Brisbane cancels Beam contract amid ‘ghost scooter’ controversy

Commuters allegedly paid for 100,000 “ghost” Beam e-scooter trips over 12 months, when the company listed mechanically sound e-scooters as inactive, robbing Brisbane City Council of $330,000 in revenue.

Brisbane City Council subsequently cancelled its contract with e-scooter company Beam Mobility amid allegations the company secretly put 500 more e-scooters on Brisbane streets than the 1800 scooters its contract allowed, gaining extra profit.

A month-long council investigation found Beam had not been reporting correct figures, with 222,975 trips taken on unlicensed e-scooters between July 21, 2023 and July 22, 2024.

Brisbane City Council referred its allegations to police and the ACCC. Credit: Fairfax Media

It found Beam placed an average of 500 extra e-scooters each day in popular locations, exceeding the cap by more than 27 per cent.

The council said that by misleading it over the number of scooters operating in the city, Beam Mobility owed $330,000 in unpaid fees.

“What we found is that Beam were using the ‘unknown’ state – when the scooter has its battery low, or it is broken – to significantly under-report the number of scooters they had operating in Brisbane,” council’s transport committee chairman Ryan Murphy said.

“We found over 100,000 trips that were taken on those scooters that were designated as unknown or inactive,” Murphy said.

“So there were ‘ghost scooters’ operating in Brisbane for over a year and our own regulator didn’t have the data feed to tell us this was happening.”

The allegations were being investigated by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Beam Mobility said it disagreed with the council’s claim, and believed the investigation’s findings were premature.

“We will now be reviewing our options,” it said in a statement.

“As previously announced, Beam has appointed external advisers to manage an independent audit process, to examine the issues that have been raised regarding Beam’s fleet management system.

“Beam takes its obligations regarding fleet management seriously and is determined to work with its council partners on these issues.”

The council began investigating allegations of “phantom scooters” after a whistleblower came forward on August 4.

Beam and Neuron were Brisbane’s primary providers of e-scooters before Neuron lost its contract to Lime this year.Credit: Courtney Kruk

Until Monday, the council had two separate e-scooter contracts with Lime and Beam. It was now looking for an operator to replace Beam.

“Beam devices will progressively be removed and Council will now seek to replace Beam with a new e-mobility operator as soon as practical,” the council said in a statement.

Lime would distribute additional devices to help fill any shortfall in Brisbane’s shared e-mobility network, Murphy said.

More than 15 million shared e-mobility trips have been taken since Brisbane became the first city to use e-scooters in November 2018.

Last week, Auckland City Council referred Beam Mobility to New Zealand police alleging the company was concealing “intentional anomalies” in the number of operating scooters.

Beam operates in 31 Australia cities and towns including capitals Perth and Darwin, and regional areas including Cairns, Esperance and Bendigo.

In April, Brisbane City Council negotiated a deal with San Francisco-based Lime to provide 1700 e-scooters and 400 e-bikes to replace Singaporean company Neuron’s orange-coloured fleet.