ZEIT ONLINE Reviews 

Respectable newspaper resorting to scamming

They will auto renew you and then continue to charge you. Absolute scammers, do not sign up.

Similar experience to most, from what I have beem reading. As German is not my first language, I feel disadvantaged about my experience signing up to Die Zeit, purely intended to help me improve my German. They were not clear about the cost when I did sign up, and tried to take an amount which was not disclosed during the registration process. I have e-mailed a few times, and do intend to seek assistance from a translator if this is not resolved. I am surprised a German company would behave like this. Will not consider using them again.

They advertise as 'can be canceled monthly at any time', show weekly prices, and then charge for entire year. Scam.

I had subscribed for the 1€ trial wich i forgot about, and got billed today for 158,60€

Didn't see it coming, so congrats on the scam, it's an old trick but wouldn't think it would come from a journal..

Ich habe am 15.04.2026 ein Probeabo für „DIE ZEIT“ abgeschlossen (5 Wochen für 1 €).
Am 13.05.2026 habe ich das Abonnement innerhalb der Probezeit gekündigt und sofort eine automatische Eingangsbestätigung erhalten. In der E-Mail stand jedoch nur, dass die Kündigung noch von einem Mitarbeiter bearbeitet werden müsse und ich später eine endgültige Bestätigung erhalten würde.
Trotz der fristgerechten Kündigung wurden am 25.05.2026 trotzdem 158,60 €!! von meinem Konto abgebucht. Zu diesem Zeitpunkt hatte ich immer noch keine klare Bestätigung erhalten, dass das Abonnement tatsächlich beendet wurde. Sobald ich die Abbuchung bemerkt habe (Sonntag, 24. Mai), begann ich, E-Mails an den Kundenservice zu schicken.
Mal sehen, wie viele ich noch senden muss, bevor tatsächlich ein echter Mitarbeiter antwortet. Bisher habe ich nach drei E-Mails ausschließlich automatische Antworten erhalten, in denen man mir mitteilt, dass meine Kündigung eingegangen sei und aktuell „deutlich mehr Anfragen als gewöhnlich“ bearbeitet werden müssten. Kein Wunder!

Ich habe sogar versucht, die Telefonnummer für Kunden außerhalb Deutschlands anzurufen (ich bin Italienerin und spreche nur grundlegendes Deutsch — so entschlossen bin ich mittlerweile, dieses Problem zu lösen), aber die Anrufe gehen nicht einmal durch.

Übrigens: Nachdem am Montag bereits 158,60 € abgebucht wurden, kamen am Morgen des 26. Mai auch noch zusätzliche 0,40-€-Abbuchungen dazu.
Jetzt bin ich gespannt, wie lange ich warten muss, bis mir tatsächlich jemand antwortet und das Geld zurückerstattet.
Ich werde Updates posten, denn langsam ist die ganze Situation einfach nur noch absurd.

1. Update: Heute, am 27. Mai, habe ich endlich eine Bestätigungs-E-Mail erhalten, in der die Kündigung des Abonnements bestätigt wird. Außerdem teilen sie mir mit, dass sie das abgebuchte Geld zurückerstatten werden. Der interessante Teil daran? Sie wollen lediglich 134,20 € !! zurückzahlen. Und was ist mit den restlichen 24,40 €?? Jetzt bleibt nur noch abzuwarten, wie lange ich auf den vollständigen Betrag warten muss.

I subscribed to a trial offer for “DIE ZEIT” on April 15, 2026 (5 weeks for €1). On May 13, 2026, I cancelled the subscription within the trial period and immediately received an automatic acknowledgment email confirming receipt of my cancellation request. However, the email only stated that the cancellation would still need to be processed by a staff member and that a final confirmation would be sent later. Despite cancelling within the trial period, money was still withdrawn from my bank account on May 25, 2026 (158,60 EURO!!). At that point, I had still not received a clear confirmation that the subscription had been terminated.As soon as I noticed the charge (Sunday, May 24), I started sending emails to customer support. Let’s see how many I’ll have to send before an actual human being replies. So far, after three emails, I have only received automatic responses saying that they acknowledge my cancellation and that they are currently receiving “significantly more inquiries than usual,” so processing may take longer. No wonder!
I even tried calling the customer service number for customers outside Germany (I’m Italian and only speak very basic German — that’s how determined I am to solve this situation), but the calls do not even go through.
And just to make the situation even better: after withdrawing €158.60 on Monday, they also charged me an additional €0.40 this morning May 26.

Now I’m curious to see how long it will take before someone finally answers and refunds the money.
I’ll keep posting updates, because at this point the whole situation is honestly becoming absurd.

1. Update: Today, May 27th, I finally received a confirmation email stating that my subscription has been cancelled and that they will refund the money they withdrew. The ironic part? They’re only refunding €134.20!! What about the remaining €24.40?? Now let’s see how long I’ll have to wait to get the rest back.

I signed up and had a runing tap - when my visa empired i tried to stop the deal. My iPad was somehow to old - i could not open the articles anymore. I had a fine and paid and tried to stop the abb… ended up using almost a year and a half on trying tomter out af the deal. Called but no help until I paid what I was due. Don’t ever start a abb

SCAM!

if you fall into their free-trial trap, just call the customer-service and go to first option (as if you are a customer to them)
then threat them!

I cannot believe how huge of a scam this is. I am yet another person arbitrarily charged with an insane sum for a service I did not use. They are a disgrace to online services, digital newspapers, and German companies. I am permanently moving away from them, there are so many better options anyway. I strongly suggest you do the same.

