Europe's HIGHWAY STICKER SCAM Exposed (Honest Guide)
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- Опубликовано: 16 окт 2021
- To buy the vignette, please use the official website from the Czech state (so you don’t overpay) - edalnice.cz/#/validation
Beware of other websites offering it.
UPDATE: After publishing our video, things started to move and the Czech Department of Road & Motorway decided to terminate the contract with these "exchange-highway-sticker-offices"! We're really happy that visitors of the Czech Republic will once again have a safer experience! Thank you for your support!
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Honza Mikulka & Janek Rubeš, Prague based journalists
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NEW UPDATE: The company actually tried to sue us... So we decided to film a sequel. We also went to visit them - they closed the door and shut the lights. Watch it here: ruclips.net/video/9_JfUukoK4k/видео.html
LOL those scammers have no shame at all. XD
Lol they are a joke
Well done you :)
In Bulgaria they'll try and charge you in Euro instead of lev, ie double! They'll say '10 Euro' if you question it, no problem, 'did I say Euro, I meant lev'.
Great video guys 👍🏼
I'm sure those booths are owned by some brother-in-law of a high-ranking government official.
The woman responding "No, I can't hear you" is like someone asking you if you're asleep and you responding "Yes"
i know what you are trying to say ... i get it
but there is a lot of people who can answer in their sleep me my sister and my mother for example
@@Crushonius are you sleeping right now?
@@TheProfessorDave yes
@@TheProfessorDave yes this was written by a telepathic link with my german sheppard . and dont worry about it , it really was no bother as he was already on the computer trading
@@Crushonius 🤣🤣😂
I like how the lady on the phone was not able to hear you, except when you asked if she hears you, which she replied with "No, I don't."
found that to be the funniest part also. Mixing lies and jedi mind tricks lmao.
lol
That's cartoon level stuff. Lmao
She wasn't even trying.
if she had been trying, she would not just be saying "hello" all the time, she would wait a little bit after you talked, then say something like "I can hear you're saying something, but I can't hear what you're saying". Or "I heard that you said 'X Y Z', but I didn't catch the rest". Or things like this.
That is what usually happens when a phone connection breaks up.
When you ask “are you sleeping?” and they say “yes”
My family and I came across this exact spot at the Austrian/Czech border today. I had watched your video before coming from the US to the Czech Republic and couldn’t believe my eyes when I crossed the exact spot you filmed at. Thanks so much for your video as it saved me 5 Euro!
The fact that the kiosk is more visible and closer to the entry than the official sales point... makes me believe some official is also earning some bucks on the side :)
Well yes, because they are paying rent for the space
@@Dj992Music The rent doesn't go directly to any official, come on.. 🤦
No shot Sherlock
@@jaro6985 Yeah, no one ever gets kickbacks in form of service contracts, etc etc. Why do you think they put in so many traffic lights when they are not needed/less efficient than a roundabout? Yeah.. enough said. Western Government structures are amazingly corrupt but most joe bloggs don't get high enough up in the biz food chain to see it.
@@jaro6985 Jesus Sherlock what about a cut from the tickets
BIG UPDATE!!! After publishing this video, things started to move and the Departments of Highway & Roads decided to terminate the contract with these "exchange-highway-sticker-offices"! We're really happy that visitors of the Czech Republic will once again have a safer experience! Thank you for your support!
Janek & Honza
great job guys, keep it up! :D
That was fast.
Btw there is a typo in “Highway” in the title :)
been following your channel for a while and i really like your videos and what you do :) thank you.
@@BozZsh1fty they charge you 7 Euros for the extra letter H ;)
You guys are the real MVP!
Great job on exposing these scammers
When these sorts of things operate right under the noses of police and other officials it is pretty much just sending a strong message to international tourists "Please do not come to the Czech Republic"
Who goes there anyway lol
@@richlee509 anyone who wants to experience good life and feasts and feeling rich.
Definitely corrupt country
@@schryliam Nice cope
@@schryliam or “anyone who wants to be able to eat excessive amounts of food for a normal price” which is any other fucking country
I won't be surprised if they intentionally damaged that vignette vending machine
Yeah they need to be investigated and fined. The way it's displaying it looks like magnet damage.
@@CrimsonBlot did you not bother to read the pinned comment?
@@artful1967 NOPE. >:]
dude they shoot their money mule pf years in a forrest…so yeah
@@CrimsonBlot magnet damage?
im gonna say no
theres only 2 ways a magnet is gonna fuckup electronics
1 the screen
2 the storage
firstly option 1 the screen this hasnt been a thing since we ran fat big bungus crt monitors and even then all you do is bend and discolor the screen lcds dont have this issue
2 the magnet this isnt going to be something youll be able to do its almost a myth but not quiet yes magnets can fuckup hdds but the magnets you or i will have laying around would have to be almost rubbed rubbed directly on the platters to do anything which at that point you might as well press onto the write head and youd do more damage infact ironically the biggest killer of hdds back in the day wasnt magnets it was funniliy enough the degausing magnets of crts the same degausing magnets desighned to unfuck the screen when it had been messed with using a magnet
but assuming you did fuckup the hdd the machine would crash or not even boot you wouldnt get the artifacting that your seeing on that machine
if i had to take my guess that machine has a failing lcd screen caused by either
clumsy hamfisted tourists being rough when using the screen
someone punching kicking or other wise hitting the screen (could be the kiosk guys but also more likley some drunk idiots or kids)
it appears the screen has a loose ribon cable or edge connector
He asks, "can you hear me now"
She answers "No I cannot hear you"
WOW, she's sharp as a marble.
