Voi Hire e-scooters and Theft

[jackofall84]

We seem to have a huge amount of these orange voi scooters around Bristol now. I seem to see more that look either dumped or parked somewhere random than being used but that's just my observations. I was wondering what's stopping these thing's being stolen all the time though?

They're apparently based on the Segway Max G30 scooter which costs around £600. But you can buy a control board for the Max G30 off ebay for £40. So once you've removed the voi scooters controller and swapped in the G30 control board it's good to go again? GPS scanners cost next to nothing to ensure all trackers are removed/disabled.

I would just assume a company would take better care of it's assets by having a mechanical means to lock them up once a registered user has finished with it's use by having specific parking bays with special locks on. Maybe that's the cynic in me or a lack of trust in humans though?

[tomsugden]

I've wondered this too. How do these things charge when they're just dumped on the pavement?

[anonymous-user]

Been thinking the same. Probably some stupid clause in the contract that the local authority ends up footing the bill for lost/stolen units at the end of the trial period.

They are trialling something similar in Birmingham too. Going to head up there after travel restrictions ease to have a go.

[jackofall84]

tomsugden said:

I've wondered this too. How do these things charge when they're just dumped on the pavement?

If it's anything like the Bird or Lime systems in the US, employees have an app alerting them where flat battery scooters are and they drive around and collect them to take home and charge, it also tells employees where any are located that are out of the GEO zone.

I don't want to make it seem like I've got any intention of stealing one of these things, but I spent about 20 mins doing some googling to see how these things operate out of curiosity. I was just thinking if it was my business I wouldn't simply rely on a GPS tracker to stop people stealing a £600 scooter.

[Spare tyre]

We’ve just got them in Southampton, the theft thing is going to be interesting

The yellow yo bikes all got nicked,lobbed in the sea,p and then withdrawn. A real shame as in theory it was a nice to have especially for students and visiting seamen

I might go try the voi scooter out before they disappear

[anonymous-user]

I guess that people don't steal them because you can buy a pretty decent scooter such as a Xiaomi M365 or a Segway E25, brand new, for about £400.

If you steal a rental scooter, you will have to buy the new parts and remove the GPS gubbins (assuming you know what you are doing) and you will also have to buy a new charger for it (£50ish)

So all in all you will have spent £100 just to get a pinched rental scooter up and running, when for £300 more you could have a new one that isn't going to get you arrested for theft.

Having said that, if you did steal one and get it running, it would be the perfect way to get around. Anyone who looks at you will assume you are just riding a rental scooter and are therefore legal. Wouldn't get a second look, unlike if you were riding a privately owned one.

[Spare tyre]

jackofall84 said:

tomsugden said:

I've wondered this too. How do these things charge when they're just dumped on the pavement?

If it's anything like the Bird or Lime systems in the US, employees have an app alerting them where flat battery scooters are and they drive around and collect them to take home and charge, it also tells employees where any are located that are out of the GEO zone.

I don't want to make it seem like I've got any intention of stealing one of these things, but I spent about 20 mins doing some googling to see how these things operate out of curiosity. I was just thinking if it was my business I wouldn't simply rely on a GPS tracker to stop people stealing a £600 scooter.

I think for lime in the us there was or still is a lucrative incentive for you guns to go out collecting them from weird places and charging them and returning them to the right place

I think I saw a doc CO where some 15 year old was getting up early before school and rounding them all up from the drunks the night before, charging them over school hours then placing them in the best hotspot for best payout

[jackofall84]

Lord Marylebone said:

I guess that people don't steal them because you can buy a pretty decent scooter such as a Xiaomi M365 or a Segway E25, brand new, for about £400.

If you steal a rental scooter, you will have to buy the new parts and remove the GPS gubbins (assuming you know what you are doing) and you will also have to buy a new charger for it (£50ish)

So all in all you will have spent £100 just to get a pinched rental scooter up and running, when for £300 more you could have a new one that isn't going to get you arrested for theft.

Having said that, if you did steal one and get it running, it would be the perfect way to get around. Anyone who looks at you will assume you are just riding a rental scooter and are therefore legal. Wouldn't get a second look, unlike if you were riding a privately owned one.

I'd have thought if you're of the mind set where you steal thing's, £300 is a reasonable saving?

[Lynchie999]

Spare tyre said:

jackofall84 said:

tomsugden said:

I've wondered this too. How do these things charge when they're just dumped on the pavement?

If it's anything like the Bird or Lime systems in the US, employees have an app alerting them where flat battery scooters are and they drive around and collect them to take home and charge, it also tells employees where any are located that are out of the GEO zone.

I don't want to make it seem like I've got any intention of stealing one of these things, but I spent about 20 mins doing some googling to see how these things operate out of curiosity. I was just thinking if it was my business I wouldn't simply rely on a GPS tracker to stop people stealing a £600 scooter.

I think for lime in the us there was or still is a lucrative incentive for you guns to go out collecting them from weird places and charging them and returning them to the right place

I think I saw a doc CO where some 15 year old was getting up early before school and rounding them all up from the drunks the night before, charging them over school hours then placing them in the best hotspot for best payout

Yeh, I was reading about the southsea ones, I think you get a discount or something if you leave them within a certain GPS zone..

