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Zurich Going Out, Zurich Living, Zurich Money, Zurich Travel

A Guide To Mobility Car Sharing

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One of the things people mention first when talking about the benefits of living in Zurich and Switzerland is the transport system.No doubt, being able to plan a journey and have no fears as to the accuracy of the information makes getting around much less stressful and the all-important reliability is a blessing. Not to mention making it easier to stick to appointments.But sometimes a car is necessary and on those occasions we have possibly the best Car Sharing system in the world – Mobility.This article is intended to serve as a comprehensive guide to using the Mobility system in Switzerland.

How It Works

It all starts at the Mobility website – http://mobility.ch/ Mobility has locations (stations) across Switzerland. Usually located by rail stations and city centres, there are over 1,700 vehicles available from 140 towns and cities. Each station has its own vehicles. This is an extremely important point. You cannot pick up a car in, say, Luzern, and drop it off in Zurich. If you pick up a Mobility car from one Mobility station, it can only be returned to that station. If anything this is the only restriction (apart from cost) but of course, it makes perfect sense otherwise you would have dozens of cars being dumped in city centers and nothing in more remote locations. So, having found the station you want to rent from, you pick your vehicle from one of the ten categories available, which range from small electric vehicles to full-blown Mercedes vans. If you need a specific type of vehicle, say a cabriolet, you can search for a vehicle on the site and see where the nearest one is located. If you want a fairly standard vehicle choice, you can most likely find it at your nearest station. As for the cars themselves, Mobility favours Renault, which are producing some very nice cars indeed. But you can also get BMW, Honda and Skoda cars. Note that the Combi is an estate car. With your station and vehicle selected, you book the car for the period of time required and away you go. You can get confirmation of your booking by email, SMS or via the smart phone apps. For the final step of actually getting in and driving away, you need a Mobility card which you get as a result of a Mobility membership. You can use Mobility without a subscription but more of that later. When you go to your vehicle at the time of your booking, you touch the windscreen where the reader is located inside the vehicle and the doors open. Keys are left in the glove box unless the car selected uses an electronic key. There is a display unit above the windscreen that shows you the detail of your reservation. You can use this unit to extend your reservation if available, or end it early. 

You can also call the Mobility center via the unit.

Once you have returned to the original station before the end of your reservation, you end the reservation from the unit above your head, leave the car and lock it again with your Mobility card up against the windscreen reader.

Regarding petrol, the cost of this is included in your hire cost but it is your responsibility to ensure that the car does not run dry. If you need (or want) to fill up, there is a fuel card inserted into the on board computer from one of the major fuel retailers so as long as you use the correct retailer, you will not have to pay.

If the card is missing or the particular retailer is not available you can still buy fuel and get the cost refunded from Mobility as long as you send them the receipt.

There is a FairPlay rule at Mobility that states that you should leave the vehicle at the station with at least one third of the tank full.

Costs

Rates for using Mobility vary based on your subscription but basically the rental cost you will pay consists of:

  • the hourly rate
  • the per km rate

So the lowest-priced rental would be a short term one with low distance traveled. Full rate information is available here.The Mobility website is very conscious that the system is right for you so it offers a cost calculator where you can select a vehicle, rental duration and estimated distance to see what the cost is likely to be. For longer rentals they will also show the cost of hiring a car from one of the rental partners.

Membership Types

An Annual Subscription currently costs 290CHF but a 100CHF discount is available if you have a Half Card or General Abonnement. If you hold an annual pass for one of the regional transport companies (eg the ZVV in Zurich) then you can get an annual subscription for just 25CHF. Interestingly, a Trial Subscription of four months is available for 70CHF or 40CHF if you have a Migros Cumulus card. For all subscriptions you must provide a copy of your driving licence.

Using Mobility Without A Subscription

nIf you are willing to limit your choice of Mobility stations to SBB rail stations, you can use Click & Drive. Here, you can reserve a vehicle at an SBB station, collect the Mobility card from the ticket office and pay for the rental by credit card. No need for a subscription and ideal for those who will use Mobility a couple of times per year.