Good one, imma steal this for sure
Sharp as a marble😂😂😂
I tell Indian Scammers that I cannot speak English.. in perfect English.
I then ask them if they wish me to elaborate or would they prefer that I swore at them in Hindi.
Here we have the saying "dull as a dore knod." Same idea.
should she have said: I can hear you but not well enough to understand you?
oh man, I am pretty sure I have gone to those Kiosks so many times. Schade, dass ich nicht gewusst habe (auch als Oesterreicherin) das es diese Kioske gibt.
Herrlicher Kommentar ;) Anfang auf Englisch und dann flotter Übergang ins Deutsche SU PER 😂
I know scammer targeting foreigner is common, but what surprises me the most is both the government and Google helping the scammer. Honestly, if not for a good guy like you, I would seriously hate this country.
Google is selling its ads to whomever pays most for the search term. Sometimes the top google advertisement result even contains viruses. Of course those get taken down when found.
Well, the government corruption is an issue, a company helping scammers is just their purpose.
I am very impressed that the contract with these scammers was ended. This shows you the influence a RUclipsr can have on exposing scams.
it was shut down?
@@Wolfsheim23 read the pinned comment.
I couldn’t imagine it would be too safe for that guy to continue living there after shutting down a multi million enterprise like that.
@@lurekayaklrf look at all his other videos, he keeps shutting down scammers all over the place
Yes, a very important change to the world.
Why did the scammers have the up-front location while the official kiosk is further away? Because someone in the government was getting a cut from the scammers to allow it. Another example of sunlight being the best disinfectant.
There you go
I can bet you that's why the first machine was defective too.
If we could only figure out how to inject it
The government does what it is convenient for itself, not you,
also because czech people (and neighbors) know the real price anyway, or buy theirs using their phones anyway. so they don't care that much if some clueless tourists get scammed.
The whole idea of having to buy one of those Vignettes seems like a scam itself.
You don't think you should have to pay for the roads you're driving on? In my opinion it makes more sense than taxing people who don't drive on the roads to pay for them.
@@livw508 People already pay an annual road tax. At least here and in the UK they do. The minimum you pay here is 200 euro a year and it only goes up from there. So I don't think you should have to pay a surplus tax like this, you're right.
@@tinsoldier24 If you look it up, you'll find that the Czech Republic abolished the road tax for vehicles up to 12 tons (so most non commercial vehicles). So it does make sense then, to tax those who drive on the roads to pay for them.
It's a better system in my opinion than the one you described where everyone is taxed to pay for the roads. Since it doesn't seem fair to force people to pay for the roads if they don't use them.
@@livw508
Who tf doesn't use roads?!
@@kjj26k Afaik, the Vignettes are only for highways. If you live in a small town that's further away from any highway access, or if you can travel long disatnces by train, you may not need to buy a Vignette.
This is my expierience as an Austrian, where we have Vignettes too. Italy, for example, does not. I was told they have toll booths at every highway entry and exit, where you get an electronic card. This system also discourages people from speeding, since the booths will know how long it took you to drive from booth a to booth b.
You should probably cover one more story with those vignettes.
Czechia has quite a great community of software developers. There was a government purchase for software services to develop (or upgrade) it, I don't remember. The price was huge for something like this, and it raised questions with IT community. So around 60 developers gathered with several architects supporting them, with tasks already decomposed into tracker and OVER A WEEKEND they implemented entire system for free based on open requirements. And it was handed to the state and first news were that it actually passed tests for requirements. I don't know what happened further, but imagine the level of frustration of those who wanted to sip some money from the budget for development.
We ran into this scam 7 years ago when traveling through CZ. We found out after buying it, peeled the sticker off our car and returned it to get our money back so we could buy it at the real place for (indeed) €12. My wife got called a “curva” (bitch) by the lady on duty who said the extra €5 were “currency exchange fees”. It’s insane that the Czech authorities have allowed this to go on for so long.
God i would come back at night and smash the whole kiosk
"Curva" in eastern europe is whore/prostitute 😂
@@hazard9423 based
@@hazard9423 they deserve it
Kurwa is correct spelling and it's universal in all slavic countries.
Can you hear me? NO I CAN NOT
Plus the worst way she played it.
Big brain moment
-400 IQ lol
She has just passed an IQ test. Luckily it resulted negative! :)))
@@Kedvespatikus "Lady i need a negative test from you" "here you go" "lady, i meant an negative Covid test, not an iq one"
I am going to Prague this month and I remembered watching this video randomly 18 months ago. Thanks! I'll do a short binge watch of your channel now to be sure
Wow, thank you a lot for this video…
I felt like something is not right when I saw a price on the internet and been asked for another price at this type of kiosk…
I think this is a great initiative to at least slow down those hustlers!
