Country of residence - Basel or Basel Bad BF

  • 17 February 2023
  • 10 replies
  • 192 views

  • Rail rookie
  • 1 reply

The global pass allows one outbound journey and one inbound journey to / from country of residence that occur during travel days at any point in your trip.

I am a resident of Switzerland, and I am planning to make the following weekend trips : 

  • Return journey between Basel / Milan
  • Return journey between Basel / Cologne
  • Return journey between Basel / Hamburg

Am I able to do so on my pass? Is this considered an outbound / inbound journey as technically I am not travelling within Switzerland.

 

Thanks for your help!!


10 replies

The global pass allows one outbound journey and one inbound journey to / from country of residence that occur during travel days at any point in your trip.

I am a resident of Switzerland, and I am planning to make the following weekend trips : 

  • Return journey between Basel / Milan
  • Return journey between Basel / Cologne
  • Return journey between Basel / Hamburg

Am I able to do so on my pass? Is this considered an outbound / inbound journey as technically I am not travelling within Switzerland.

 

Thanks for your help!!

 

When going from Basel to Milano, I think you'd cross Switzerland. So you are travelling in your homecountry. You'll need an outbound day. On your way back an inbound day.

When going from Basel to Köln / Hamburg and back it depends. If you are starting from Basel SBB, you'd need four more traveldays in your homecountry (you don't have these). Of course it's not the way to do, too.

If you are starting from Basel Badischer Bahnhof, it's not considered as travelling in your homecountry. So that's possible to do with your global pass.

Of course it's possible to start in Basel SBB anyway by paying to Bad Bf. 

Conclusion: It's possible to do these three trips when holding a global pass but you'd also use your outbound / inbound days doing so. And you'd need to start from Basel Bad Bf when going to Germany.

Userlevel 5
Badge +5

Basel - Milano includes a long journey within Switzerland! for the trips to germany you just need an additional ticket between Basel SBB and Basel Bad to avoid the need of in-/outbound days. But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

@runner.on.rails The app has implemented the rule correctly. Basel Bad Bf is considered to be in Germany. 

@Mei No need to add this manually.

Userlevel 5
Badge +5

 

Basel - Milano includes a long journey within Switzerland! for the trips to germany you just need an additional ticket between Basel SBB and Basel Bad to avoid the need of in-/outbound days. But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

@runner.on.rails The app has implemented the rule correctly. Basel Bad Bf is considered to be in Germany. 

Ah yes, makes sense. because there it easy because the border is between Basel SBB and Basel Bad. But when it is in a station, like St Margrethen or Buchs the app considers it as Switzerland. Or is it also fixed nowadays?

 

Basel - Milano includes a long journey within Switzerland! for the trips to germany you just need an additional ticket between Basel SBB and Basel Bad to avoid the need of in-/outbound days. But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

@runner.on.rails The app has implemented the rule correctly. Basel Bad Bf is considered to be in Germany. 

Ah yes, makes sense. because there it easy because the border is between Basel SBB and Basel Bad. But when it is in a station, like St Margrethen or Buchs the app considers it as Switzerland. Or is it also fixed nowadays?

 

It's not as easy to "fix" this. Basel Bad Bf is really a DB station (the tariff border isn't between SBB and Badischer Bahnhof, it's at the station, too). If you'd show Buchs SG or St. Margrethen SG as being in Austria, you'd get new problems with journeys completely in Switzerland. It's been tried with other border stations to implement them with two countries to choose but that's causing other problems.

Userlevel 7
Badge +9

It's not as easy to "fix" this. Basel Bad Bf is really a DB station (the tariff border isn't between SBB and Badischer Bahnhof, it's at the station, too). If you'd show Buchs SG or St. Margrethen SG as being in Austria, you'd get new problems with journeys completely in Switzerland. It's been tried with other border stations to implement them with two countries to choose but that's causing other problems.

For some stations it works correctly (e.g. Basel Bad Bf, Chiasso) but for some other it doesn't. Geneva was a problem some time ago and I don't know whether that has been fixed yet.

