Phonecard (Germany)

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Various stickers for "making calls without coins"

Telephone cards as we know them today in Germany have been around since the test phase in 1983 . However, these were only introduced nationwide in 1990 after the test phase had been completed. The telephone card is to be distinguished from the TeleKarte , which was also issued by the Bundespost. Legally, the phone card is a so-called " small bearer paper " according to § 807 BGB.

Since the widespread use of cell phones , phone booths and calling cards are used less and less. This led to the dismantling of telephone booths and the discontinuation of almost all telephone card series .

precursor

The telephone billet from 1891 is considered to be one of the first forerunners of today's telephone cards

From 1881 to 1891, telephone tickets were used in the German Empire to handle telephone traffic from public telephones .

On November 5, 1883, in the Kingdom of Bavaria , numbered telephone billets "for the use of a public telephone station for a period of 5 minutes" were issued first in Munich , and later in some other places in Bavaria . In the four corners there is the value (10, 25, 50 pfennigs or one mark ), at the top the name of the place above the designation "Telephone system". These telephone certificates were suspended in 1908.

Both were receipts of fees .

introduction

Regional field trials

In June 1983 the first field experiments with prepaid calling cards for public telephones took place. These prepaid telephones should not replace the existing coin operated telephones, but complement them. According to the Federal Post Office, they are particularly suitable for telephone customers who often call from a telephone booth and have therefore always had to carry a lot of change with them. Finally, the Post hoped that these new telephones would be less damaged because they could not be robbed.

When the test phase was presented in October 1982, the Deutsche Bundespost was still thinking about how to improve phone calls with cards. In their opinion, credit cards would not be useful just for making phone calls, as they were then used in the United States. Swiss Post considered whether more universal cards would be possible with which several services, such as making calls and purchasing machine stamps, would be possible.

Were tested hologram cards , smart cards , magnetic cards and punch cards . The decision was made in 1986: the chip card system tested in the Bonn and Aachen area was introduced nationwide after another supraregional trial. The reason for this was, at the time, superior protection against counterfeiting.

Frankfurt am Main

The first regionally limited operational trial with around 30 card phones each for exclusive use with prepaid "phone cards", as it was called at the time, was carried out in Frankfurt am Main . A system based on holograms (optical card system) began on June 20, 1983 in the city center and on the exhibition grounds . This operational trial should initially last 18 months. The fee units were embedded in the functional part of the telephone card on the basis of a hologram in the form of an optical microstructure in the carrier material. For the operational trial, cards with 45 or 92 units at a price of 10 or 20 DM were handed in at post offices 1 and 11 and on the exhibition grounds. The front of all cards was red, the back of all cards was black. The cards were manufactured by the Swiss company Landis & Gyr and had to be inserted into the card phone with the longest side. The operational test was ended on December 10, 1986, since a nationwide test began on December 16 of the same year. A card phone that was located in Ramstein in the Palatinate remained in operation until 1989. There were a total of 10 different phone cards.

Bonn and the Aachen area

On October 9, 1984, another use of card phones began in the city of Bonn and in the Aachen area on November 23, 1984. 30 card phones for cards with electronic memory (chip card system) were tested. The value was electronically stored in the functional part of the cards in green. Telephone cards with 40 and 80 units at a price of 12 and 24 DM respectively were given to the following acceptance points for this purpose:

  • Post office (V) 5300 Bonn 1 (city center)
  • Post office Bonn 2 (Bad Godesberg)
  • Post office Bonn 111 (Bundesbahnhof)
  • Post office (V) 5100 Aachen 1 (city center)
  • Post offices 5100 Aachen 13, 22 and 23 (city center)
  • Post office 5140 Erkelenz 1
  • Post office (V) 5130 Geilenkirchen 1 (city center)
  • Post office I 5130 Geilenkirchen 11 ( Teveren airfield )
  • Another delivery point was in the Federal Press House .

A chip system from Siemens and GAO was tested . The operational test in Bonn was ended on December 10, 1986, as a nationwide test began on December 16 of the same year. The field test was continued in Aachen until 1989. There were at least eight different cards.