I hope your video gets to be seen by as many persons as possible!
I feel ripped off just by watching this. This is quite unbelievable. I would've fallen for this too tbh.
Robbery at plain sight
Au contraire, this is quite believable
Drove into Czech Republic (as it was called then) from Germany. There was no sign to say you needed one of these stickers, even though the cops claimed there was (we checked later and there wasn't), and we'd never heard of them before. Was directed to pull over at the service station by traffic cops and fined in a van which was kitted out like an office for nothing else but catching unaware tourists. They also directed us to buy the sticker from the dodgy booth in the video. Whilst we took a break from driving we saw them do this several more times to other tourists.
Same. I was shouting "give me back my 5 Euros!" in my head. What a scam.
@@chriscurls7638 Tourist are always great cash milking ..i am from Serbia and last summer i went to Greece to vacation try Bulgaria..when i entered Bulgaria from Serbia there was road construction and some horrible roads that i never saw ..when we finally step on highway i stopped at first gas station and bought vignette..it was like 20 km from border ....when i was returning same way 10 days after some officials stop me and they were not police but something like that and they fined me 38 euros because i drived that 20 km when i enter Bulgaria with out vignette ..even that 20km was not highway but some most horrified road i ever saw in my life..it was 50 craters per square meter ..but what you can do..is foreign country and you just want to continue so you have to pay even you know its a scam ...because that gas station would not sell vignette if you cant buy there
Literally 2 weeks ago we traveled to the same vignette station and the lady was very angry at us for not having a registration for our rental car and would not sell us a ticket. We went back to the gas station and inquired with them where we could get a ticket, a great Czech citizen, who did not speak English, took us to the machine and helped us get our ticket. Thank you for the video, the 'welcome slap' almost made us think we would have to return to Austria.
Ok you will need to elaborate on this one. What do you mean you didn't have a registration, what kind of registration were they expecting? The license plate is literally on the car. Also don't they sell vignettes at the gas station (like in every other country that uses them)?
@@matejmahkovic they wouldn't take our rental agreement with license plate number on it, they wanted a registration. We tried gas stations before the boarder and after and neither had toll passes. We were told at the gas station to proceed to the hut up the road.
@@youwhathurts Hmm, that seems like they indirectly wanted you to NOT pay their scammer price, was your group that intimidating? :D Joking aside, I'm very very glad you were not scammed and obtained a fair vignette ... Still this whole system seems build and protected from someone, just for scamming tourists. Corruption ahoy! Please tell me there is nothing like this in the Slovenian-Austrian border?
Doing one's homework before travels usually helps a lot.
She angrily refused to rip you off?
your channel is excellent, providing the info for travellers to avoid scams, and most of Europe is filled with endless scammers on every corner, its almost comical how many of those scammers there are stepping over each other to ripoff unsuspecting people.
First vidéo i see on your channel. Nice one. Just wanted to add that this is the same problem on lots of country from Germany to Turkey. Thanks for the information about the official e vignette.
There's clearly government corruption involved in that. A proper building allowed to be built on those spots
The corruption is in the law. There is no reason why you should have to buy a sticker to use the already paid for road in the first place given the outrageous excise and VAT taxes levied on gas and diesel.
@@joseph1150 The vignette is for foreign cars who don't pay taxes in the country. It's either the vignette or having to pay tolls
@@milo1263 So the assumption is that they won't be buying gas in the country? I don't get charged for driving into Canada or Mexico, nor do I get charged extra for "importing" goods for personal use as long as the goods are from US, Canada, Mexico. What's the point of having the EU if stupid internal barriers exist just to shake down travelers? It's bad enough that the countries are the size of small states, but God forbid if you want to leave the valley you were raised in I guess. Hell the tiny ass state I was born in (Indiana) is 20 percent larger than Czech Republic and has way more miles of road (~125,000km of Federal, State, and country highways and roads, not including streets, over 500km of just on ramps) without resorting to scuzzy tax farming or toll roads (we have one toll road in the entire state) while having 4 million less people.
@@joseph1150 In the majority of European countries you pay to drive on the freeways. Around the borders there are cops that only check if you have a regular vignette. In France the government take a taxe for the roads but you always have to pay the toll booth on the freeway regardless if you are a citizen of the country or not.
@@milo1263 That's crazy considering how much tax there is on gasoline in France. The current after tax price for gas is almost double what I pay.
First Job of the kiosk every morning, go out and destroy the slot machine...
Bro, you really mad me laugh with this
Maybe related, but I got concerned when that guy came running out of the kiosk at 6.26, fully expecting him to try to beat up Janek to keep this scam secret... Thankfully he made a turn about ten seconds later..
