Dumped E-bike Provokes Questions

Published on: 7 Nov, 2024
Updated on: 10 Nov, 2024

The Beryl e-bike Brian Holt found dumped in Northway

By Martin Giles

Dragon reader Brian Holt sent in a picture of a discarded ebike in Northway. It was a Beryl bike, one of those introduced in the recent e-bike hire scheme arranged by Surrey County Council.

Mr Holt wrote: “This bike was dumped such a short time after the scheme started. I wonder how much worse is it going to get? Who is going around to collect them? And why should the public have to keep reporting this, wasting their time trying to find where to report it to and paying for the phone call?”

He was also concerned that some of the ebike bays could be obstructing pavements but reported that the abandoned bike had been taken away within 24 hours.

The Dragon NEWS got on to Beryl Bikes and posed some questions:

What happens if a hired ebike is left away from a marked out station?

Beryl uses a system of parking bays, called Beryl bays. These are marked spaces in key locations where you can start and end a ride. Anyone that ends their journey and locks the e-bike outside of a bay will have an “Out of Bay” fee added to their journey. This helps Beryl to maintain an organised scheme. Our customer and on-street teams will then work together to ensure the e-bike is returned to a bay as soon as possible for other riders to use.

The hired e-bikes are not always left tidily in the bays.

Can an ebike be pushed/wheeled/ridden away from a station without using the app/battery power and dumped?

No, bikes can only be unlocked in one of two ways, either contactless using a smart device or by using a six digit bike ID code. Once a ride is complete, users are required to close the lock on the e-bike to complete their ride and make it available for the next person to use.

Please confirm that you know the location of all your bikes at all times.

Yes, all of our e-bikes are fitted with Beryl’s industry leading, UK developed Smart Bike GPS technology, which is also used by London’s Santander Bikes and West Midlands Cycle Hire.

How many operatives are employed to pick up bikes left away from designated stations? How long should it take before they are collected?

Guided by the Smart Bike technology our on-street and customer service teams work incredibly hard in partnership to look after scheme practicalities, such as moving vehicles to empty bays or swiftly locating and returning lost or stolen ones. This approach enables the team to nearly always exceed their target of rebalancing the bikes at key hub locations within one hour, ensuring the scheme remains as user friendly as possible.

Should bikes that appear to have been dumped be reported?

Yes. The public can report incidents of vandalism or antisocial behaviour involving Beryl e-bikes quickly and easily to their Customer Support team – by phone on +44 020 3003 5044 between 7am and 9pm Mon-Sun, by email at: support@beryl.cc or through the Beryl app.

We will work with Surrey Police to investigate any incidents of theft or criminal damage and retain the option to suspend and ban/remove accounts for improper use of the scheme.

How many of the ebike stations have been installed so far? When will all stations be in place?

By November 12, there will be 200 e-bikes available to hire from a wider network of 37 bays. In Spring 2025, a full complement of 300 bikes will then be available across 56 bays that will connect with the outer areas of the town to complete a comprehensive network.

How satisfied is Beryl with the Guildford Scheme so far? What is the usage rate (eg how many bikes have been deployed and how many hired per day)? How does it compare with schemes in other towns?

We’ve been delighted with the initial response to the scheme, both in terms of rides taken and in direct feedback. So far we’ve seen nearly 12,000 sustainable journeys made across more than 25,000 km. However, the differences in size, geography, infrastructure, fleet, population and economy, to name but a few variables, mean that it is very difficult to make meaningful direct comparisons with schemes in other areas.

We also asked Surrey County Council: Is the council monitoring the scheme? If so, how? What are the performance metrics?

The contract with Beryl has a set of detailed key performance indicators and a service level agreement to ensure the scheme meets our requirements and provides a good service to Surrey, the details of these are commercially sensitive.

We monitor the performance of parking compliance and the response to bikes reported as left out of parking areas.

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