The German tour operator Bentour is taking legal action against the quarantine regulation, which is due to come into force in Germany on October 15, 2020. The main argument is that all returnees from so-called risk areas will have to be in quarantine for five days in future, but domestic travelers will not.

The management submitted an urgent application to the Schleswig Administrative Court. In this the court is asked to review the new regulation. The company is deliberately taking legal action in Schleswig-Holstein, because there and in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, returnees from Turkey are already in quarantine. However, a bilateral agreement between the Federal Republic and Turkey does not provide for this if you have stayed in certain regions. A negative PCR test releases you from quarantine according to the agreement between the two states. Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Schleswig-Holstein have, however, issued their own regulations that require quarantine. Basically, these are very similar to the planned Germany-wide regulation.

Bentour is quite creative, because you do not appear as a plaintiff yourself, but take over all legal and court costs for a customer residing in Schleswig-Holstein. The aim is apparently to bring about a court decision before October 15, 2020. In the optimal case, this could bring the quarantine obligation to fall after return from risk countries or at least delay it. In Italy, a court overturned the obligation to submit negative PCR tests in Sardinia and justified the decision by stating that the fundamental right to freedom of travel was restricted.