@@hinzster that was when he realized the camera is rolling, lmao! 😂😂😂
Se how he starts running? 🤣
Last year, the lady at Slovak-Czech crossing border wouldn't take 310CZK. It wanted to charge ABSOLUTELY in euros. So, after checking we just managed to find out the electronic machines. Thank you for exposing these scammers!
Amazing video, very helpful, consistent... you got a new sub. Thanks for the update, still this is a very intesting topic to know about. Keep the great work up!
Somewhere, a czech politician was getting a kickback.
Institutional corruption in the Czech Republic, surely not!?
@@zeus01504 To be fair, ot could have been a politician or any official, anywhere in the world.
@Bob Don't think, our german politicians are any less shady ;) We have some who literally have gotten police visits... one of them in his ministry... and guess what: That guy wants to be our next chancellor, Olaf Scholz!
Its probably something like the standard vignette is tax free, but the money the company pays gets taxed, or gets taxed higher, so the government doesn't care because its basically a tax on tourists. Just speculation but that's often how it works. Like in Cyprus rented cars have red licence plates, so it's easy to spot tourists, and then certain things like tolls magically cost you more because of your red licence plate (according to the man taking the moeny)
Maybe, just maybe the machine wasn't broken by accident. Just saying.
Of course it wasnt broken by accident.
It's so easy to buy these transit tariffs on line. In fact it's easier to buy them on line!
I was suprised that QR code was still readable.
No I just think that nobody cares to even check if they're still usable
Thats what I was thinking, it looks like interferrence from a magnet or somone thing sending someone sort of interferrence.
That much was obvious.
Driving from Leipzig to Prague! and your video is a true life-saver.
I have no idea how I even came across this video. But thanks a million bro!
Vignette is something we don’t have in America. If you drive on a “toll” road they have cameras that will simply photograph your license and bill you that way. This would be very confusing for me, so glad you’re keeping people informed!
Revealing such a scams sooner or later will make the world a better place. Dear Janek & Honza, thank you and keep up the good work!
This is capitalist reality, and capitalism will never make the world a better place.
@@celboss I agree 💯
Just hope he doesn't end up like that woman.
@@milvan6829 Pokus.
@@celboss yes let's turn Europe into Soviet Union...
Holy moly. I have been to that place on my way to Denmark. Fortunately, it is not required to have a vignete for a motorcycle in Czech Republic so I did not got scammed. Awesome!
ayy, Im from Denmark
Bă ej nebun ?
There is no way you can get scammed in Romania. LoL
You escaped cheaply.🤣 PS: I saw the video
Buuuna dimineata
Interesting! Thanks for this video. I usually try to buy all my foreign highway fees prior to driving there at the local office of my automobile club (in my case it's ADAC, German autmobilist's club). If you're a member they don't charge any fees in my case and you pay the exact same price the correponding government or highway governing institution asks! Incredible how scammers get their way sometimes. Great work getting these offices shut!
Cheers for the heads up 👍🏻. I was aware of the fees and to be honest, I would have just went to the kiosk like a tourist paying the extra, thinking the price has been put up recently.
I would imagine the kiosk makes sure the official machine is always operating properly
Yes, that is what was implied
Krhm....
No I say they wouldn’t.Then everybody has to pay at the scam kiosk.
@@dazza9859 WHOOOOSH 🤦🏻😂
Nothing a powerful magnet can’t fix…😄
I wouldn't be surprised if the machine was ensured to be constantly "malfunctioning" by an employee of the booth armed with a strong magnet...
can't that be classified as vandalism?
@@GavinPetty Sure, you'd have get caught though. But placing only one should be prohibited in the first place, everything done with computers without providing a backup is done wrong.
@@GavinPetty Only if you get caught doing it. I imagine a magnet could be easily hidden inside a sleeve or glove
@@MaxPlayne87 I think someone just hit the machine really hard. Magnets, even strong ones, don't damage computers, they could damage CRT screens but those are long gone.
My guess is someone has put water somewhere it should have never been able to reach under normal conditions.
I got so used to live into Euro zone/Schengen area that I almost forgot what currency exchange and customs are.
Traveling inside Europe and having to change currency or paying customs is now like a trauma.
Fun fact: I can travel from my hometown in Italy to Portugal passing through Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain without any stop for bureaucratic things. But I can't if I want to go to Campione d'Italia (the Italian exclave in Switzerland).
Hi, mate! I'm about to go to Czech Republic and I want to say that your videos are helpfull for tourist, thank you!
Doing an investigation into a company that has employees getting executed in the woods? Man this is honest journalism.
yep she tried to steal from the mob.. Nobody steals from the mob!
What do you mean? According to the police it was suicide!
You guys are legends. This is a terrific public service you're doing.
"public service" don't be hillarious
@@ferdinand8994 I’m here to say that, beyond whatever else it is, is DEFINITELY a service to the public- I’ve been planning a trip to the CR and really appreciate this info
why does that trigger you, Ferdi?
@@brianfergus839 i doesn't trigger me dude, but ur using crazy words, you might aswell say he saved the f.. world.
@@ferdinand8994 lol yeah it obviously triggers you
@@brianfergus839 ok, if that makes you happy then it's fine, you can pretend it triggers me.
