Beryl - bike & e-scooter hire 4+

No bell!

The scooter I hired bad no bell which was extremely dangerous riding where I did today. I had to keep stopping and asking people to move! As no bell. I wasn’t going to pay another unlocking fee to pick up a scooter with a bell.
Then when I parked in a bay and wanted to end ride, I got a warning message saying are you sure you want to end the ride as parking outside bay fees may apply!? Why do that to me? So I rode around til a 1 min within its battery life and riding out more and more minutes trying to find another bay to park in so I don’t get charged. Eventually with 1% battery left I go back to the one I’d first found and took a chance and just ended the ride.
Thankfully it said thank you for parking in a bay.
So much hassle for nothing
Also I’d suggest there is a way of finding AND navigating to bays!!! Nearest bay to you and not have to waste time going back and forth into google maps to try find out how to get to one.

Developer Response ,

Hi- We're so sorry for the frustration this has caused. Thanks for your review. Our customer service team can look into this for you. Just send us an email at support@beryl.cc or use the messenger within the Beryl app. In future you can message us right away so we can help and you can also use the 'Get Directions' feature to find a bay. We hope your next ride with us will be much smoother. Ana at Beryl

Nice app and service, new silver bikes are better!

Beryl is really good. The app is easy to use and having a bike service in Watford is so useful. Although the bikes are bone shakers and not the most comfortable, but this is the same with all the bike services I have used in London. The silver Beryl bikes are much better. Something to note is, when you finish your ride, make sure it is in a dedicated Beryl bay. I didn’t realise this and parked the bike with 4 other Beryl bikes, but was charged £5 as it was ‘not in a Beryl bay’ some bays have no indication they are Beryl bays. You can check in the app, but not easy when on a bike. Also, make sure when you lock your bike, you hear a beep. Otherwise your ride may not be acknowledged as finished and you’ll keep getting charged.

On several occasions, I have been prompted to update my payment details, even though I have pre paid credit available. I understand this is because I may exceed my credit limit during my ride, but the prompt only comes up when you try to unlock a bike, so it’s very inconvenient when you are in a rush. I don’t use bikes as much as I would like, so I think my card details have changed on occasions, but it would be great if you could get an alert when you open the app that your preferred payment details are out of date or invalid, rather than right when you want to use a bike.

Developer Response ,

Hi- We're so sorry for the frustration this has caused. Thank you for taking the time to help us improve Beryl! Could you please contact us directly at support@beryl.cc and send screenshots of the bugs you referred to. We'd love to get to the bottom of this so that we can get it right for you. Ana at Beryl

Excellent method of in town transport

I first decided to use a Beryl bike when returning from Hereford railway station to home, when the buses were out of schedule and the taxis were too expensive. I was very impressed, the bikes themselves are smart and a pleasure to ride, and when one is faulty they are repaired and put back into service relatively quickly. They’re also reasonably priced (£5 for 100 minutes, and given it takes me about 20 minutes to cycle from the city centre to home it works out to roughly £1 for an almost 3 mile journey, cheaper than the bus).

I have since become well accustomed to them and use them almost daily to go into and around town, they are very convenient and a much more practical way to get around than using a private bike, especially if you don’t have much room at home. I honestly can’t think of any reasonable complaints to make. Thank you very much Beryl for providing an excellent solution to city journeys in Hereford, I am incredibly eager to see more of these spring up around the country.