Goslar

On October 23, 1984, another use of card phones began in the Goslar area in the Harz region. 30 card phones for cards with magnetic tracks were tested. The value was stored magnetically in the functional part of the white and orange phone card. Telephone cards with 40 and 80 units at a price of 12 or 24 DM were given to the following acceptance points for this purpose:

The test ended in April 1989. For example, one of the corresponding telephone boxes in Altenau was at the former wave pool. The magnetic stripe card system came from Autelca in Gümligen in Switzerland. There were five different cards.

Bamberg

On February 12, 1985, another use of card phones began in the city of Bamberg . There were 30 telephones for cards with magnetic track on a punch card system of Copytex tested. The value was stored magnetically in the functional part of the card made of cardboard paper. Telephone cards with 40 and 80 units at a price of 12 and 24 DM, respectively, were given to all post offices in Bamberg for this purpose. The test ended in early 1989. There were eight different cards.

ICE test cards

Between 1985 and 1988, special card telephones were installed in 1st class cars on the InterCityExperimental trains operated by the Deutsche Bundesbahn . The devices worked on a magnetic strip system with guide holes, similar to the system that was tested in Bamberg. The cards were also produced by Copytex and were given away or sold by train crews to passengers , mostly journalists , during representation and demonstration drives . There were three different denominations of 5, 10 and 50 DM. The later Intercity-Express series trains were equipped with the normal card phone, a special phone card for the trains was omitted and calls could be made with the normal phone card.

Nationwide operational trial and transition to regular operation

Field trial locations (1984–1989) and nationwide field trial (from 1986)
on the left in the picture a card phone in 1988 in Bonn

At the end of 1984, more than 60 domestic and international companies were asked to submit an offer for a card phone system. The card phone systems from Siemens and Telenorma were then used . After these two manufacturers had modified their technical concept so that the card phones of both systems could be operated with the cards, the way was clear for a nationwide operational test. 400 card phones were installed: 200 in 16 large cities with an intercity train station or an airport, and 200 in the greater Stuttgart area. The 16 cities included:

  1. Berlin ( Zoo station , Berlin Airport ( Tegel or Tempelhof ), city center)
  2. Bonn ( central station , city center)
  3. Bremen ( Hbf , Bremen Airport )
  4. Dortmund ( central station )
  5. Duisburg ( central station )
  6. Düsseldorf ( Hbf and Düsseldorf Airport )
  7. Essen ( central station )
  8. Frankfurt ( Hbf , Frankfurt am Main Airport , city center)
  9. Hamburg ( Hbf , Hamburg Airport )
  10. Hanover ( Hbf , Hanover Airport )
  11. Karlsruhe ( central station )
  12. Cologne ( Hbf , Cologne Airport )
  13. Mannheim ( central station )
  14. Munich ( Hbf , Munich Airport )
  15. Nuremberg ( Hbf , Nuremberg Airport )
  16. Saarbrücken ( central station )

On December 16, 1986, the card phones were officially opened to the public in Bremen. Both test systems already showed a similar, albeit simpler, system structure to the later series system. The operational test was designed in such a way that it provided information about the acceptance of the card phone among travelers and business people on the one hand and among a broad cross-section of the population on the other.

The telephone cards with credit at the price of 12 DM (40 units) or 50 DM (200 units) were sold at almost all post offices near the card telephone locations.

The short-term, around 10-year triumphant advance of the telephone card began. After 1.5 million cards were sold in 1986, six million of the 46.2 square centimeter (85.5 mm wide and 54 mm high) and 4.5 gram plastic cards were sold in the second year. By the beginning of August 1989 at the latest , additional card phones were put into operation in other cities, such as Mainz . There was a further boost with the monetary, economic and social union and the reunification in 1990, in the former GDR the payphones had to be converted to DM anyway. On this occasion, card phones could be installed straight away. By the end of 1993, more than a hundred million phone cards had been sold. In November 1998 the 500 millionth phone card was sold. Shortly thereafter, cell phones spread and phone card sales dropped massively.

