Through Bucharest with Blinkee Electric Scooters

What is Blinkee?

Blinkee.city is a company (application) that allows you to rent electric scooters. This application is also available now in Bucharest, besides the other 21 cities in Europe (cities in Poland, Hungary, Croatia, Spain, Sweden).

For start in Bucharest, there are only 20 electric scooters are available. But according to company representatives, they want 50 scooters to be available by the end of July this year. And to multiply the areas where these scooters can be parked.

How to use Blinkee?

Blinkee is very easy to use. You need a phone that is connected to the internet, and the GPS turned on to locate you on the map as accurately as possible and of course a driving license/ document stating that you can drive these scooters. Install the Blinkee app (Android, IOS) and already half of the job is done.

After installation, you’ll need an account that you create in less than 2 minutes. Then, just take a photo of your driving license and enter a payment method. Then you only have to wait until the photographed document is validated and you are allowed to use the app (it lasted about 30 minutes for me on a Saturday).

Unlike the electric trotters in Bucharest that need you to scan a QR code to use them, for Blinkee all this operation is carried out in the application.

Once you have identified the desired scooter on the map, you just select it and reserve it. Then you have 15 minutes to get to it and go on the trip. Inside the outer boot, you will also find two protective helmets that will make your trip safer.

How much does Blinkee cost in Bucharest?

At this moment, Blinkee does not have a starting price (which is extraordinary). And the first 2 minutes of the race are not charged (minutes that are needed to put on the helmets anyway).

Now one minute on a Blinkee scooter costs 0.79 lei, reduced from 0.89 lei. If you want your scooter reserved, you can pause the race and be charged only 0.09 lei per minute. And if these prices have not yet impressed you, well, there is a limit of 99 lei for a full day driving/using the scooter (between 00:00 and 23:59).
P.S. If you are a student you only pay 0.67 RON per minute.

More details about the actual costs and actual prices of Blinkee can be found here.

Why is Blinkee good for Bucharest?

We believe that Blinkee is good for both tourists and residents for the following reasons:

• doesn’t pollute (an extraordinary thing especially in a big city like Bucharest);
• it is amazing to ride a scooter that doesn’t make any noise, so the journey with it is very relaxing;
• although at first glance the traffic in Bucharest does not seem very friendly to scooters, we can say that at least on weekends there are no problems. we felt safe all the time from Timpuri Noi to Romexpo (almost at the other end of the city);
• the scooter can fit 2 people (it is equipped with 2 helmets). The two people will sit very comfortable on Blinkee scooters because they are wide enough to not bother you;
• the pause function makes it very good for intense use throughout the day;
• you do not have to go to an office to rent a scooter, everything is done through the application.

How is it like to use Scooters in Bucharest?

It’s really fun to use Blinkee through Bucharest. We spent about half an hour on the scooter and we can say it was great. Besides we arrived at the destination without polluting and in peace, we found that we can also go with the scooter in Bucharest.

The last time I drove a scooter was in Bali (our experiences here) where over 70% of the traffic was made up of scooters. We have always wondered how safe is to drive a scooter in Bucharest, but on this occasion, we found the answer. It’s very funny!

They have enough autonomy to keep you going. Plus when you reserve a scooter, it also tells you what autonomy it has, depending on the battery level.

However, the autonomy depends very much on how you use the scooter, it has 3 “speeds”. Until we discovered this we were going with 25 km/h in first gear, which was very frustrating. Especially when everyone passes you, including cyclists. But once we found out, we switched to second gear, where we were allowed to go with 43-35km/h, which put a huge smile on our face. Finally, we could really enjoy the experience of driving a scooter. I tested a little bit the third speed, but it did not seem to have a major impact on the maximum speed. (It almost reached 50 hm/h). But the estimated autonomy was halved, which made us quick to realize that we are better off at the second speed.

I tried at one point to put the scooter on the pause mode (as we wait for a friend to start his Blinkee scooter), but the application did not let me, announcing that there is a problem and try again or contact them. (contact button didn’t work :(.) So we stayed for a few minutes on the normal rate of the race. I don’t know if I did something wrong or was an error of the app. But it didn’t bother me (I could have stopped the race and start it again if I wanted).

In conclusion, it is now very easy to travel through Bucharest with the help of the scooters from Blinkee.city.