I freakin' LOVE your videos! So informative entertaining and SO WELL DONE! You guys are amazing. I'm also blown away at how many languages you speak. Thanks for doing what you do!
Super helpful and short video, Thanks Janek & Honza!
I wish the Czech Republic government gave Honest Guide an entire department with some legal authority, that would be cool.
Having "wish", "government", and "honest" all in the same sentence will only lead to disappointment.
@@jthieme Perhaps if capitalism did not exist, there would not be those capitalizing on us.
@@ProleDaddy You should read more history books. Before capitalism existed as it's defined today, governments were still committing atrocities.
Your point makes absolutely zero sense.
@@jthieme capitalism is merely feudalism with a floating labor pool. It's all authoritarian, oppression, and exploitation.
@@ProleDaddy You should do more research on capitalism. You conveniently left out the fact that people have a choice in capitalism, if they don't want to be exploited, they can do something else. If you're advocating for socialism or communism, you should read about the atrocities and people that those governments exploit.
I really liked visiting Czechia, but the amount of dodgy tourist traps is freaking appalling. Prague required careful navigation to avoid exchange traps etc.
Czech government should be ashamed of themselves, Prague is lovely city but full of scammers
It is pretty much the same in London, Paris, Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg and Kopenhagen. So I guess, and this is just a guess, you will find those traps in nearly every bigger city in the world.
@@Techn0magier Those cities will of course have traps, but not on the industrial scale of Prague. ( I live 150km from Prague) Taxi drivers, money exchangers, rogue vendors, etc, have been at it for years, especially around the old town area, yet the city authorities show little interest in coming down hard on these people.
@@Techn0magier you clearly haven't been to Prague.
@@Techn0magier tonnes of scammers in Paris. I have not seen them in London but guess that being British I’m less of a target there. Had no issue in either Berlin or Hamburg.
Hey, I just traveled to Czech and was told I could only buy the vignette online, did they defeat the scammers?
yup
Good work. You're spreading a good message on RUclips and trying to end the falsehood and mischief:) 👍
Let me guess... Someone in the government is getting a nice back hander...
Not likely. You don't need people on the government for such a simple trick. And it's completely legal.
It would be too low of a bonus for them. These are simply people trying to get bigger payday on unsespecting people
With these small machines without proper signage. There just has to be some serious corruption involved.
Should i quit RUclips or should i go back to hitting licks?😪
@@jefmertens3959 Those are not controled by the government, but by some clerks in the transport department. And those have likely never been there.
I once got stopped by the Czech police on the highway for not having a highway sticker. He first wanted 5000kr, then after a talk he wanted 2000kr, he finally settled for 1000kr. We even got a receipt, but just for 500kr.... This was some 20 years ago, hopefully it is better now.
Yes...now they will give you a receipt from 50 kr
Yeah, probably cost more, you can't beat inflation.
Narrator: Things were not better now. In fact, they were worse.
it was possible 20 years ago, now not, they all have bodycams, and theyr not gona risk it for few tousand crowns, my father once paid them off when i was younger :D
@@arturozons151 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 Now, that's improvement
These videos are not only very informative, but also highly entertaining!
Outstanding video. It is so clear and easy to understand. Thanks for the Explanation. I felt in the trap in the highway from Germany.
If the state owns the land, they could easily NOT rent to the scammers. This is sad.
They could not do that, but not that easily. Usually these contracts have been established long time ago for stupidly long terms (10 years or so) and there's little government can do to cancel such contracts, as technically, it's perfectly legal, just not very morally good.
they probably make money from the rent, and so it isn't worth ruining their business and losing the rent money lol.
The state does not own anything or rent in this case. The municipalities/little villages on the border (obec in Czech) or other owners of plots of the land allow (for a fee) such "business"..
@@dinodinoslav he said in the video that the land was owned by the state. So the state should just reclaim it from scammers. Any rental agreement should have a clause for voiding the lease.
@@na195097This guy has a patent on truth or something? Just look at the video, these kiosks are located in the villages near the border or on land plots adjacent to gas stations...
in Slovenia (not Slovakia) I also experienced a trick, more than once: before a highway entrance, the signs lead you to a kiosk selling the vignette. the kiosk is placed in the middle of the highway entrance, where there is no turn-around possibility any more..but guess what, the kiosk is closed. in the middle of the day. leading you to the decision of either driving on onto the highway without a vignette or driving backwards in reverse for a couple of 100 meters facing a surveillance camera..I chose the second option, drove back 5 km, bought a vignette at a gas station, went back to the highway and guess what, there was a cop controlling the vignette 200m after the highway entrance.
if something like this is about to happen once, who cares, but stuff like this is done systematically.
Wow.
TBF, in slovenia the highway-sticker system itself is kinda scammy...
They sell a 7-day ticket or a 14-day (probably longer ones too, but they don't often apply to tourists), instead of a 10-day like a lot of other places. So if you go on vacation - often saturday to saturday - guess what, you're in the country for 8 days and need the longer vitnette...
