That’s it! This knowledge saved me hours of commuting to the copy-shop just to print one piece of paper 😀
DHL bonus 1: they have a bonus programme and promote using Packstations. For every online purchase you receive 50 cents on bonus account and for sending via Packstation — another 50 cents.
DHL bonus 2: Amazon delivery to the Packstation is free of charge disregarding the order amount (for articles sold by Amazon).
Appointments
If you’re an expat, you should face endless queues in Foreigner department and 0 available slots in “book online appointment” tools.
I tell you a secret the department clerk told me — new available appointments pop up at midnight 😀 Seriously! Just try to book an appointment at 00:01 and you’ll see. The trick works in Hamburg, don’t know about other cities — please share if it worked for you!
AusweisApp2
When you receive your residence permit — the clerk asks if you need an “online authentication”. Half of people say “no”, another half say “yes” and never use this function 😀 But actually it allows you to use a lot of governmental online services such as Rentenversicherung (pension) or Finanzamt (taxes).
The trick is — to authenticate you need to “read” your card don’t need a card-reader, if you have a phone with NFC.
The “AusweisApp2” application turns your phone into card-reader and you can start using the “online authentication” right away.
How to save some money 💶
Schufa
Probably you ordered Schufa at least once. It is usual requirement to rent an apartment in Germany. Schufa (the organisation) collects an information about your (actual and possible) debts and rates your financial reliability with a score from 1 to 100. Of course their service costs money. That’s what the majority knows.
But what is not very known is that according to the GDPR law Schufa must provide you with all your data on your demand. That’s called “Datenkopie(nach Art. 15 DS-GVO)” and is free once a year. Enjoy receiving your Schufa annual score as well as all data they have about you 🙂
Cashback platforms
Everybody know Payback, but there’re plenty of real cashback platforms (where you get 1–2–5% of your purchase back). I prefer using Shoop, but it’s a matter of taste.
Smart Heizkörper-Thermostat (radiator valve)
If you have “default” radiator valves at home — replace them right now! Smart valves allow programming of heating cycles and temperature and by that spare ca. 30% of you annual heating bill. They pay for themselves in one year, just think of it.
Zahnzusatzversicherung (additional dental insurance)
I was so scared by stories that dental service in Germany may cost thousands euro, so the first five years after relocation I treated my teeth in my homeland during vacations 😀
The stories about thousands euro are truthful, but there’s a way to protect yourself and feel much safer — additional dental insurance. It costs ~20€ per month and covers 80–100% of a dentist bill.
Wow, you’ve made it to the end! 😀 I hope you enjoyed the reading and the tips will help you. Feedback is very welcome!
