The Bucharest City Council approved on Monday, September 11, the granting of 25,000 extra vouchers for the purchase of bicycles in the "Cyclists in Bucharest" program. Meanwhile, some Bucharesters who got vouchers in the first phase of this program have been trying to sell them online.

The City Hall offered 5,000 vouchers for bike purchases, with each of them having a value of RON 500, at the end of June. Some 30,000 people submitted requests for vouchers prompting the municipality to call the program a success and grant more tickets. Thus, the municipality will spend about RON 15 million (EUR 3.3 million) to support this program.

However, some of those who got the free vouchers have put them up for sale on local classifieds website OLX.ro, looking to get between RON 350 and RON 400 for them. Their plans were stopped by OLX, however, as the platform's managers announced in a press release on Monday that they decided to delete all the ads that relate to this topic.

“The rules for granting the vouchers show that they are nominal and can not be transferred, so we decided to deactivate all the ads selling vouchers offered by the City Hall as soon as we became aware of this situation,” said Razvan Acsente, head of marketing at OLX Group Romania.

Acsente also said that the company would continue to monitor such actions. “Regarding this situation, OLX will still keep an eye on ads selling vouchers for bike purchases, so as to avoid and solve any fraud attempts,” reads the press release.

Mayor Gabriela Firea said on Monday, September 11, that she appreciated the fast reaction from OLX. She also reminded people that the vouchers couldn't be transferred from one person to another as every ticket has the holder's personal numeric code (CNP) written on it.

The City Council also passed a proposal to install 10,000 bike racks in Bucharest by September 30, 2018. They will be installed in stages, with the first 2,500 being planned for this year.

Opposition city councilor: Value of Bucharest City Hall bike vouchers will drop after taxes

Irina Marica, irina.marica@romania-insider.com