Terms of use

These terms apply to Catch: the website catch-mobile.info, the web app app.catch-mobile.info and the Catch app for Android. The provider is the person named in the legal notice. By registering you accept these terms. You don’t need an account to search and browse, but sections 4 to 6 apply to everyone. This is a translation; the German version is legally binding.

1. What Catch is

Catch is a free community app for buses and trains. Passengers share short tips about what’s happening on a line: delays, cancellations, crowding, disruptions (e.g. doors, heating, lifts) and ticket checks. Catch also shows connections and departures from open timetable data, analyses the tips per line and can notify you during your trip with live tracking.

There is no entitlement to a particular availability or particular features. We may develop, restrict or discontinue Catch.

2. Account

• You need an account to report, confirm, flag and use live tracking. You must be at least 16 years old.
• One account per person. Keep your password secret; you are responsible for actions taken with your account.
• Your display name must not be offensive, infringe the rights of others or suggest that you speak for a transport operator or an authority.
• You can delete your account in the app at any time (Profile → Delete account).

3. Tips are community content – no guarantee

Tips come from other users and are not checked by us in advance. They may be wrong, incomplete or out of date. Timetable data also comes from third parties. Catch does not replace official information from transport operators. Don’t rely on Catch alone for important journeys.

4. Rules for tips

When you report, confirm or flag something:

• Only what you saw yourself: report only what you are observing or observed shortly before. No invented, deliberately false or misleading tips, no spam, no duplicates.
• No information about people: Catch is about the situation on the line, not about people. People – passengers as well as transport staff – must not be described, identified, tracked, photographed or exposed. That’s why Catch deliberately has no free text and no photos; don’t try to work around this, e.g. through your display name.
• Respect for staff: don’t obstruct anyone in their work and don’t call for harassment, threats or violence.
• No automated use: bots, scripts, mass queries and scraping are not allowed.

5. Travel with a valid ticket

Catch is meant to make your ride easier. It is not intended for travelling without a valid ticket or for avoiding fares. By using Catch you agree to use public transport only with a valid ticket. The conditions of carriage of the transport operators and the instructions of their staff continue to apply.

6. Safety

Don’t use Catch while driving a vehicle, or when doing so could endanger you or others (e.g. at the platform edge or when boarding or getting off). In emergencies, accidents or dangerous situations, contact staff, the emergency equipment in the vehicle or the emergency numbers 112 / 110 – not Catch.

7. Reporting content, moderation, trust, suspension

• Every tip can be flagged in the app via “Report content”, e.g. as wrong, spam or inappropriate. You can also report illegal content to us by e-mail (see the legal notice). Please say which tip it is and why it is illegal.
• Automatic hiding: tips flagged by three different users, or disputed by clearly more users than confirm them, are hidden automatically. We review flags and may hide or delete tips.
• Trust levels: Catch automatically calculates a trust level for every account from the last 90 days. Confirmations of your tips count positively; disputes, flags and hidden tips count negatively; some activity and the age of the account count as well. Tips from trusted accounts get a badge. Tips from new accounts are shown as “unconfirmed” until someone confirms them. If your level is clearly negative, your tips only trigger live alerts after a confirmation and don’t count in the line’s statistics until then; your votes also count only half towards automatic hiding. Others never see your account, only the level on the tip.
• Automatic limit: if three or more of your tips are hidden or deleted within 7 days, or at least three more users dispute them than confirm them, you can submit at most 3 tips per day and one every 30 minutes for 7 days. The limit ends automatically; we can lift it earlier.
• If these terms are violated, we may remove tips, restrict features of your account or suspend your account, taking the circumstances of the individual case into account.
• Reasons and objection: if we restrict a tip or your account – manually or automatically – we send you an e-mail to your account’s address. It says what is affected, which measure we took, the reason, whether the decision was automated and how you can object. You can object by replying to that e-mail, by e-mail to us (see the legal notice) or via “Send feedback” in the app; a person will then review the decision again. If your account has no e-mail address, you can ask us for the reasons. Your right to take legal action is not affected.

8. Rights to your tips

Your tips consist of fixed details (kind, line, stops, time, tags). You grant us the simple, free and unlimited right to show them in Catch and to use them for statistics without any reference to you. If you delete your account, your tips remain in anonymised form for statistics (see the privacy policy).

9. Liability

Catch is free of charge. We are liable without limitation for intent and gross negligence, for injury to life, body or health and under the German Product Liability Act. Otherwise our liability is excluded to the extent permitted by law. In particular, we are not liable for the accuracy of tips from other users or of third-party timetable data, for example for missed connections.

10. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms, for example when features or the law change. We will inform you about material changes in the app in good time and, where necessary, ask you to accept them before you can continue to report.

11. Final provisions

German law applies, excluding the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. If you are a consumer, mandatory protective provisions of the country in which you live remain unaffected. We are neither willing nor obliged to take part in dispute resolution proceedings before a consumer arbitration board. If any provision is invalid, the rest remain valid.

Last updated: November 2026