When’s the last time you used the phone? Seriously, when’s the last time you couldn’t find a piece of information or do anything else online, and then resorted to calling up the other party and explaining your case? Can’t remember? Well, then you certainly don’t live in Germany.

We Germans, we love our phones. We love them to the point that you simply cannot get a home or even business internet plan without also getting their landline business. It’s just impossible. Even fiber, a 100% digital medium, still comes with at least one landline phone number.

And here’s something interesting: Did you know that you can agree to contracts over the phone? Yes, you can agree to actual, legally binding contracts using just the phone. And I think it’s a bad idea. To explain why, we’ll need to take a look at the German law.

Enter: The Fernabsatzregelung. It basically means that you can agree to contracts using most mediums but they give you the option to back out until 14 days after you agreed to it. This does not work for face-to-face agreements, though.

To reiterate:

I think this system is stupid. And I firmly believe that the only reason it is still around, is old people. In no particular order, here’s why I think the current system is a bad idea and should be revised:

It pushes companies to laziness. Here are some examples. Most companies, I’m using ISPs as a prime example because this is usually the thing that gets done over the phone, especially ISPs, will allow you to make the contract over the phone, but you can’t cancel over the phone. Suddenly, they want you to send a letter or an e-mail. I made an ISP contract for my apartment, online. They had some nice offers, an online bonus of 100€ and 70€ of router credit, and offered a 250 Mbit/s line. A couple of days later I get a text that my order was cancelled due to “technical reasons” and they’d appreciate if I phoned them up on the number of their sales line. I called them, gave them the order number and they explained to me that due to some limitations, I can only get a 100 Mbit/s line and that’s why they cancelled the order. Annoying, but no big deal. Then they gave me two options. Either I can make the contract right here on the phone and they’ll put it in as an express order, getting me online within 3 days. However, I’m losing the 100€ online bonus. Ooor I could just make the 100 Mbit/s contract online, leaving me without internet service for around 2 weeks until they get it done. Well, needless to say I missed out on the 100€ online bonus and made sure to get it over with ASAP. But, and now get this, how about, idk, giving the sales staff a tool that can generate a special order link for me, texting me that link, and allowing me to agree to the stuff online WHILE getting the online bonus? You can add a nice summary and all… get it? But nah, that’s way too progressive I guess.

It opens the doors to fraud. So the way these contracts are done, is the sales staff on the other end of the phone will inform you that they’re gonna start an audio recording and ask for your consent. If you consent, any serious company will run your personal data by you, the conditions of the contract, and then ask you to confirm by saying “yes”. Here’s what this will usually look like when transcribed:

Ok, I’m asking you for your consent to start the audio recording to complete your contract. If you have any questions please interrupt me. You can find information about the data processing of this voice call at example-isp.com/phone-gdpr. Do I have your consent to start the audio recording now?

Ok, I’m now starting the audio recording.
Mr. step-SysAdmin, you’re interested in the following contract:
Example ISP Ultra Fiber 5000 with the following conditions:
Unlimited data over fiber up to 1000 Mbit/s down and 500 Mbit/s up
Unlimited phone calls within Germany to German landlines and the Example ISP mobile carrier
We will start delivering the internet to you on $arbitrary_date

The monthly cost for this package will be 79,99€ including VAT plus a one-time fee of 100€ for the installation.

The installation address will be Example Street 1, 12345 Example City and your full name is Steppy step-SysAdmin

Do you agree to the terms and conditions outlined and would like to agree to this contract? If so, please say “yes” now

Ok, thank you, the audio recording is now over.

Got it? All you really need to do is say “yes” and your contract is done. Recording a call in Germany without explicit consent from both parties is highly illegal, it’s a felony level crime here. Not kidding. However, that doesn’t stop actual criminals from just recording calls anyway. Anyone will probably have gotten a robocall in their life, and if the bad guys get your phone number, chances are, they’ll also have other data from leaks or other sources. So, imagine being called by a number you don’t recognize at 7 in the morning, picking up the phone, and the person says “Hey am I speaking to step-SysAdmin?” - and most people would probably absent-mindedly say “yes”. Perfect, you’ve just fucked up. Nothing’s stopping them from cutting an audio file so it sounds like you agreed to their contract. After a month, an invoice rolls in for a contract you never agreed to. Good luck proving the opposite then. They do it with everything here - phone, electric, gas, mobile plans, and all other kinds of contracts.

It’s intransparent. Usually, with these deals, you won’t get the specifics of what you’re actually agreeing to. If it’s a really serious company (which most ISPs are) you’ll get a summary of what you’ve agreed to via e-mail. But sometimes, ya don’t. It’s still a massive hassle if the person promises something on the phone and then you get delivered something completely different. It happened to me that said ISP promised me an add-on for a combination home internet/mobile phone plan which would make it a little cheaper and give me double the data, and after the fact, I found out that they bullshitted me and my specific phone plan isn’t eligible for this discount. That kind of sucks, ngl. Sure, that can happen in store aswell, but then you know exactly who fucked up and can go back there to demand they make it right.

In conclusion, I can see some upsides of it, especially for elderly people that can’t go to a store and don’t have internet access, but for the rest of the general public, this is completely wild.