Calling card categories

The Deutsche Bundespost Telekom and later the Deutsche Telekom AG divided the phone cards issued into different categories. The identification is on the edge of the card, followed by the date (month, year) of the issue and the number of copies:

Series designation Beginning of the series End of series description Number of cards
A. 1990 2003 Subscription phone cards could be obtained from the Deutsche Bundespost / Telekom shipping service from 1990 to 2003 and were the successors to the discontinued W card series. The cards only advertised for Telekom or for companies or events sponsored by Telekom. The A cards were sold with a surcharge until 1995, which was DM 10 until 1992, DM 4 until 1994 and DM 2 in 1995. From 1996 onwards no additional charge was required. The last card in this series was released in August 2003. 548
AD 1996 1999 Contact cards from Deutsche Telekom similar to A cards. On the AD maps from 1996 to 1999, no circulation volume is given because the production volume resulted from demand. There were only five cards in total in this series. The KD cards are the successors. 5
B. 1992 1993 Benefit phone cards were issued for a good cause in 1992 and 1993 with a surcharge of 3 DM. The recipients were sport aid, welfare, environmental protection and Unicef. A total of six cards with a circulation of 300,000 each have been published. 6th
C. 2000 2003 Collector cards, which were produced between 2000 and 2003, are characterized by the use of special card materials and other curiosities. The cards could only be purchased with a subscription of 25 DM or 12.50 euros. A total of 16 cards with an edition of 2000 copies each were published. There are cards made of wood , glass , paper , aluminum , sheet metal , ceramics , transparent plastic with tinsel , velvet , leather or silk as well as fluorescent , phosphorescent , punched and magnetic cards, one card with two modules and one that contains a CD . The first twelve cards were issued with modules, the others as calling cards . 16
E. 1991 2003 Edition editions of Deutsche Postreklame and later DeTeMedien. The motifs always related to the history of the Post. The circulation was at first 30,000 pieces, but finally decreased to 1,000 pieces. An annual edition consisted of four cards in a presentation pack. 52
K 199? 2000 Telephone cards with customer advertising (no counter sales). The distribution takes place through the advertising companies and sales through the collector service of Deutsche Postreklame GmbH, for this mostly 2000 cards more were produced. about 5,300
KD 2000 2002 Replaced the discontinued AD series in 2000. Customer thank you cards were intended as promotional gifts and were sold in individually configurable packaging. There is no print run on the cards in the series. The series was discontinued two years later with 16 cards. 16
M. 2000 2006 Merchandising cards were together ( "exclusive, collectable") with products (eg. As purse ) sold, marketed by the manufacturer or issued on special occasions (eg. As the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the calling card). 37
O 1992 ... Like K-cards, but not sold by the postal advertising collector's service. The minimum order was 500 pieces. Around 14,200 different cards appeared. about 14,200
O (MiniMedia cards) ... ... Later the O-Karten were supplemented by the MiniMedia-Karten, which appeared in smaller editions (at least 20 pieces). Companies that commissioned cards could only design the reverse side. Up to 22 motifs specified by Deutsche Telekom were available for the front. about 4,000
P 1986 ... Telephone cards with self-promotion by the Post . At the beginning, the editions were between 5,000 and 50,000 pieces. In the mid-1990s, the minimum circulation was 500,000. P cards are available at the post office counter at the regular selling price and could also be obtained from the collector's service. 381
PD 1992 ... These are P-cards with permanent motifs , which appear in an edition of at least 500,000 and are reproduced during the year as required. PD cards are available at the post office counter at the regular selling price and can also be obtained from the collector's service. 127
R. 1995 2001 External advertising for regional cards . The distribution took place after the Nielsen area . 70
S. 1988 2003 Telephone cards with third-party advertising for sale at the counter or via the collector's service were available from 1988 to 2003. By the end of 1994, the client could determine whether the card was only sold regionally or nationwide. From 1995 there was only nationwide distribution. 295
TKC 2008 ... The Comfort telephone card has been issued since 2008. It has both a telephone card module and a scratch-off panel, so that use is not limited to card phones or public phones. ?
V 1990 1991 Were used by Telekom as VIP gifts . They were used by Telekom to contact preferred people and as business cards for company executives. The number of copies was between 1,000 and 20,000 copies. Many of the 38 different cards were issued in special packaging. 38
W. 1987 1989 Advertising cards as contact information for the post office (no counter sales), which were intended to familiarize a broad public with the use of card phones, were available from 1987. The first eleven copies had no serial number, and the numbering did not start until mid-1988. Completed at the end of 1989 and a total of 31 card motifs. It is considered to be the forerunner of the A series. 31
X 1988 1999 Telephone cards with self-promotion of the postal advertising, later DeTeMedien. Between 1988 and 1999 three motifs were published annually in editions between 500 and 6060 pieces. 35
* - or N cards 1989 1992 * Cards ( Michel catalog designation: N cards for name cards ), were used as private business cards and are not numbered. The business card series started in November 1989 and was discontinued in May 1992 after 80 main themes. Some motifs correspond to those from other phone card series and in some cases only differ in the signature. 80
Prepaid refund cards 2003 ... At T-Punkt stores and at Deutsche Telekom CardService GmbH, the option has been created to exchange invalid phone cards with remaining credit for valid cards. The reimbursement card preloaded with DM 50 or EUR 20 was reduced to the amount of the remaining credit submitted. These have been integrated into the PD series since 2003. A ruling by the Cologne Higher Regional Court in 2009 confirmed the restitution of credit balance on telephone cards from DM times to Telekom customers. Telekom has created a corresponding form for this. ?

