Wait, They aren’t already?
Usually it would make sense for the operator of a vehicle to be the one liable in case of an accident, not the owner of a vehicle.
I’d imagine that in the case of vehicle sharing it might be difficult for law enforcement to determine who was operating the vehicle if the person in question leaves the scene of the accident. Making the company liable might encourage them to divulge information on who was operating the vehicle at that time.
What’s wrong with a good old fashioned “who was operating a scooter at this location at this time” legal request?
This new regulation protects the victim since they’d no longer have to get that information, they can get compensated directly from the owning company. The company can then presumably try to claim damages from the rider, I’m betting there’ll be a clause you agree to when renting which says you’ll have to pay up, but the victim doesn’t have to worry about any of that.
From the article it seems like they’re more focused on damage caused by leaving the scooters in dangerous places anyway, in those cases it’s much harder to identify who caused it. Making sure victims don’t have to wait around for that investigation seems reasonable, that could take a while if the owners aren’t liable since they won’t really care. It might even encourage the company to make sure their scooters are always stowed safely. Probably not, but it’s nice to be optimistic sometimes.
In Norway the operators has to have insurance for each scooter, but the riders are still responsible if they cause any accidents
