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Victims hit by rental e-scooters on German streets will have an easier time gaining compensation from their operators under legislation due to pass parliament that would put the vehicles on a similar legal footing to cars.
The draft law by the right-left coalition government, which has been welcomed by consumer rights advocates, says that given the rapid rise in the use of e-scooters in recent years coupled with high accident rates, rental operators such as Lime and Bolt should be held liable.
“Those who earn money renting e-scooters should also take responsibility for the damage caused by these vehicles,” said justice minister, Stefanie Hubig, one of the bill’s sponsors, before the vote scheduled for late on Thursday night.
Riders, however, will also share liability under the measure for any “presumed fault” in a collision they are believed to have caused, in line with policies that already apply to other motorised vehicles such as cars.
E-scooters have been permitted on German roads since ۲۰۱۹ and are restricted to riders aged ۱۴ and over.
The new policy, which does not address other motorised rentals such as e-bikes, also explicitly targets accidents caused by e-scooters improperly left on footpaths and pavements – a scourge in German cities that operators and local authorities are under pressure to address.
The government cited figures showing e-scooter accidents in which the number of people hurt or killed more than doubled since ۲۰۲۱, to nearly ۱۲,۰۰۰ in ۲۰۲۴ from ۵,۵۳۵ three years earlier. In ۲۰۲۴, that represented about ۴% of all traffic accidents with casualties.
Twenty-seven people died in such accidents in ۲۰۲۴ – all of them riding the e-scooters themselves. About ۱,۵۰۰ people were badly hurt while about ۱۱,۴۰۰ suffered minor injuries.
Insurance sector data show that users of rental e-scooters tend to be younger, less experienced and more likely to ride on pavements than owners of the vehicles.
The government said findings showed the number of non-riders hit rose to about ۵,۰۰۰ in ۲۰۲۳ from ۱,۱۵۰ in ۲۰۲۰. Data on accidents caused by falsely parked e-scooters are not centrally collected.
Victims are currently required to show that the e-scooter rider was at fault to file a claim – a standard of proof difficult to provide because the riders are often hard to conclusively identify. In accidents caused by e-scooters improperly parked in public spaces such as pavements, it is even more difficult to find the person at fault.
Under the new law, the rental companies themselves can be held responsible and victims can gain compensation directly from the firms. “The rights of affected passersby are being strengthened vis-a-vis the operating companies – they (the victims) will no longer be left just to foot the bill,” Beate Saupe from the Saxony state consumer advice centre told public broadcaster MDR, welcoming the draft legislation.
However, Anna Montasser of the Shared Mobility lobbying group representing e-scooter operators said the industry now expected more cases of fraudulent claims. “Damage caused to a person or property can simply be attributed to a provider, entirely regardless of fault,” she said, adding that the legislation could set off a flood of lawsuits that would “inundate German courts”.
It is relatively easy to identify a rider who caused a collision based on rental data showing who was using it at the time, she said.
But accidents caused by errant e-scooters left in hazardous spots were trickier to trace, Montasser said, noting it was often third parties who overturned scooters, creating obstacles for pedestrians or damaging parked cars.
German voters welcomed the plans, with ۶۷% saying they favoured the new liability rules for e-scooter operators, according to a YouGov poll.
The government has already approved a tightening of safety rules for e-scooters from next year, requiring new models to have turn indicators and imposing higher fines for those who ride with two or more people on board.
Nearly ۵۰۰ people were seriously injured in collisions involving e-scooters in Britain last year, government statistics have shown.
