How to seek hotel reimbursement from Bahn (DB) when they don't reply?

​@Adam_AU I had once a little problem with Deutsche Bahn and I had to wait 4 months to receive an answer from the customer service and to get a refund.

In a such case, I would send registered letters with acknowledgment of receipt and not e-mails.

This is typical for DB: they refuse to help, say you have to arrange it yourself and then get your money back.

However, they have 1 month to reply to any request. Has that period already passed?

Yes, ​@rvdborgt I should have refused to leave the little window till they booked it for me, but the poor DB  staffer looked frazzled.  Next time 🙄

The reply-paid envelope with receipts etc was posted one month ago today; I emailed 2 ½  weeks ago. 

So perhaps I should wait two weeks before beginning action (through EU consumer bureau? German consumer protection?)

I will be sure to post here, whatever the outcome!

And thanks for that thought ​@Danhiel, but that’s simply not an option for me as I live in the remote Arctic  and the nearest printer to reprint all 10 (!) documents (let alone get to a post office) is a 70 minute journey on very difficult roads.

Plus, if travellers have to go to such lengths (receipted international delivery of a large letter costs around €15 from Norway) then it becomes unfeasible to claim; I’ve cc-ed myself the emails to prove that they were sent and received and photographed the envelope exterior and contents before I posted it.  So I think these should be sufficient as evidence.

​@Adam_AU 

I see another problem in your case. According to the Interrail terms and conditions, you are not eligible for a refund of your accomodation, because it was not a through ticket. This is not the same carrier from Hamburg (SJ) and reservations are mandatory in the night train. This does not excuse the delay in the DB's response, but that response could be negative. 

Thankfully DB’s website (not just the DB woman at the infodesk) also say that they ARE liable; see https://int.bahn.de/en/booking-information/passenger-rights/faq “I have an Interrail-/Eurail pass - can I submit my passenger rights application directly?” to which the answer is 

• “Have you incurred additional costs (e.g. for an alternative means of transport or an overnight stay) due to a cancellation of a train or a train delay? In this case, your application for a refund of these costs will be processed directly by the SC FGR [Passenger Rights Service Center].”

The fact I was continuing on another carrier had nothing to do with it; the RailPlanner app showed a through-journey (Munich-Stockholm (hint: add through-journeys and not single journeys wherever possible!)) and I was unable to continue that journey until the following morning.  And I fulfilled the other obligation which was to talk to their station staff to ask them to organise me a hotel before booking my own.

I do have travel insurance, but it wouldn’t cover DB’s stuff-up (misplacing half a trainset – the staff in Munich were as bemused as the passengers) as it was avoidable; in any case I’d need a written refusal to compensate from DB.

My battle is to get any acknowledgement at all, which makes me determined to pursue the matter.

Whether the current information about this is sufficient is up for debate. It's only in the Conditions of use and on the compensation web page. There's however no warning if you add such a journey in the Rail Planner app, look up a journey on the Interrail website or book reservations. IMO that's not enough.

Whether the current information about this is sufficient is up for debate.

According to the EU-regulation, the railway must inform you when you buy a ticket that it is not a through-ticket (in this case a travel pass or a season ticket with special rules). Currently, you don’t have to confirm that you have read the conditions when you buy a pass, you could really argue that you were not clearly informed by Eurail/Interrail.

But the DB or any other railway could answer that it's not their problem if Eurail doesn't properly inform their customers and that you must deal with them. IMO Eurail should improve the information about this problem when you buy a pass and not when you add a journey in the app.

You're right, it's before you buy a ticket that you have to be informed. In case of a regular ticket, you have to be informed, whether, for the concrete journey you are booking, you will be having multiple contracts. This also means that just mentioning this in the conditions is usually not enough, since those are often not specific enough to draw conclusions for your journey. You could argue that in the case of a pass, you'd have to be informed in general when you buy the pass, and specifically when you add a journey in in the app, or book reservations, since only then you indicate a concrete journey, for which it is possible to state whether or not it will be one contract or multiple.

I think information needs to be improved in both cases. It needs to be clear, when you are planning or booking a concrete journey, whether you are going to have multiple contracts. I doubt this can all be explained when you're buying a pass. Alternatively, if you really have to rely on the information available when when you buy the pass, then the Rail Planner app needs to show more information about the trains to be able to say whether you'll have one contract or not.

But this is just my informed opinion. I'm not a lawyer.

But this is just my informed opinion. I'm not a lawyer.

This is also a problem, we try to help other passholders, but we are not lawyers.

I had a similar case in Switzerland, not with an Interrail pass. I have filed a complaint with the Federal Office of Transport, but I was not satisfied with the answer.  It was not possible for me to appeal to the administrative court because I would have needed legal counsel and would have had to pay significant fees if I had lost the case, just for the reimbursement of one hotel night. Probably we would have the same problem in every other European country.