I always avoid highways in Slovenia with back roads. Won't pay a penny to thieves. This is a penalty for the fact that the police are even standing at the motorway entrance roundabout, claiming that part of the roundabout is already paid. Thousands of people were so robbed.
Makes me not want to go there.
Which side were you entering Slovenia on? Coming from the Karawankentunnel, you do not need the vignette directly after, you can still take exit Jesenice and continue on B roads from there. And Slovenia also has the electronic vignette as of recently. :)
Every country needs a guide like this
I would legit spend My entire day just standing outside that booth and redirecting people to the official vignette machines.
@@TheCoolCucumber yet this dude posted a video and it worked!
I'm sorry, but even after hearing that the country has revoked their licenses, it begs the question, how did they have a license in the first place?
And it really seems like they tried to put these machines out of the way so that people would get ripped off by these companies.
Agreed, some higher-up officials must have been getting a very nice kickback from that company!
The law probably predated the kiosk
The word you are looking is not company, it's mafia
The joke is him saying in the end that that’s not what the country is like. Dude, you literally just proved it
Some Eastern european states are considered "mafia-states".
This is not new.
Morning routine for the Kiosk owner: Go over to ticket machine, give it a good kick, go back to kiosk
You are doing a good service for people everywhere. Thank you and subbed.
Great video and great news 🙂
Thank you.
And you just earned yourself a one more subscriber 😃
Oh my god, that broken ticket machine with the flickering screen is like something out of Kafka.
Comparing a failed high tech ticket machine in 2021 to Kafka is brilliant! 👌🏼🤣 Franz would love it.
@@Porsche996driver Well, yeah? I mean the hilarity of the fact that there’s so much steps to get a ticket to be able to get through, and then finding out the true way to get it is broken, then yeah, that’s pretty Kafkaesque.
In German we call that kafkaesk (would be kafkaesque in English) 🙃
Well, here we go again. Second time a machine I did software for is being on this show. This time.. not that glorious. I immediately checked the machines and they run fine. Therefore it must be a hardware issue. Either a monitor or a touchscreen, it probably let in some moisture and it messed up the display. I will bring it forward on Monday, hopefully it will get fixed.
Pro-active. I like that.
Yeah, i wonder how long it will take for the machine to "mysteriously" break again when it starts taking money from the scam booth
@@andyt2k Good point. Never occurred to me, it could be intentional. If Janek is right about that connection to a murdered woman, crippling few machines would be nothing to these scammers. We'll see if this is correlated. If two of the machines are out for a similar reason at the same time at the place where this scam booth is, and the machines elsewhere are fine, it might be a clue. But at first I'll assume just a hardware failure. These machines are on the border, in a remote place and the technical maintenance is not as easy like in a case of the Prague ticket machines. I will keep it in mind though, and see if there's some connection to the booths.
@@andyt2k the first thing i thought was actually the same. We have a criminal mind, it seems.
@@SmartK8 just be carefull. They are clearly bringing in a lot of money with this scam.
Thank you for all the infos. It helps a lot of how to get around the country and aware of any possible trap especially the money changer scam.
Best video on RUclips I saw like in years.
👍🏻 Thanks
Useful one
When the taxi goes over five bridges, and there is just one river, you start to understand how things work there. Later I just ordered an Uber in advance.
lmao
😂
Even Uber May charge for stickers!
Simple solution: print the price on the vignette.
There is no vignette. No sticker, nothing. Pure electronic.
BUT the price is I'm the official currency of this country. Which is... Not Euro
The vendor should have to show the foreign exchange margin they are charging. When people see the 20% or whatever they will start to query it. It should be a law to have to show the breakdown of costs at point of sale. Sticker is $12, fee is $2, foreign exchange conversion is $3.
Or: only have tank stations sell it, like austria does it. Tank stations will not overpay you, because they don't need to - they make their money off the gasoline
Two years ago I was pulled over in Switzerland because we didn't have a vignette.
We didn't know we needed one as we picked up the rental care at Malpensa airport in Italy.
The CH Autobahn patrol was kind to us and allowed us to just pay for one on the spot without penalty because we honestly didn't know - the agency at MXP didn't warn us at all.
The vignette system across the EU is really poorly documented and not tourist friendly. You just have "to know" about it. That's not fair.
Another great content and very very good editing skills. Well done guys 👍🏻👍🏻
Thank you man, went to the slovakiaring and needed the drive through czech Republik. I was the only person at the machine, everyone else went to the booth, hopefully more people see your Video.
1:45 I love how she says she can't hear you but responds perfectly.
I can't read you.
@@nichderjeniche hello? Hello? I can’t read you. Hello?
So glad this resulted in them being shutdown. I find it fascinating that there are people out there who can quite happily scam normal everyday people out of their hard earned cash and not feel bad about it. I don't know how they sleep at night. All for such tiny margins as well.
Tiny margins?
