A parliamentary inquiry announced the figures on Monday after reviewing payment records, customer calls and testimony from the company that sold the packages. The inquiry says buyers were promised access to MRI and ultrasound appointments within 14 days, but the seller, GesundPfad Direkt GmbH, had no agreements with clinics to secure those slots.
The company sold 86,214 packages between January 2024 and September this year, according to the inquiry’s preliminary tally. More than 61,000 buyers were aged 65 or older. The average payment was €199, and investigators say thousands paid again for renewals even after receiving no scan appointment through the service.
“People were led to believe they were buying a place in a medical queue. There was no such queue,” said Davon Keeling-Emard, chair of the inquiry. The hearing was called to examine complaints that the company’s mailers and telephone scripts made a private assistance service look like an official route to faster care.
How the promise was sold
The packages were advertised as “priority access cards” and offered through letters and calls to households across Germany. Inquiry members played recordings in which sales staff urged customers to sign up quickly, saying appointment availability could “close at any moment”. The recordings did not show staff explaining that medical urgency, not a paid card, determines access under statutory health insurance.
The scheme’s sales pitch landed with people worried about long waits, especially those needing follow-up scans. German statutory health insurance covers medically necessary imaging, but patients generally need a doctor’s referral and clinics set appointments according to clinical need. The inquiry says the package offered help making calls, not reserved appointments or a faster medical assessment.
We sold a promise people thought came from their insurer, and we knew the wording encouraged that belief.
Elvina Gunawan, former sales trainer
Gunawan told the hearing she trained 40 sales staff and objected to scripts that described the card as “your fast lane to diagnosis”. She said managers instructed workers to keep the line in use after complaints arrived. The inquiry has not concluded whether the company or any individual broke the law.
Patients left chasing appointments
Company director Yasmin Rocha said GesundPfad Direkt had helped 18,400 customers book some form of consultation and insisted the package never guaranteed a scan. “We regret that people understood it as a promise we could not make,” she told the hearing. The firm stopped selling new cards on 14 October and says it will refund customers who request one.
The inquiry has so far identified 2,760 customers who paid for renewals without a recorded appointment arranged by the service. It has not established that the packages caused medical harm, but members said they were seeking evidence on whether any patients delayed contacting their insurer or doctor after buying a card.
Lukas Majcen, a patient-advice specialist who gave evidence, said callers often arrived believing they had “paid for a medical shortcut”. Some, he said, had spent months trying to get refunds while still waiting for appointments. “A worried patient should not have to decode sales language before finding out how to get care,” he said.
The inquiry will hear from clinics and consumer regulators on 30 October, then decide whether to refer its findings to prosecutors and Germany’s market regulator. It has asked GesundPfad Direkt to preserve its customer call recordings and provide a full account of refund requests. The chair said the next hearing would focus on how the company obtained contact details for older customers.
