Ottawa has just put an end to a scam that allowed unscrupulous buyers of electric vehicles to obtain federal assistance for the purchase of $5,000 on dozens of vehicles, then resell them at full price. However, this measure cripples the Montreal company Weeve, which helps Uber drivers acquire electric vehicles as well.
Transport Canada’s Zero-Emission Vehicle Incentive (ZEVI) program has had a clear limit since its inception: if you are a business, the assistance of up to $5,000 per vehicle purchased will be limited to ten vehicles per year. Except that some unscrupulous dealers were simply opening numbered companies one after the other to take advantage of this program on more than ten vehicles.
Transport Canada has become aware of this scheme and has recently been trying to block it by refusing assistance beyond ten vehicles for all numbered companies that belong to the same owner.
For the federal government, Weeve falls into this category. The company was created in Montreal at the end of 2020 by young entrepreneurs eager to help people quickly acquire their first electric vehicle. The company, then called Louélec, presents itself as the “Netflix of electric cars”: it rents electric vehicles by the month or week according to a turnkey model that is especially suitable for newcomers looking for a first job.
Louélec then changed its name to Weeve in order to conquer the pan-Canadian market.
Weeve has since put some 700 of these zero-emission vehicles on the road, which it buys directly from manufacturers and for which it has received the same $5,000 federal assistance as individuals.
“It’s a program that was designed very specifically for individuals,” says Léo Bouisson, CEO of Weeve. That’s the main problem, he notes. “If our goal was just to resell cars to put federal aid in our pockets, it would be very different. Here, we’re helping some of the most polluting drivers reduce their vehicle emissions to almost nothing. We probably represent more than half of Uber’s electric vehicles in the country.”
“We have told our partners that we are putting the brakes on the purchase of new vehicles. We hope that the government will reconsider its position.”
The example of Australia
Weeve would like to see Transport Canada rethink its IVZE program to favor projects that have a greater and faster impact on reducing GHG emissions. The electrification of taxis and car-sharing vehicles like those of Uber or other similar services could fall into this category, suggests Léo Bouisson.
The young entrepreneur cites the example of the Australian government, which has ensured that companies like Weeve have no difficulty receiving the promised federal aid to purchase electric vehicles.
If the situation doesn’t change, Weeve doesn’t know what it will do. The idea of buying cheap hybrid or gasoline vehicles is being floated, but with little enthusiasm. “That’s not our intention,” says Bouisson.
Contacted by The Pressthe Federal Ministry of Transport, which is responsible for the IVZE programme, declined to comment on the matter.