La licence Mietwagen allemande (2026) : §49 PBefG, conditions et obligations

1. What Mietwagen traffic legally means

§49(4) PBefG defines the model: you hire out the whole vehicle with driver, the client sets destination and course, and orders may only be received at the company's registered seat or the owner's residence — never on the street. No waiting at taxi ranks, no picking up hailing passengers: doing so poaches the taxi monopoly and risks the licence.

In return, prices are freely agreed — the basis of the premium business model: fixed-price airport transfers, hourly bookings, corporate accounts.

2. The licence: who grants it and what it demands

The licence is granted by the local licensing authority — depending on the Land, the district office, city administration, or in Berlin the LABO. It is tied to the person and business, and for Mietwagen traffic limited to at most five years (§16 PBefG), then renewed.

Three pillars under §13 PBefG: personal reliability (criminal-record and trade-register extracts), financial capacity (equity per vehicle, tax-office and social-insurance certificates), and professional competence — proven via the IHK exam or recognised equivalents. The 2021 PBefG reform did not abolish the operator's competence requirement.

3. The drivers' P-Schein

Every chauffeur needs the passenger-transport permit (§48 FeV): at least 21 years old, a category B licence held for two years, medical and eyesight examinations. The permit runs at most five years and renews with fresh examinations. The local-knowledge exam was abolished in August 2021; the nationwide driver-competence certificate meant to replace it never became operational and now sits with the Länder as an opt-in — check the current state for your Land directly with the authority.

4. Ongoing duties: return-to-base and the order register

After every ride the vehicle must return to the registered seat without delay — unless a new order arrived before or during the trip. In cities above 100,000 inhabitants the authority may approve additional parking locations (at least 15 km from the seat).

Central in practice: receipt of every transport order must be recorded "in books or electronically — including via an app-based system" and retained for one year (§49(4) PBefG). At a roadside check, this record decides whether a follow-on ride without returning was lawful. A booking system with timestamps is literally the documentation form the law names.