Conclusion

\r\nAlong with the SBB service, Mobility is one of the first things I like to brag about when I talk about living in Switzerland. The process of walking up to a car you have reserved, holding your wallet up to the windscreen and then getting into the vehicle feels like the stuff of magic. The service center is also very good. Just before a recent rental I got a call to say that the passenger door of the car I had reserved was stuck and that they had switched my reservation to another nearby station. As I was driving alone the door was not a problem so they just switched it back.You must bear in mind the limitation of having to bring the car back to its “home” station and also keep an eye on cost. Renting a cabrio for a day to drive 500km is going to cost you a lot of money. Conversely, I rented a combi (estate) to carry some furniture around Zurich for a couple of hours and it cost me 13CHF. From the cost perspective, make use of the Cost Comparison Tool. strongly recommend the Mobility system, you only need to see how many of the bright red Renault Combis are parked at Ikea on Saturdays to see the benefit!

Zurich Going Out, Zurich Kids, Zurich Living, Zurich Money, Zurich Travel

Cheap Train Tickets In Switzerland

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As someone who has just arrived to Zurich I have not yet purchased a “half price” train card or a “GA” reduction card. Especially since the cost of using public transport encourages me to cycle as much as possible. This however has its drawbacks and the exorbitant costs of full price train tickets becomes painfully clear when you try to book an intercity train.

Paying anywhere in the region of 6-60 Swiss francs for a one way ticket is not the ideal situation for someone on a budget. However there is hope for people here visiting or just without a card, as the National Swiss train company the SBB are currently running a “Supersaver” ticket scheme. This scheme allows you to book tickets on line at a much cheaper price than buying them at the train station.

Supersaver Tickets can be a whopping 60% cheaper than the regular fare, making them even cheaper than what you would pay with the half price card. The supersaver tickets are also available for half price card holders, but here the reduction is only a few swiss francs.

The catch. Obviously this is not just a cheap ticket free for all, and there are only a certain amount of cheap tickets available per route. Also the tickets are not usually available for more popular travelling times. The most important point to note these tickets are only available until the 20th of February 2012.

While the scheme is limited until the 20th of February it has been popular before and this is the 4th time these types of tickets have been available, so hopefully they will relaunch the scheme again after February or even make it permanent.

A couple of quick tips on Supersaver tickets.

 

    • the ticket is only valid for the train you booked so don’t try and change it after

 

    • you can only book the ticket a maximum of 14 days in advance

 

    • print your ticket at home. you can not print them at the train station and they do not accept smart phone screen shots

 

    • be flexible as the availability of tickets can sometimes be limited

 

    • make sure you type in Zürich correctly with the “ü”. The search wont recognise the city with out it.

 

However on one of my journeys the first train was delayed and as a result I missed my connection. Worried about receiving a fine I went to the ticket office and the clerk stamped and signed my original ticket making it valid for the next train. Remember though I missed the connection because the train was late, not me.

Another point to note about buying tickets at the train station is that recently they have added a 10CHF charge for this service. Kinda of like a tax for the non computer savvy. But I suppose there is a point to this concept and the SBB could only be considered to be falling in line with cost reduction policy’s that certain airlines have been pioneering for quite some time.

So if you are planning on travelling around Switzerland and need to book a train do it on line and print it at home.

Cecily

Featured, Get Started, Zurich Going Out, Zurich Kids, Zurich Living, Zurich Money, Zurich Travel

