Dennis Schneider works at Edeka in Halle (Saale). “It’s terrible how racial profiling is carried out here,” he tells the taz. Schneider’s actual name is different and he wants to remain anonymous so that he doesn’t lose his job. The young man still wants to talk: “At the checkout I ask people who don’t look phenotypically German and want to buy the vouchers how they pay, i.e. about the payment card,” says Schneider.
He has to do it this way because he has been instructed by his shift manager not to sell vouchers to people who want to pay with a payment card. So not to asylum seekers.
An asylum seeker receives a maximum of 455 euros per month. These are transferred to a payment card, which at first glance looks like a normal debit card. In most cases, however, you cannot use it to make transfers or shop online – and in almost all municipalities you can only withdraw 50 euros per month in cash. This is a problem because asylum seekers have to be frugal. And this often requires cash in addition to online orders, for example to shop at flea or weekly markets.
Initiatives simplify barter transactions
The first payment cards were issued in Hamburg in February 2024. Other states and municipalities followed. At the same time, people in many places founded initiatives against the payment card. The mission of the initiatives is simple: provide cash for asylum seekers. Your approach: organize a barter transaction.
Asylum seekers use their payment cards to buy vouchers from large supermarket chains. Private individuals then buy these vouchers from them with cash. A 20 euro Rewe voucher for 20 euros cash. The initiatives facilitate this exchange by providing rooms, setting appointments for exchanges and disseminating information.
It’s better not to make any sales
Critics of the payment card say it was not only introduced to simplify administration, but should also restrict the lives of asylum seekers – to encourage departures and act as a deterrent.
Those who shouldn’t actually have a problem with the exchanges are the supermarket chains whose vouchers are used for this. Because every voucher sold means higher sales for you.
But initiatives in several cities report similar incidents. For example in a Lidl in Nuremberg main station. When Benedikt Aumeier from the local initiative heard about it, he accompanied an asylum seeker there last summer.
And actually, when he wanted to buy a voucher, the branch employees refused to do so, Aumeier tells taz. The reason given was that the asylum seekers would commit “fraud” with the vouchers and “only buy alcohol” anyway. The non-sale is an instruction from the branch management.
It also depends on the employees
The sale of vouchers to asylum seekers is also sometimes refused in an Edeka in Osnabrück. “It seems to be a mix of racial profiling and how much individual employees are behind it, because some are sold vouchers and others are not,” says a member of the Osnabrück initiative.
As in Nuremberg, it was said here that buying vouchers with a payment card was illegal – which is not true. In nearby Hesepe it was said that the “management level” of the NP supermarket had decided that it was no longer allowed to sell vouchers to people with payment cards.
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Why these decisions were made is unclear. Maybe there is a misunderstanding and individual branch managers really think the sale is illegal. Maybe some branch managers think the payment card is a sensible measure. Maybe they think that not selling is in the interests of local politics and want to be on good terms with them. Or they act on instructions.
In Greiz in Vogtland, Edeka, Rewe and Lidl branches temporarily removed their in-house vouchers from their range last year, according to the initiative there.
Announcement from the immigration office?
“When we asked Lidl and Rewe employees about it, they told us it was an announcement from above, directly from the immigration authorities,” says one member. The Greiz district office contradicts these allegations to the taz. There was never such an instruction from the immigration authorities; rather, the responsible district office informed all grocery stores that the payment card was considered a normal means of payment.
“At Lidl we were told that exchanging vouchers was illegal, that asylum seekers would steal them or sell them without value and that they were taken out to reduce crime,” says the person from the taz initiative. “Staff also told us customers would feel safer if there were fewer foreigners hanging around outside the market.”
We’ve already had a ban on a certain group buying things in the supermarket in Germany
Lena Frerichs, lawyer at the Society for Civil Rights
Even when asked, the asylum seekers were refused the vouchers. The person from the initiative is convinced that these incidents are racial profiling. “The card looks similar to any other debit card, so you can’t immediately tell that it’s an asylum seeker.” Rather, individual store employees would choose who they would sell the vouchers to.
An incident from an Edeka in Berlin-Kreuzberg sounds very similar. Employees there are said to have approached refugees and informed them that they could not buy vouchers when they approached the relevant shelf. “It is completely clear that they were targeted because of their skin color,” says Patrick A. from the initiative against the Berlin-Brandenburg payment card. A cashier told him that too many vouchers were being purchased.
The insinuation of doing something criminal
Those affected have so far reported to the initiative about at least ten incidents in various supermarket branches in Berlin and Brandenburg in which they were refused the purchase of vouchers. “My impression is that it is clearly a racist dynamic is that insinuates that people are doing something criminal when they are not.”
The taz questioned Lidl, Rewe and Edeka (which also includes NP) about the allegations, as well as, where possible, the branch management of the stores mentioned. Everyone who answered said that there was no regulation to deny vouchers to asylum seekers with payment cards. Lidl explained that it would follow up on tips and provide additional training to employees if necessary.
A spokeswoman for Edeka emphasized the company’s claim to provide all customers with equal access; the chain stands for diversity and against discrimination. If it was temporarily not possible to purchase vouchers with payment cards, this was due to organizational reasons. However, she also pointed out that handling the payment card was at the discretion of the individual market owner.
In principle, supermarkets, as private companies, are allowed to decide for themselves who buys from them. They are only limited in this by the General Equal Treatment Act (AGG). It stipulates that people must not be discriminated against based on certain characteristics, such as gender or religion.
Stigmatizing and legally sensitive
“But this is where things get legally tricky,” says Lena Frerichs, lawyer and procedural coordinator for the Society for Civil Rights. “The law does not stipulate residence status as a criterion of discrimination.” The law is outdated and is currently being reformed. Excluding asylum seekers with payment cards from purchasing certain products would clearly be stigmatizing, but it has not yet been legally clarified whether supermarkets would have to pay compensation for such discrimination.
Nevertheless, she considers the behavior to be drastic: “We’ve already had a ban on a certain group buying things in the supermarket in Germany. Showing people off like that has a blatant history,” says Frerichs.
Even several months later, nothing has changed at Edeka in Halle, says Dennis Schneider. He is still encouraged to ask people who look “not German” about their means of payment and, if it is a payment card, to withhold product vouchers from them. He thinks that’s “pretty bad.” Nowadays, however, hardly any asylum seekers would try to buy vouchers there.