You get 5€ per person. With 369€ a month for rent and 3.5€ per hour for the employee, your expenses are roughly 3000€ per month. Even if we add another 1000€ for additional expenses, you only need about 30 customers a day to make a profit, or lets say 2 per hour. Considering the amount of people crossing the borders every day I would assume that they have way more than two customers per hour. It's a money making machine, a quite efficient one at that.
@@jan2oo yupand lets not forget all the other locations the same people have. They where banking big time. The lady who was killed was bring in a lot of money so how can he say small amounts lol.
Thank you for the guide man, much appreciated.
Thank you - especially the update is astonishing
kimi: you hear me now?
engineer: no kimi we stil no hear you
kimi: but you answer still
no kimi you will not have the drink
@@ppbdrinker but is the button on or no?
yes
FOR WHAT???
@@ActuallyLinden bwoah
The website seems straight up illegal tho. it does not say about any conversation rate or fee. it is just PayPal 19€
It is illegal under Czech law. But the company is Polish so…
@@stensoft Still even In Poland it need to be addressed that they charge you extra for something. At least on receipt and Paypal in most cases doesn't tell you on it's receipt what you paid for.
@@stensoft Since this is a common issue in the EU maybe setting up an Honest Guide Vignette website might be a fun thing to do. With some help from your subscribers it should be possible to push it to the top of the Google search results. With a couple of ad links it could likely even pay for itself...
@@CzeCzaCreg they don't charge you for anything extra, a Czech vignette is just a regular commodity in Poland you can sell at at what ever price you want - no exchange fees needed.
@@fischX well they have to use some API for buying the real vignette inthe Czech system.Or even if they manually buy it on the official website. It likely violates the terms and conditions of the official eShop. So still it can be legally challenged. But well, Since Poland does not consider fellow EU members as judicially equal, it's tricky. That's why EU free market cannot work without EU wide rules and legal system. But I guess I would be happy if Poland leaves with it's scams (sorry for the majority of Poles who are nice people)
I just want to thank you for all the warning and suggestions.....merci!
That was cool.
The welcoming slap is usually the airport taxi here in Turkey.
" can you hear me" " no, i dont?" well.... XD
LOL! Sounds like my plumber's wife!
never knew my parents get scammed, you even showed the exact border crossing we use, never even noticed the machine, thanks for putting this out!
Thank you so much for this video!
We are renting a car for the first time, and this video saved us a lot of headaches in advance.
A perfect example of really(!) useful RUclips Videos. Thank you!
You probably skipped the most important tip: Never ever click on an ad while looking for something official, or even to buy something in general. An ad costs a company money, they would only spend that money if they can take extra money from you. Ads are very bad, stay away from them, always.
Click the ad then revert. So they have to pay Google but get nothing in return.
@@foty8679 This will optimize their result location form searches though, it'll promote them and we do _not_ want that _(their name would appear higher in organic search queries)_
@@ProtoMarcus Darn, I'm a duckduckgo user, and regularly click an add to support the service (as they can't make money from directly selling me).
I'd hate to think that I'm contributing to worse organic search results in the long run..
Do they really allow ad clicks to influence the organic results though? Seems to me to be a bad business model. If after every ad campaign there's less need for another as it just got the advertiser closer to the top already..
@@sigi9669 Yeah it still promotes relevancy :/
Makes me glad that my adblockers, both on my home network and in my mobile browser return a "network error", if I accidentally click on an ad in the Google search results (that is, if they show up at all)
“Gov rented it so they can run their shady business here”
Sums how scammers can run their business freely in almost every country
Love these videos, keep up the great work guys 👍
I love your videos! You're so cool! I'm still laughing for the lady on the phone 😂
My company used to own a subsidiary in the Czech Republic. I was amazed by how corrupt the whole bureaucracy was. Literally, nothing would move, no permits would be issued unless special considerations were made for the right people. I honestly didn't expect it to be that bad, but it was.
Ahh yes, that's a remnant of the Soviet Union
We have it in Latvia as well. It is a very tough thing to weed out but it's possible.
This kind of scam would be so easy to close down with Swedish law as it would fall under usury. Translated from Swedish Wikipedia usury here is: "According to Swedish law, usury is a crime that consists of the person who uses someone's hardship, lack of knowledge, frivolity or dependence to gain a benefit, which is in obvious disproportion to the consideration or for which consideration is not to be paid, being sentenced to a fine or imprisonment. for a maximum of two years. If the crime is serious, you are sentenced to prison, a minimum of six months and a maximum of four years."
This kind of vague law is exactly something, that could cause a 10 years long court battle over the deffinition of "obvious disproportion".
Usury is a loan with a very high interest. This is the description of a fraud, and yes, it is illegal in Czechia as well (with very similar definition) but it's difficult to prove that they actually misused the tourists' lack of knowledge and it was not just a convenience charge.
@@stensoft usury is what the Swedish word "ocker" is translated to which is the word used in the law text which also include such loans.
@@mrkv4k Not in Sweden, at most 5 if it's appealed against to the next of the three instances and they decide to take it on every time at that next instance which isn't always done. Most cases are solved within 7 months in Sweden.
in USA usury is committed on daily basis.
