Short Answer You must dial the central emergency blocking hotline immediately at 116 116 to freeze your banking card across the entire national network. This universal safety hotline operates twenty-four hours a day and completely stops any subsequent fraudulent debit attempts. What Most Expats Don't Realize Your banking card was retained by an outdoor terminal slot late at night, and you chose to walk home and wait until the physical branch opened the next morning to retrieve it. Criminals who had installed a mechanical skimming trap over the machine frame extracted your physical card minutes after you walked away and emptied your account via localized electronic withdrawals. The thieves drained €1,200 before you acted — and although the law caps your liability at €50 for unauthorized withdrawals, the bank spent weeks arguing that walking away from a retained card counted as gross negligence before reluctantly refunding the rest. What To Do * Call 116 116 from your smartphone immediately while standing directly in front of the malfunctioning automated terminal. * Open your mobile banking software to activate the digital card suspension toggle inside the account profile settings page. * "Ich möchte meine Bankkarte sofort für alle Transaktionen sperren lassen." (I want to lock my bank card immediately for all transactions.) — state this to the hotline operator to execute a network-wide asset freeze. The Truth Germany relies on the universal 116 116 hotline as a strict financial emergency tool. The law caps your liability for unauthorized transactions at €50 before the block and zero after it — but the system treats hours of inaction as an open invitation for the bank to argue gross negligence and fight every cent.