  • Telephone card A (1991). With advertising for the ROLAND project (implementation of open communication systems based on recognized European standards and the implementation of harmonized test procedures by Deutsche Bundespost Telekom)

  • Telephone card O (1994)

  • Phonecard P (1993)

  • Credit reimbursement card PD telephone card (2006) as a reimbursement card : Remaining credit on the telephone card - credited to this card in EURO. Remaining credit can be transferred to a new card.

Card manufacturer

The phone cards are produced by different manufacturers.

  • Giesecke & Devrient (G&D) was active until the beginning of 2000 and had the manufacturer's code number 1 , which corresponded to the first digit of the control number that every telephone card has.
  • Oldenbourg Datensysteme (ODS) was taken over by Gemplus in 2000 (manufacturer code number 2 )
  • Gemalto was created in 2006 through the merger of Gemplus and Axalto. Telephone cards bear the manufacturer's number 3 (production facility in Filderstadt ) or 6 (Gémenos in France)
  • Solaic , worked until the beginning of 2001 (manufacturer code 4 )
  • Uniqa-Kartensysteme GmbH , took over the organization in 1994 (manufacturer code 5 )
  • Orga , manufacturer number 0 and after the takeover by Uniqa-Kartensysteme GmbH in August 1994 the 5th
  • GHP has been active since November 2002, (manufacturer code 6 )
  • Schlumberger , has so far only produced one card for Germany with the manufacturer ID 7

Purchase options

Deutsche Telekom phone cards can be bought in Germany from the post office , from Telekom or in kiosks and supermarkets. There are cards with different values. As a rule, the purchase price corresponds to the credit. If you make a call on a public telephone , the amount stored on the card is read and the credit used is deducted.

Collector's item

As early as 1990 collectors discovered the telephone card, in 1992 there were already over 200,000 collectors in Germany. Telekom therefore introduced a collection service for purchasing phone cards. The Telekom shipping service in Nuremberg was responsible for the A, P and S cards and Deutsche Postreklame GmbH in Frankfurt am Main for the E, K and X cards, which was renamed DeTeMedien in 1994.

Many collectors not only include a single copy of a card in their collection, but look for variants with different control number types, print data or modules. Modules were initially referred to as “chips” , although only the contact area is visible.

