“Ah, but they’re not going to put them back afterwards?” Taken aback, Claire, a regular user, can’t believe it. A few meters from her, Tier Mobility’s scooters are removed never to return to the streets of Paris. Benjamin Guerpillon, Director of Operations is not surprised: “We still receive a few messages from users who are surprised that they can no longer find our scooters. »
However, the event has made noise since the announcement of the referendum organized on April 2 by the Paris City Hall and which resulted in the outright banning of these “free floating” racing cars in the capital. Also, since August 18, the “Rangers” (the nickname of Tier Mobility employees responsible for the disposal and removal of scooters in the field) are busy everywhere in Paris to remove them.
Scooters redeployed in Île-de-France and Europe
“We are proceeding zone by zone to limit the impact of withdrawals,” explains Benjamin Guerpillon. Of the operator’s 5,000 devices, only 1,500 were still in service on Monday. At a rate of 400 to 700 withdrawals per day, they will have disappeared by September 1. This Tuesday morning, Sérigne, one of the thirty Rangers, travels through the 12th arrondissement at the wheel of his van in search of the last survivors that he locates by GPS.
The scooters will then be taken to the operator’s warehouse to be checked and repaired before knowing their new destination. A short trip for a third of them, redeployed in the 80 cities of Île-de-France (Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, Marne-la-Vallée, etc.) where Tier Mobility offers its services. The others will be sent to Germany or Poland where the operator is also present. No time to be unemployed.
Jobs in danger
Fortunately for Sérigne and his colleagues, unemployment is not on the agenda either. Despite the loss of a major market, the company claims to want to keep all of its employees according to Benjamin Guerpillon: “On average, they have been there for 2 to 3 years, this represents a real internal skill that we want to safeguard. »
A chance for them. Contacted by 20 minutes, the operator Dott, which finished withdrawing its scooters a week before the deadline, has already announced the closure of its operational center in Wissous on August 31 and the launch of a job protection plan (PSE) . In all, about fifty jobs are directly threatened and an employee assistance plan has been put in place to help them find work (support for six months from a specialized firm, financing of training, contacts with many companies of the sector who are recruiting).
Full on cycling and the Olympics
To sustain its jobs, Tier, like its competitors, Dott or Lime, relies on the bicycle. A still hypothetical modal shift: “The studies we have carried out give results that are still uncertain,” explains Benjamin Guerpillon. According to the director of operations, although the uses of the bicycle are different from those of the scooter (journeys longer by 25% on average according to the figures of the operator), it has several advantages, in particular a greater speed (limitation at 25 km/h against 20 km/h for the scooter).
With a fleet of 5,000 bicycles in the capital, Tier is counting on the Paris 2024 Olympic Games and on the support of the city and its pro-cycling policy (cycle paths, parking areas, etc.) to develop this service. . Asked about this by 20 minutes last June, David Belliard, assistant to Anne Hidalgo in charge of mobility and destroyer of scooters, said he was in favor of complementary solutions to Vélib’. Discussions have already taken place between operators and several elected officials last April on this subject.
By removing two new scooters, Sérigne took the opportunity to change the battery of a company bike parked next door: “We really hope it will work. It’s a useful service, and we really want to keep our job. »
It’s only a good bye ” ?
Still, if the self-service scooters say “goodbye”, and perhaps farewell, to the capital, the “trott’s” do not disappear completely. Some operators, such as Volt, are preparing to offer long-term rental offers for electric scooters.
Private scooters remain authorized in Paris, and some are already surfing on the place left vacant for the moment. Sometimes even in the literal sense like The good corner which is launching a campaign in favor of second-hand scooters by painting on the spaces formerly reserved for operator parking, a QR code which, once scanned on a smartphone, leads directly to its online offer.