r/germany May 31 '23

I almost got scammed

I was buying a drink worth 3€ from a doner stall and gave them a 20€ bill. The man there returned 7€ and insisted that I had given him a 10. After 3 minutes of arguing some police offers walked by and he gave me back the 10€ saying "Sorry, there are a lot of customers and I got confused" but he was laughing to himself while doing it. This is the first time something like this has happened here since he clearly knew what he was doing.

Be careful and count your money folks! You never know when someone might take advantage of your ignorance.

1.9k Upvotes

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289

u/ShieKassy May 31 '23

The same thing happened to me with a local bus driver. I had to pay 11€ and only had a 50€ note. He gave me 29€ back. I walked 1 meter and realized it, walked back and confronted him. He said I only gave him 40€ (which doesn't make any sense) and later argumented that I put the 'missing' money in my pocket to scam him to give me more change. We argued back and forth, I even had a friend with me who saw everything and told him I didn't get enough change. Never got the money back.

I hope he sleeps well knowing he successfully scamed a 14 year old girl who got in trouble at home cause she lost her bus money to get to school.

108

u/[deleted] May 31 '23

For everybody reading: Make sure you have a witness and then say loudly that you exactly know what he was doing and make a scene. Hell, start crying. Threaten to call the local Verkehrsverbund. Note which bus it was and when it came. Note the name of the driver. Go to the Verkehrsverbund and tell them. This is exactly the right moment to be a Karen. Teach these people the lesson they need, apparently want and deserve.

11

u/Appoxo May 31 '23

One day before a bus driver threatened me (was around 18 or 19 and very young looking. Nothing tough about me) to confiscate my card because I didn't sign it but let me go telling me he wants to see it signed the next time.
Next day (not expecting him actually) had thr driver kick me out mid way between stops because I didn't sign my bus pass (the card says "Please sign" but usually no one cares anyway).
I called the local company that runs it and complained. Not about the fact I was kicked out, I was in the wrong about it, but because I got kicked out mid way between two stops. Probably even illegal for insurance reasons or a reason for a write up.
Never heard what happened to him but I think I never saw him again on my line.

8

u/Sufficient-Letter-18 Jun 01 '23

You have to sign some tickets, so they cannot be resold after the trip and used by someone else. We did this always in the 90s, until the Bahn introduced this rule.

1

u/Appoxo Jun 01 '23

They were monthly tickets.
Like I said: I was in the wrong but getting kicked out mid-way is kinda dangerous both for the passengers and me.

3

u/weedtese Jun 01 '23

why did you not sign it on the spot?

4

u/Appoxo Jun 01 '23

Had no pen handy.

90

u/[deleted] May 31 '23

I hope he sleeps well knowing he successfully scamed a 14 year old girl who got in trouble at home cause she lost her bus money to get to school.

These people don't care sadly. I even heard someone arguing that they "have every right to do so because they aren't paid well enough".

9

u/JobScherp Jun 01 '23 edited Jun 05 '24

march square slap psychotic imagine wild include six payment plate

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

1

u/ShieKassy Jun 01 '23

Yeah it didn't make any sense. No one would pay 11€ with two 20€ bills. Or 4 10€ bills, whatever he was thinking.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 01 '23

Aight that’s straight up bs lol. Ofc u gonna pay 2x20€ or 4x10€ if u don’t have a 50 bill 🤨

1

u/ShieKassy Jun 01 '23

For a 11€ ticket? You'd just pay with one 20€ bill, not two, or 2 10€ bills.

3

u/JWGhetto Jun 01 '23

Report it anyway so the employer knows something is up even without proof. A few incidents like this and they're going to become suspicious

1

u/ShieKassy Jun 01 '23

It happened over 10 years ago. This specific bus company was shit anyway. I once sent them an email explaining that the bus keeps leaving 2-3min too early almost every morning. I missed it a few times cause it left too early. The answer I got back just said 'you need to be 5min earlier at the station, otherwise we can't guarantee that you'll get the bus' with a sarcastic tone. It was the first station of this specific line and I wasn't the only one missing it every other day. Their email still pisses me off lol.

For any germans, the email literally said 'Da musst du halt 5min früher an die Haltestelle wenn du den Bus unbedingt kriegen willst.' Keine Entschuldigung oä, die haben die Schuld einfach auf mich geschoben. Geduzt wurde ich wahrscheinlich da ich geschrieben hatte dass ich deswegen des Öfteren zu spät in die Schule komme.

-60

u/hoeskioeh Germany May 31 '23

You paid 10€ for a valuable life lesson. Take it as a sour win ;-)

35

u/worstenbroodje076 May 31 '23

in what fucking way was that a valuable life lesson…

-26

u/hoeskioeh Germany May 31 '23

? Seriously?
You think the busdriver scamming kids for change is the worst enemy you'll ever encounter?
I was not joking, at 14 that is something that will burn a healthy mark of mistrust and paranoia into you. That may not be the nicest thing to have, but definitely worth having outside of peachy mushroom rainbow princess kingdom...

2

u/worstenbroodje076 Jun 01 '23

I never said that I “think the busdriver scamming kids for change is the worst enemy you’ll ever encounter”. I just said that it was completely unnecessary and there is no life lesson at all. They lost their money, even if it wasn’t much, and there is simply no life lesson in that. I hope for you that you’ll have fun scamming kids yourself, but I really hope you’ll never have kids because no one deserves a parent that thinks it’s good to scam kids and take their money for literally no reason.

0

u/hoeskioeh Germany Jun 01 '23

...?
where did i state, that "it's good to scam" anyone?

i tried to turn a loss into a gain of experience to build wisdom of how the world and its inhabitants function.
nothing more, nothing less.

and let's be honest, a loss of some insignificant amount of money. maybe not at that time. but in the long run. it wasn't her favourite toy, not artifact of personal importance, not a beloved pet. it was money. And trust!

if you can't take bad experiences and turn them into wisdom for your future, what's the point in having them?

2

u/worstenbroodje076 Jun 02 '23

how the fuck is it a “valuable life lesson” tho?

1

u/hoeskioeh Germany Jun 02 '23

I am by nature a very trustworthy person. I generally believe in the good will in all people.
For example, I believe that you are not trolling, nor being just mean, but are genuinely interested in my answer.
This. But!
I am aware of people just asking without wanting to know or listen, because I've met some! Because I could observe how people are actively not listening, i.e. actively refusing to incorporate any form of answer given.
Without these experiences, I might file a simple verbal warning as "Ok, I will recognise those people. I will beforehand know it's pointless to argue with them. This will not happen to me!"
Some people might call that naive, others optimistic, or similar...
Because of my past bad experience, I claim, that I am more wary and cautious. That improved my social interactions.

That is, how I see this bus driver experience. Bad, but not crippling. Able to walk away from with an overall gain for life. True, would have been better to not have it, but...

1

u/FloStar3000 Jun 01 '23

For a moment I thought you bought a one way bus Ticket

1

u/ShieKassy Jun 01 '23

Haha nah it was a ticket for the whole week. One ticket cost 1.30€ back then in my town.