This is how divvy works as well. If there are no acoustic bikes you can pay for the e-bike or pay as would for a regular bike but get an e-bike in low power mode. I find it basically gives just enough power that it feels like a regular bike.

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Looks like this is the same feature chicago used to have on ventra cards, but they canned that program seemingly due to low utilization. But it does seem like a great feature for the unbanked if it doesn’t come with high fees.