Traveling With The SBB

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In December 2009 the SBB and Trenitalia decided to end the Cisalpino train service, a joint venture between the two national railways. Naturally when such things happen allegations flew. The SBB claimed that the consistent late trains coming from Milan was one of the main reasons. Trenitalia also made claims, but anyone who has travelled to Italy or even wanted to come back from Ticino has experienced that more often than not it is the trains coming from Italy that are running late and causing delays elsewhere in Switzerland.Traveling back from Lucerne the other day, I was witness to something that would have played out much differently in Italy. Many might find the following incident tragic others as quite funny. For the sake of the protagonist, I hope that he will look back in five years and laugh.I was on a class trip with students all around 15 years of age. Having boarded the train we patiently waited for the train to depart. Outside the train was a man with two monsters for suitcases with a little twitch in his hand and a bead of sweat rolling down his face. Then the rail attendant made the last call to board the train. In a panic the man tossed his two suitcases onto the train and followed rescuing his foot from a closing door in true Indiana Jones style. Seconds later the train rolled into motion and a look of fear struck the man’s face. Quickly he ran to the window where I was sitting and frantically tried to open the locked window. The other teacher and I looked at each other and wondered what was going on.The rail attendant seeing the panic-stricken man running around the train tried to explain that she had given the final call and announced that the man had to either be on the train or off the train, but that the train was departing. Furthermore, once the train is in motion it will not stop until it reached the next destination. The man with an Italian accented Swiss-German then explained that his wife was still on the platform. Adding to the problem of leaving his wife behind, was the fact that neither of them had mobile phones on them. After twenty some minutes on the train the man deboarded the train in Zug after apologising for his frantic behaviour.This little story illustrates a fine point about Switzerland. In fact it is one of the paradoxes of this tiny country, especially for Expats: Ask most Expats to list three things that they like or even love about Switzerland and the rail service will surely be listed. “It’s efficient and punctual” is a praise often quoted by Expats from the UK and Ireland, whereas most Americans and Canadians are simply amazed that trains can transport more than goods. However, these are the same people who find it terrible and cold hearted of the SBB to give such little regard to travellers racing down the platform with a suitcase trailing behind them trying to make the train as the last call is announced and the little green light encircling the open button disappears for the last time and the doors shut leaving that poor traveller to wait for the next train.Cold and heartless would be one explanation. Mechanical and calculated another. Much can be said about Switzerland by looking at the rail system. The reason the trains are on time and why a 10 minute delay is front page news is because it has been calculated. If the train waited an extra 30 seconds at every station it would gradually delay itself more and more. Other trains would then need to wait for passengers needing to make connections and the entire system would descend into chaos like in Italy, where one travelling by train can merely hope that there will not be a strike and that the train will arrive that day.While disorder and unpunctuality are frowned upon in Switzerland, so are limitations to mobility and personal freedoms. Therefore, most longer routes are travelled once an hour and many of the in-between-stops can be reached by taking another train. The other thing that makes train travel so convenient in Switzerland is that it is a “one ticket all trains service”; unlike travelling with the Deutsche Bahn where ICE trains cost more than regional trains.The best tip for travelling with the train in Switzerland is to give yourself a few extra minutes to get to the station. If you’re on time, you should not miss your train.If you’re travelling by train around Switzerland here are a few tips: Frequent travellers of longer distances or people who simply love sitting in trains should get a GA (Generalabonnement). This is a card that gives you unlimited travel in Switzerland for the year for 3100.00 CHF or 285.00 CHF/Month in second class. Less frequent travelers should at least get a Halbtax that gets you 50% off the price of all tickets for train and bus. The cost for this is 150.00 CHF for a year.Both will save you money. As a reference a one-way ticket Zurich to Bern at a normal price is 46.00 CHF.Have visitors coming to Switzerland? Tell them to get a Swiss Card for the time they are here to save money and hassle when travelling. There are different time frames from a few days to a month. Are you on facebook? You can become a fan of the SBB and see their Sparbillette programme and see all the latest ticket specials. For iPhone users the SBB Mobile App is great and allows you to check your connections anytime anywhere. German – English Vocabulary for train travel: das Gleis = track der Zug = train die SBB = Schweizerische Bundesbahn (Swiss Federal Railway) die Bahn = railway / rail der Fahrschein = ticket der Nachtzuschlag = addditional fee for night trains (after 1 am) die Verspätung = delay die Gleisänderung = change of track “Der Kluge reist im Zuge” = “The smart one travels with the train” (Written by Christian Langenegger, co-founder of Marathon Sprachen in Winterthur www.marathonlanguages.com)