[ARHarh]

jackofall84 said:

Lord Marylebone said:

I guess that people don't steal them because you can buy a pretty decent scooter such as a Xiaomi M365 or a Segway E25, brand new, for about £400.

If you steal a rental scooter, you will have to buy the new parts and remove the GPS gubbins (assuming you know what you are doing) and you will also have to buy a new charger for it (£50ish)

So all in all you will have spent £100 just to get a pinched rental scooter up and running, when for £300 more you could have a new one that isn't going to get you arrested for theft.

Having said that, if you did steal one and get it running, it would be the perfect way to get around. Anyone who looks at you will assume you are just riding a rental scooter and are therefore legal. Wouldn't get a second look, unlike if you were riding a privately owned one.

I'd have thought if you're of the mind set where you steal thing's, £300 is a reasonable saving?

the sort of people who would steel them wont have £300 to save.

[anonymous-user]

jackofall84 said:

I'd have thought if you're of the mind set where you steal thing's, £300 is a reasonable saving?

I'm going to assume that the sort of people who would steal scooters and/or throw them in canals, aren't the sort of people who would have the skills, intelligence, or inclination to start reading up on the electronics schematics, tinkering with GPS units, and sourcing parts from the internet.

Most petty criminals or ASBO teenagers would rather just steal something that they could either sell or use without any hassle.

Stealing scooters which require some electronics knowledge to reactivate are probably incredibly far down their list of worthwhile thefts.

[jackofall84]

Lord Marylebone said:

I'm going to assume that the sort of people who would steal scooters and/or throw them in canals, aren't the sort of people who would have the skills, intelligence, or inclination to start reading up on the electronics schematics, tinkering with GPS units, and sourcing parts from the internet.

Most petty criminals or ASBO teenagers would rather just steal something that they could either sell or use without any hassle.

Stealing scooters which require some electronics knowledge to reactivate are probably incredibly far down their list of worthwhile thefts.

Fair point, I have a habit of over estimating the abilities of the general public.

[98elise]

Lord Marylebone said:

jackofall84 said:

I'd have thought if you're of the mind set where you steal thing's, £300 is a reasonable saving?

I'm going to assume that the sort of people who would steal scooters and/or throw them in canals, aren't the sort of people who would have the skills, intelligence, or inclination to start reading up on the electronics schematics, tinkering with GPS units, and sourcing parts from the internet.

Most petty criminals or ASBO teenagers would rather just steal something that they could either sell or use without any hassle.

Stealing scooters which require some electronics knowledge to reactivate are probably incredibly far down their list of worthwhile thefts.

Agreed. If you want a working scooter just mug someone for their personal scooter. Why steal one you have to work on to get going.

[jackofall84]

98elise said:

Agreed. If you want a working scooter just mug someone for their personal scooter. Why steal one you have to work on to get going.

Having said that, people steal cars, chop shop style and sell the parts. I'll bet a Segway max G30 battery and motor are probably worth a bit on eBay?

[anonymous-user]

jackofall84 said:

98elise said:

Agreed. If you want a working scooter just mug someone for their personal scooter. Why steal one you have to work on to get going.

Having said that, people steal cars, chop shop style and sell the parts. I'll bet a Segway max G30 battery and motor are probably worth a bit on eBay?

I still don’t think the figures make it worth doing.

People steal Golf R’s, Sprinter vans, and Range Rovers because they can sell the parts for thousands, if not tens of thousands.

People are very suspicious about buying used scooter/ebike batteries on ebay as they are often being sold because they are nearing the end of their life, so they don’t often fetch big money.

A non-genuine battery pack for most of the popular e scooters is around £100, brand new.

[Gecko1978]

I think its steal and chuck not steal and ride round. Plus if you steel a lime one when you get to destination a then what take it inside or leave it outside an a legitimate rider goes off on it.

[Maximus_Meridius101]

We had a cycle hire scheme down here, so many ended up in the river / burned out / stolen / damaged beyond repair, that the company behind the scheme pulled out. We’ve now got an e-scooter trial going on, thus far they haven’t been found in the basketball hoops in the local parks, on fire, but it is early days.

[anonymous-user]

Gecko1978 said:

I think its steal and chuck not steal and ride round. Plus if you steel a lime one when you get to destination a then what take it inside or leave it outside an a legitimate rider goes off on it.

Absolutely.

A certain section of society will spend their spare time stealing them and throwing them in canals and onto wasteland. We saw it with bicycle hire schemes.

We can only hope they get bored of it.

[TTmonkey]

We used Lime scooters in Budapest. Many were left on the various bridges across the Danube.

I reckon they probably had lost a few over the side of the bridge.



They are tracked by GPS which is bloody accurate, so if you nick one, you have to disable the GPS tracking before you get to wherever you need to take it to do all the electronics swap out.

You can’t ride them out of rental zone, so it would have to go in the back of a wagon to take it away further. When you get to the edge of a geo zone they just stop working. Brakes get applied too. You wouldn’t nick one you’ve just logged into anyway... would you


Much more likely to get thrown in a river than nicked for permanent theft. Unsellable too. So I think this is why they don’t get truly nicked.

[Slackline]

Then there's the hire bikes. I think the business plan, in China anyway, is to just produce them quicker than people park them!

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2018/03/bike-sha...