In addition to a wide variety of motifs , there were also copies of the Collectors series made of paper, metal, glass or wood. All of these cards are fully functional and should arouse particular interest among collectors. The actual collector's market collapsed in the mid-1990s, not least because the market was flooded with new issues. The main reason for the collapse of the collector's market was the expiration date of the phone cards after 3 years from manufacture. Since only full phone cards had a high collector's value, many collectors suffered high losses in value. With judgment 115 C 1/09 of the Bonn District Court of February 8, 2010, Telekom has to reimburse phone cards that do not have an expiry date from DM times.

As for postage stamps , there are collectors' fairs, magazines and collective value catalogs (e.g. the MICHEL and Sherlock catalogs and the DeTe catalog).

manipulation

While the chip phone card was still considered secure when it was introduced at the end of the 1980s, in 1992 pupils (including Katrin Ellermann ) presented a way to make free phone calls with phone cards as part of a project at Jugend forscht . In 1993 the first manipulated cards with which one could make free phone calls were discovered (see also phreaking ).

German Democratic Republic

In the GDR there were no card phones and therefore no phone cards were issued. A green card with a magnetic stripe is in circulation, but it is a fake.

literature

  • Official Journal of the Federal Minister for Post and Telecommunications, ISSN  0003-2263
    • Born 1983, Bonn, May 26, 1983, no.73; Order 405/1983: public telephones; Operational test with public card phones in Frankfurt am Main ; P. 854
    • Born in 1984, Bonn, September 17, 1984, No. 111; Order 762/1984: public telephones; Use of public card phones in the city of Bonn and in the Aachen area ; P. 1215
    • Born in 1984, Bonn, September 17, 1984, No. 111; Order 763/1984: public telephones; Use of public card phones in the Goslar / Harz area ; Pp. 1215-1216
    • Born 1985, Bonn, January 28, 1985, No. 15; Order 81/1985: public telephones; Use of public card phones in Bamberg ; P. 214
    • Born 1986, Bonn, December 11, 1986, No. 168; Order 1015/1986: public telephones; Operating trial with public card phones for phone cards with credit and booking cards ; P. 2471
  • Official journal: Official notifications of the Deutsche Bundespost TELEKOM
    • Born in 1991 from June 7, 1991, No. 18; Order 250/1991: General Terms and Conditions of the Deutsche Bundespost TELEKOM ; P. 433
    • Annex 28 available 250/1991: Conditions for the telecard for the use of public card phones (telekarte ÖKart) ; Pp. 481-482
  • Post from the post. Ed .: Federal Ministry for the Post and Telecommunications, press department.
    • Year 28, No. 6/82, Bonn, October 21, 1982: Telephoning with a card - a new postal service ; Sheet 2–3
  • Mail book guidebook for customers; 1988 edition; Ed .: Federal Ministry for Post and Telecommunications, PTZ ; P. 324
  • Archive for the postal and telecommunications system (journal for legal, administrative and transport science of the Deutsche Bundespost); Published by the Telekom General Directorate for the Deutsche Bundespost
    • 42nd year, No. 3/90, August 1990, Reinhard Westphal: The card telephone system of the Deutsche Bundespost Telekom ; Pp. 253-264
  • Journal for Post and Telecommunications (ZPT)
    • Issue 6/1990 from June 26, 1990
    • Issue 4/1990: Johannes Kaufmann: Telephone cards: Popular advertising media and collectibles ; Pp. 14-21
  • Karin Schultz and Norbert Walter: The telephone card - communication and service, in: Deutsche Telekom class sheets The specialist journal of Deutsche Telekom for training and further education, Volume 51, 2/1998, p. 70 ff.
  • Karsten Windfelder: Specialized catalog for PrepaidCards 2002 . DeTeCardService GmbH, Nuremberg 2001, ISBN 3-9808043-0-5
  • Michel catalogs , Schwaneberger Verlag, Unterschleißheim:
  • Sherlock telephone card catalog, V2004.1, Wolfgang Zimmer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2004
  • Franz Kalckhoff : The telegraph brands and telephone certificates of the German Reich. without year

