Spa card
A spa card is a paid access authorization card for a specific spa area within a spa resort , which is usually provided with serial numbers or other features, made from printed paper and which allows its respective rightful owner access. The fee generally payable for this is known as the tourist tax .
A spa card also entitles the card holder to participate in an otherwise restricted-access event, for example a spa concert or to visit guarded beaches. Spa cards therefore have a controlling and limiting function and implement a fundamental principle, that of compartmentalization.
Modern spa cards often have other technical features, for example a magnetic strip , an integrated chip or a machine-readable barcode to speed up the technical reading process. They are produced, sold and distributed using modern e-ticket processes, and in future also with the help of the Internet. Some open source projects are working on it.
To generally subject all visitors of spa territory the obligation to purchase a tourist card, for example, the Lower Saxony North Sea spa works Norderney Island Visitors transported with the 1998 shipping company north Frisia together. With the purchase of a ferry ticket, every visitor to the island - regardless of whether or not they use the spa facilities - must purchase the so-called service card (formerly the spa card), without which they cannot leave the island again. The usually sovereign task of controlling the payment of a public-law fee such as the visitor's tax has been transferred to a private provider and at the same time a compulsory fee previously unknown for German health resorts was defined. On the Schleswig-Holstein Baltic Sea coast there is the "ostseecard" in 18 places, which serves as a tourist card and offers many regional perks and discounts, free beach access at the beaches subject to tourist tax and sometimes discounts on the use of local public transport.
Free use of local public transport
In several holiday regions and places, tourist cards allow the use of local public transport. A part of the resort fee is used to compensate for lost fare income.
Comprehensive concepts of this kind in Germany are the KONUS in the Black Forest , the GUTi in the Bavarian Forest National Park , the VHB guest card on Lake Constance , the Sauerland card and, from 2011, the guest card in the Cochem-Zell district .
In Austria there are similar concepts with the Neusiedler See Card and the Lechtal Aktiv Card.
In addition, there are individual free tourist-oriented bus routes in many places.