Warnung Betrug! Ich hatte genau das gleiche Problem wie alle anderen auch. Ich habe ein Probeabonnement abgeschlossen, weil ich dachte, ich würde nichts/fast nichts bezahlen, bis sie ohne Vorwarnung immer wieder ihre Zeitungen schicken und am Ende eine exorbitante Rechnung präsentieren.

Wie ist so eine Situation im Jahr 2024 in Deutschland möglich?

Die Lösung, um aus dieser Situation herauszukommen? Bezahlen Sie die Zeitungen, die angekommen sind, verweigern Sie die Gesamtrechnung und drohen Sie mit einem Anwalt. Sofort hören sie auf, dein Geld zu stehlen.

Nie wieder.

__________________________________________

Warning SCAM! I had the same problem as everyone else. I signed up for a trial subscription thinking I would pay nothing/almost nothing until they kept sending their newspapers without warning and ended up presenting an exorbitant bill.

How is such a situation possible in Germany in 2024?

The solution to get out of this situation? Pay the newspapers that have arrived, refuse to pay the total bill, and threaten to contact a lawyer. Immediately they'll stop stealing your money.

Never again.

Never take their silly offers only for EUR1. They only send threatening mails with late layment due by hardcopy thereafter!!! Warning, don't subscribe to any of their offers, or else you will just get emails and added fees for late payment, non-stop. This newspaper is not serious and only there to make money by pushing people to pay bills which are unfair. Good luck cancelling any subscription!

Do not fall for the free trial scam; you will end up on a quest to figure out how to cancel the subscription. While it may appear promising initially, the content is below average, one-sided, and overly opinionated. Be cautious and sceptical before signing up for such offers.

I was charged 70 euros without my knowledge after requesting ONE free trial of Deutsch Perfekt!!! They even sent me an invoice at home, it really sucks! I still ask for clarification today.I want my money back! Never do that!!!

Terrible service. I was unaware that a free subscription was going to turn into an invoice of 140euro without notice. And I did unsubscribe from my googlepay service but apparently isn't enough. They don't reply to emails asking to cancel the abonament, after 7 days.

Thanks to the reviews here, I managed to avoid the €1 trap - when you first click on the button to test the digital abo for 4 weeks for €1, it says "jederzeit kündbar" so you think, okay, I can read this article online for €1 and then cancel. If you read the small print on the next page of the registration and payment process, you find out you can only cancel the digital part - you are actually signing up for a minimum of 6 months of the printed newspaper for €5.60 per week (payment semi-annual) which includes the digital paper. SUPER misleading - glad I checked here first. I wish you could just pay individually for articles that you want to read, occasionally.

Awful service! They tricked my mum into a subscription and made it extremely difficult to cancel. Would never get a subscription with them again. Extremely unfriendly as well!

I was only lucky that I didn't have anything on my card when they tried to withdraw 150 euros (???) after the trial ended without any warning. Obviously, the first thing I did was trying to cancel, but you have to make a phone call or write a goddamn email! Would never have thought that such a popular newspaper would be such a scam. Shame on them. Never subscribe

Beim nächsten Mal bitte ein bissl langsamer. Ich möchte nicht in die Oberstufe. Danke.
Sincerely, a desperate student.

This is a dishonest company that deserves 0 stars.

Like many others, I fell into a free subscription trial trap. What they don't tell you is:
• they won't tell you when the subscription is up, nor do they tell you automatic continuation will happen, and, if you choose "Rechnung" (Bill) when signing up, the ridiculous fees add up. Their fees per week vary wildly, some offer a free trial, others offer $1 per week for 4 weeks, then €5.60 or another fee, per week, then somehow, even though it's only 3 months, I got a bill for over €250!
• when you continue, unwittingly, to subscribe, you keep getting charged for it
• the subscription is too easy to sign up for, but very hard to cancel! Signing up does not require anything other than your name, an email address, physical address and doesn't even require you to click on a link to confirm your subscription! Therefore it is super easy to sign anyone up without them knowing or permission, and ultimately they may be required to pay! I just successfully signed up 2 Der Zeit staff to their own free trial for 4 weeks, one with their own email address and the other with a disposable email address and it didn't require confirmation. This probably goes against German GDPR rules!
• I was charged over €250 for a crappy online newsletter for less than 3 months - the most expensive newspaper ever or what! When I complained, they instantly reduced the fee to about €150 and offered me to pay in installments. No thanks, I refuse to pay a cent.
• got another letter demanding payment PLUS extra to cover their debt collection efforts.
• If you want to raise a dispute, check their Impressum, they say they are not obligated to participate in dispute resolution so they have covered all their asses: they will trick you to get in then deny all responsibility afterwards:
(Translated to English:)
"According to § 36 VSBG we would like to point out that we are not obliged to participate in a dispute settlement procedure before a consumer arbitration board and do not participate in a dispute settlement procedure before a consumer arbitration board."
STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY! If you already are a victim, we should band together and refuse to pay them! Sign up their own staff and see how they like it when they notice the misleading ease of signing up but difficulty in cancelling!

People are forced into Abos without prior notice. On my question when did I sign a contract the lady on the phone said I did not and that it is not necessary.
In case people do not notice that, they just receive a large bill after a while and of course not right after the first payable edition.
The practices they use so as to gain readers are unacceptable therefore the press itself is not to rely on.

How dare you waste my time with your popups and begging for money...
Legit any other site is superior to that one.