E-scooter firm Lime dodges questions about its action on safety concerns with NZ fleet

Wednesday, 6 March 2019

A design flaw prompted Lime to pull its entire fleet of electric scooters from two cities in Switzerland - one month before the Auckland ban.

Lime continues to evade questions about why it waited for a council ban to remove its e-scooters from Auckland streets when one month earlier its entire fleet was withdrawn from two cities in Switzerland for the same glitch.

On January 14, a design flaw prompted Lime to pull e-scooters from Basel and Zurich after several riders were left with serious injuries following sudden, unexpected braking. More than a month later on February 22, the same irregular braking was the reason behind Auckland Council suspending Lime's licence.

When asked why the multi-billion dollar company did not analyse its New Zealand fleet after realising the safety concerns in Basel and Zurich, Lime's New Zealand public affairs manager Lauren Mentjox claimed the company had been 'diligent in the detection, diagnosis and resolution of any issue or problem that occurs in any one of our scooters'.

But there were 155 irregular braking incidents reported across the country - 92 of which were in Auckland, resulting in 19 separate injury claims - and it only pulled them on Auckland Council's orders.

* Lime suspension: e-scooters could be back on Auckland streets soon

* Lime e-scooter suspension: Juicers losing income as Auckland ban continues

Lime said e-scooters were being 'triple checked' before going back on Auckland streets.

* Lime says it's fixed dangerous brake bug, Auckland Council's stand is 'disappointing'**

According to Swiss media reports, the company removed its fleet after three alleged incidents in which users were left nursing a broken elbow, dislocated shoulder and abrasions when the scooters halted mid-ride, leading to crashes.

All Lime e-scooters in New Zealand have undergone a firmware update since a glitch which saw wheels lock was discovered.

In January, Technology website TechCrunch obtained an email Lime reportedly sent to users in Switzerland, in which it said it was looking into whether 'a software update could be causing a reboot during the ride, triggering the theft protection', before removing them from the Swiss cities altogether.

Meanwhile, users in New Zealand continued to report similar problems of unexpected braking.

In November, Auckland's Chris St Bruno was on his first ever Lime trip when the wheels locked up, sending him flying through the air and onto the footpath. The barista's 'excruciating' injuries required three days in hospital and 10 weeks off work.

At the time, St Bruno was critical of Lime's safety standards and condemned the company for allowing scooters on the streets that were capable of malfunctioning.

Despite Stuff's repeated attempts to clarify why the California-based company did not pull its e-scooters from New Zealand streets when it knew there were safety issues, Lime continued to offer vague explanations.

In a statement, Mentjox said: 'We pulled scooters from circulation in Switzerland and New Zealand to run analyses and testing.

'Because there are more scooters in New Zealand than Switzerland, pulling scooters for testing in Switzerland effectively paused operations there because of the smaller number of total scooters.

'This was a firmware issue rather than one that impacted a specific model of scooter. In New Zealand, we have ensured that the firmware update has been rolled out to every scooter in our fleet and we have manually checked each one as well.'

Following Auckland council's temporary ban, Lime's teams in China, San Francisco and Auckland identified the problem and produced a firmware update for all scooters.

That update eliminated the glitch and would reduce the number of incidents, Lime director Mitchell Price said at the time.

JUICERS STILL FEELING THE SQUEEZE

On Friday, Auckland Council gave Lime the green light for its e-scooters to return to Auckland streets, however, it has yet to redeploy its fleet while it carries out further quality assurance checks.

Mentjox told Stuff: 'The safety of our riders remains our utmost priority and following the council's decision to allow Lime back on the streets of Auckland, we have taken it upon ourselves to carry out further quality assurance checks across our fleet before the scooters are redeployed.

'Lime has accepted the conditions of Auckland Council and Auckland Transport and is committed to working in partnership with the city to provide a safe, affordable and sustainable transport option for the community.'

On Monday, Lime told its Auckland juicers - contractors paid to recharge e-scooters collected from the streets overnight - they could expect to see them back on the streets this week.

On a social media page set up by Auckland's contractors, some juicers called Lime's communication 'frustratingly vague', while others said 'it's better than no communication'.

Mentjox thanked Lime's juicers for being 'extremely patient and supportive during this time'.