The Ginger app has been updated to check driving licence information.
From today, users will be required to submit this information when they set up their details, before they can unlock a scooter for the first time. The check is a one-time setup.
Registered users today received a text message that read:
Hi! It’s Ginger here. We have a new driving licence verification feature on the app. Next time you #GoGinger please have your licence with you. It takes seconds.
Ginger
An email bulletin was issued later in the morning:
The Department for Transport mandates that all e-scooter riders hold at least a provisional driving licence to participate in the government’s trial programmes. However, for the first few weeks of the Middlesbrough trial – the first such project to go live in the UK and where Ginger is the sole operator – checking licences was not a feature of the app used to register riders and unlock the scooters.
Middlesbrough has understandably been in the spotlight as the shared scooter pioneer but stories of underage users have caused concern. Requiring driving licence details before releasing scooters should help shore up safety.
This will be important given that the scooter trial appears to be going down well with local residents: Ginger says that 1,500 riders have collectively travelled 15,000 miles on the e-scooters since the trial began in July.
In time, most micromobility providers hope that licence requirement will be dropped, to bring e-scooters into line with bikes and e-bikes. For now, Ginger is ensuring that riders comply with DfT guidelines and that is a good thing.