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Federal Office of Justice: Section 807 bearer cards and brands. In: Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch (BGB). Federal Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection, accessed on May 1, 2019 .
  2. ↑ MICHEL postal stationery catalog Germany; 1999; Pp. 9 and 166
  3. ↑ MICHEL postal stationery catalog Germany; 1999; P. 9 and 47
  4. ↑ MICHEL postal stationery catalog Germany; 1999; P. 9
  5. ↑ "Telephoning with a card - a new postal service"; page 2
  6. ↑ "Telephoning with a card - a new postal service"; Sheet 3
  7. ↑ Vfg. ​​405/1983: Public telephones; Operating trial with public card phones in Frankfurt am Main (Amtsbl. 73, May 26, 1983, p. 854)
  8. ↑ MICHEL telephone card catalog Germany 2005; Pp. 20-21
  9. ↑ Const .: 762/1984: Payphones; Use of public card phones in the city of Bonn and in the Aachen area. P. 1215
  10. ↑ MICHEL telephone card catalog Germany 2005; Pp. 22-23
  11. ↑ Vfg. ​​763/1984: Public telephones; Use of public card phones in the Goslar / Harz area ; Pp. 1215-1216
  12. ↑ MICHEL telephone card catalog Germany 2005; P. 24
  13. ↑ Const .: 81/1985 Payphones; Use of public card phones in (sic!) Bamberg. P. 214
  14. ↑ MICHEL telephone card catalog Germany 2005; Pp. 25-26
  15. ↑ MICHEL telephone card catalog Germany 2005; P. 27
  16. ^ Reinhard Westphal: The card telephone system of the Deutsche Bundespost TELEKOM; P. 255
  17. ↑ Vfg .: 1015/1986; P. 2471
  18. ^ Reinhard Westphal: The card telephone system of the Deutsche Bundespost TELEKOM; P. 255
  19. ^ First card phone in Mainz ; Mainzer Wochenblatt, No. 26 of August 10, 1989
  20. ↑ Multicard '94: Plastic card in 2000 as a means of payment on Computerwoche from April 1, 1994
  21. ↑ http://www.telesammler.de/katalog.html (accessed on September 7, 2014)
  22. ↑ http://www.telesammler.de/katalog.html (accessed on September 7, 2014)
  23. ↑ Information from Deutsche Telekom AG on the comfort phone card ( memento of the original from September 6, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / mwl.telekom.de
  24. ↑ Telekom is defeated in the dispute over the remaining credit of old phone cards on heise online from June 3, 2009 18:01
  25. ↑ Exchange form for telephone cards PDF file
  26. ↑ West Germans have discovered a new collector's item: phone cards. The hobby is booming, the plastic pieces promise higher profits than stocks. in DER SPIEGEL issue 19/1990 of May 7, 1990
  27. ↑ Thank you letters are on their way - the Republicans would like to dedicate a telephone card to Franz Schönhuber - if necessary by a court order in DER SPIEGEL issue 52/1992 of December 21, 1992.
  28. ↑ Telephone cards: once in great demand, today slackers - the headquarters for the Telekom product are in Nuremberg by Hartmut Voigt in Nürnberger Nachrichten of April 17, 2013
  29. ↑ AG Bonn condemns Telekom to repay remaining credit on blocked phone cards and judgment of AG Bonn as a PDF file on meilicke-hoffmann.de (lawyers) from February 8, 2010
  30. ↑ AG Bonn: Telekom has to refund credit from phone cards that are around 20 years old to damm-legal.de (lawyers) from February 22, 2010
  31. ↑ Young people research as a prelude to a successful academic career. Stiftung Jugend forscht e. V., April 2008, accessed November 20, 2013 .
  32. ↑ Card tricks - reading out phone cards with the PC by Peter Laackmann and Marcus Janke in c't issue 9/1993
  33. ↑ The Zinker chip card terminal with serial connection by Carsten Meyer in c't issue 12/94
  34. ^ Plagiarism - card from the cold in DER SPIEGEL , issue 22/1995 of May 29, 1995, p. 136

Web links

Commons : Telephone card  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

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