Biking bonus: The cities that pay you to cycle to work

Florence has become the latest city to incentivise cycling to work or school.

Cycle commuters can earn up to €30 per month using an app and small Bluetooth device attached to their bike.

The same ‘Pin Bike’ system is now used across 30 cities, where it boosts cycling by an average of 7 km per day per participant.

Following this success, the initiative is being targeted at schools, public bodies and private companies that want to encourage cycling.

Tax incentives for cycling to work

If you cycle for business reasons, your employer can pay you a tax-free mileage allowance of up to 20p per mile. Unfortunately, the commuting journeys between your home and permanent workplace don’t qualify.

By contrast, cyclists in the Netherlands can reduce their tax bill by €0.21 per km of cycle commuting. That’s worth €450 a year to a Dutch cyclist travelling 9km to work.

It’s just one of the ways the Dutch promote and support cycling on top of 35,000 km of dedicated cycle infrastructure. And 70 per cent of traffic calmed, 20mph urban streets.

An increase in car use prompted former Secretary of State for Infrastructure, Stientje Van Veldhoven, to tweak Dutch tax law so companies could effectively pay staff to cycle to work: “The bicycle makes an important contribution to accessibility, liveability and health. It reduces traffic jams. That’s why I want to stimulate cycling with the goal that there will be 200,000 extra commuters from the car and that we will make 3 billion more bicycle kilometres together.”

25% of Dutch people cycle every day

Could the same work here?

In Britain, four million people drive less than four miles to work by car.

If we adopted the Dutch scheme, a person who swapped a four mile car commute for cycling could pay £46.40 less tax each month. Such measures are offset by savings made on the external costs of motoring such as congestion, health and pollution.

This may come as a surprise to those who believe motorists are the government’s cash cow. While everyone accepts cars are a major household expense, there is limited comprehension of their private (internal) and social (external) cost per km, year, or lifetime of use. So says ‘The lifetime cost of driving a car‘ – research that puts the total at £500,000; an eye watering sum of which society shoulders 41 per cent.

The internal costs are particularly burdensome to low-income motorists, who must invest a large share of their net income to own and operate a private vehicle. Furthermore, poorer neighbourhoods are more likely to be plagued by motor traffic air pollution and road danger. Just another reason why investment in cycling is so worthwhile.

The ethical choice

The ETA was established in 1990 as an ethical provider of green, reliable travel services. Over 30 years on, we continue to offer cycle insurance , breakdown cover  and mobility scooter insurance while putting concern for the environment at the heart of all we do.

The Good Shopping Guide judges us to be the UK’s most ethical provider.