Userlevel 5
Badge +5

 

Basel - Milano includes a long journey within Switzerland! for the trips to germany you just need an additional ticket between Basel SBB and Basel Bad to avoid the need of in-/outbound days. But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

@runner.on.rails The app has implemented the rule correctly. Basel Bad Bf is considered to be in Germany. 

Ah yes, makes sense. because there it easy because the border is between Basel SBB and Basel Bad. But when it is in a station, like St Margrethen or Buchs the app considers it as Switzerland. Or is it also fixed nowadays?

 

It's not as easy to "fix" this. Basel Bad Bf is really a DB station (the tariff border isn't between SBB and Badischer Bahnhof, it's at the station, too). If you'd show Buchs SG or St. Margrethen SG as being in Austria, you'd get new problems with journeys completely in Switzerland. It's been tried with other border stations to implement them with two countries to choose but that's causing other problems.

Actually it would be easy to fix it. Most proper way:

store all the tariff border points (also virtual ones) and consider that when checking if in-/outbound day is needed. (if journey starts/ends at a border tariff point, use the next stop to determine if in-/outbound day is needed). I would implement this in less then a day.

It's not as easy to "fix" this. Basel Bad Bf is really a DB station (the tariff border isn't between SBB and Badischer Bahnhof, it's at the station, too). If you'd show Buchs SG or St. Margrethen SG as being in Austria, you'd get new problems with journeys completely in Switzerland. It's been tried with other border stations to implement them with two countries to choose but that's causing other problems.

For some stations it works correctly (e.g. Basel Bad Bf, Chiasso) but for some other it doesn't. Geneva was a problem some time ago and I don't know whether that has been fixed yet.

 

Honestly, it doesn't work "correctly" anywhere - I do just see workarounds to minimize problems. Even the Basel area is not implemented correctly (but it works for the vast majority) and for Basel Bad Bf itself you need to know which station to choose depending on direction. And for Chiasso I couldn't verify that it would work correctly; at least it doesn't look that way but I'm not from Italyi. At least it looks like Genf is implemented the same way as Chiasso. And the next user-unfriendly thing is that same border situations aren't implemented the same way. But maybe there are just too many borders. 😉

 

Basel - Milano includes a long journey within Switzerland! for the trips to germany you just need an additional ticket between Basel SBB and Basel Bad to avoid the need of in-/outbound days. But since the app has implemented the rule wrongly, you need to enter the trip from Basel Bad to Germany (anf back) manually!

@runner.on.rails The app has implemented the rule correctly. Basel Bad Bf is considered to be in Germany. 

Ah yes, makes sense. because there it easy because the border is between Basel SBB and Basel Bad. But when it is in a station, like St Margrethen or Buchs the app considers it as Switzerland. Or is it also fixed nowadays?

 

It's not as easy to "fix" this. Basel Bad Bf is really a DB station (the tariff border isn't between SBB and Badischer Bahnhof, it's at the station, too). If you'd show Buchs SG or St. Margrethen SG as being in Austria, you'd get new problems with journeys completely in Switzerland. It's been tried with other border stations to implement them with two countries to choose but that's causing other problems.

Actually it would be easy to fix it. Most proper way:

store all the tariff border points (also virtual ones) and consider that when checking if in-/outbound day is needed. (if journey starts/ends at a border tariff point, use the next stop to determine if in-/outbound day is needed). I would implement this in less then a day.

 

Sounds good when reading it. For someone from Switzerland: Let's take a journey from Basel SBB to Riehen. How does it work implementing your idea? 

Thank you all for your tips. So I will use my pass in the following manner :

  • Return journey between Basel / Milan - utilize 1x inbound and 1x outbound entitlement here
  • Return journey between Basel / Cologne - take the train to / from Basel Bad Bf
  • Return journey between Basel / Hamburg - take the train to / from Basel Bad Bf

Thanks again!

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