Italy fines e-scooter firms Bird, Dott and Lime €2.6 million over blocked free rides in Rome

Competition watchdog finds e-scooter and e-bike operators made it too difficult for public transport season-ticket holders to claim their free trips. Italy's competition authority has fined the three companies licensed to run shared e-scooter and e-bike services in Rome a combined €2.675 million for obstructing customers' access to free rides they were entitled to. Bird, Dott and Lime were sanctioned at the close of an investigation opened in November 2025, which examined the companies' conduct over the period of their current Rome operating licence, running from 2023 to 2026. What the fine is for Under an agreement with Rome city council, holders of an annual Metrebus season ticket, valid across the capital's public transport network, are entitled to a package of free rides on shared e-scooters and e-bikes, a benefit designed to encourage combined use of public transport and micromobility. To use it, customers must activate the offer through each operator's app. The competition watchdog - Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM) - found that all three companies had put in place organisational systems and procedures that were inadequate to handle user requests, making it slow and difficult to activate the free-ride packages and leaving customers less time to actually use them. The regulator said the companies had advertised and promised a benefit to season-ticket holders without providing effective means of accessing it, and stressed that the problem lay with commercial conduct rather than the standard of the vehicles themselves. Lime, which operates the largest fleet in Rome, received the heaviest penalty, of €1.4 million, after the authority found it had relied on a largely manual system, with a single member of staff handling more than 1,100 requests, causing systematic delays and, in many cases, no response at all. Dott was fined €525,000 and Bird €300,000 for the same type of conduct. Bird was also hit with a separate fine of €450,000 after the authority found it had deactivated customer accounts, often over alleged parking infractions, without giving prior notice of the reasons or a chance to respond. Impact on consumers The regulator said the conduct had a significant impact on consumers, since it restricted access to a mobility service that complements public transport and produces lower emissions than private cars. The investigation followed hundreds of complaints from users over several years, many reporting long waits to activate the free-ride benefit or difficulty reversing account suspensions. Consumer group Codacons welcomed the sanction, saying Rome residents with Metrebus season tickets had been unfairly denied free rides on the shared vehicles the three operators were contractually obliged to provide. Photo credit: Olha Siomik / Shutterstock.com

WIRE — Competition watchdog finds e-scooter and e-bike operators made it too difficult for public transport season-ticket holders to claim their free trips. Italy's competition authority has fined the three companies licensed to run shared e-scooter and e-bike services in Rome a combined €2.675 million for obstructing customers' access to free rides they were entitled to. Bird, Dott and Lime were sanctioned at the close of an investigation opened in November 2025, which examined the companies' conduct over the period of their current Rome operating licence, running from 2023 to 2026. What the fine is for Under an agreement with Rome city council, holders of an annual Metrebus season ticket, valid across the capital's public transport network, are entitled to a package of free rides on shared e-scooters and e-bikes, a benefit designed to encourage combined use of public transport and micromobility. To use it, customers must activate the offer through each operator's app. The competition watchdog - Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM) - found that all three companies had put in place organisational systems and procedures that were inadequate to handle user requests, making it slow and difficult to activate the free-ride packages and leaving customers less time to actually use them. The regulator said the companies had advertised and promised a benefit to season-ticket holders without providing effective means of accessing it, and stressed that the problem lay with commercial conduct rather than the standard of the vehicles themselves. Lime, which operates the largest fleet in Rome, received the heaviest penalty, of €1.4 million, after the authority found it had relied on a largely manual system, with a single member of staff handling more than 1,100 requests, causing systematic delays and, in many cases, no response at all. Dott was fined €525,000 and Bird €300,000 for the same type of conduct. Bird was also hit with a separate fine of €450,000 after the authority found it had deactivated customer accounts, often over alleged parking infractions, without giving prior notice of the reasons or a chance to respond. Impact on consumers The regulator said the conduct had a significant impact on consumers, since it restricted access to a mobility service that complements public transport and produces lower emissions than private cars. The investigation followed hundreds of complaints from users over several years, many reporting long waits to activate the free-ride benefit or difficulty reversing account suspensions. Consumer group Codacons welcomed the sanction, saying Rome residents with Metrebus season tickets had been unfairly denied free rides on the shared vehicles the three operators were contractually obliged to provide. Photo credit: Olha Siomik / Shutterstock.com

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