Hi, quick note. It'd be great to have the official website visible for longer in bigger letters or you could put a link to it in the description. It kind of flashed for me and even after stopping the video, well it's in Czech so I had to put letters together very slowly to read it hah 😄 thanks for the tip!
Good information Janek. It would be nice if you make a video for people who are driving electric car to Czech because they do not need to buy the vignette. I have done that for myself but it was a bit tricky to find it at first place.
Oh wow, I thought I pretty much know every trick in the book, but I'm pretty sure I fell for this one a few years back when traveling to Prague for a concert by car. Thanks for pointing this one out, I'm sorry not a lot of people know this one!
It's new since this year..
*in the booth
"no i can't hear you"
Now thats an epic response to the question "can you hear me".
Well done, very useful video, tricky people are everywhere and they give a bad light to an entire population, obviously it's not like this, but your doubts about the right placement of the automatic machines shows that this is more than a isolated case
Subscribed after the ATM video. This channel will blow up. Love from the 🇺🇸
Thanks so much. I got trapped by this in AUSTRIA in 2003. There was just a queue of confused foreigners paying the fine.
I explained to the police that if your're taking money from a queue of confused foreigners, then YOUR'RE the con man.
would love to know where this was. I live in western Austria, and we dont have this problem here as far as i am aware...do you maybe remember where this happend? I hate it when people visit my nation and have a bad aftertaste from it
We drove from Liechtenstein to Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany. I cannot recall the route through Austria but it was short. In any event we were unaware of the need to buy a pass and it wasn't apparent we needed to stop somewhere to buy one. There were some police waiting for us right after the border and they charged us a few hundred Euro for our ignorance. They even had a credit card reader to immediately charge us. I was not trying to circumvent any entrance fees and they certainly had set a trap for ignorant tourists. Left a very bad impression of Austria and sticking it to tourists is not a good way to promote your country.
@@craigtruax5236 yes. It's corrupt gangsterism.
@@craigtruax5236 oh gosh fu**. That sounds like someone scammed you! You dont need a pass (we call it vignette) to use our regular streets. Only the Highways (Autobahn) require one. I myself forgot to purchase one a few times now, but ive never been charged that much. Thats horrible.
Im really stings me that you had such an bad impression of my nation. We have flaws but taking advantage of unsuspecting tourists/travellers should not be one of them.
@@andrefasching1332 Thank you for your reply. Do you think we were scammed by imposters or actual police? It was 10 years ago so some details are fuzzy but I think they had uniforms, official looking car, etc. I remember thinking I don't know I did, I don't want go to jail lol.
next step in this scam: the QR code gets erased or replaced :(
Yeah…like a sharpie 3-second alteration, could send whole state/visitors into chaos
@@lawsfreelancemalice1380 Print out another QR code, redirecting to their scam website, and sticker it over that one.
The scam is charging people to travel
Thanks mate! Really useful information.
I annually drive from Sweden to a Hungarian festival. Passing through Cz and Slovakia, buying the vignettes every time. I have bought the vignettes from gas stations. Paid a lot more since I tend to stay more than 10days in Hungary. With some extra days stay in Prague. I've paid about €45 for my big van in Hungary alone.
I'll most definitely buy my vignettes online from the official CZ, Slovakian and Hungarian site from now on.
I'm expecting them to print a different QR-Code sticker (that will redirect to their website with overpriced stickers) and slap it on those vending machines.
Already done
I imagine that could actually be a crime unlike what they were doing now.
@@seneca983 Yes but whom do you tie the website QR code may redirect to? Its too easy to have a website and no direct connection to actual scammers.
@@MrDomingo55 If it points to the website of the company operating these booths it wouldn't be easy for them to explain that they're not responsible.
Don’t give them any ideas..
It’s really disappointing that these things exist and happen, and they are so convincing and skirt the laws via these loopholes, that many people- even EU natives who are familiar with vignette laws- would easily be tricked by these :/
I live in the EU and have newer heard of vignettes.
@@Tupsuu Come to Central and Eastern Europe...
Tapsu10 Maybe not a thing everywhere. Eastern Europe and some Central Europe countries have it though. It’s like a highway toll tax in place of toll gates which other countries have. For example, in Bulgaria we do not have the usual toll gates which collect a fee or tax for using the highway, rather we have a weekend/weekly/monthly/yearly vignette which you buy and stick on your windshield which serves the same purpose. Then there are regular checks via cameras on highways that read out the vignette+license plate on the car. Obviously with no vignette, there’s a fine to pay
@@BrutishLearner4 In Finland we don't have road tolls or vignettes.
Also Bulgaria is the only country I've been to that isn't next to Finland and it was beautiful.
Tapsu10 I learn something new every day, I didn’t know that about Finland :)
Glad to hear you enjoyed Bulgaria :) Lots of nice mountain ranges, forests and historical landmarks around
First of all, great job, guys :) Also, I must say it (although I am not a native English speaker myself) that the guy in the video has, of all Czechs who I heard speak English, the very least Czech accent. Good job :)
OMG the phone call sounded just like those Tony Talks sketches 😂🤣