“Bicycle use is increasing in the business world. It is reaching an unprecedented peak. However, the mandatory benefit owed by the employer remains unknown,” observes this business leader, who with his company Devside, had developed the Coronalert app and the Covid Safe Ticket app for the State. “I myself started Cycling in 2013. I felt very alone on the Boulevard du Souverain with my cart to transport my children. Since then, more and more people have started doing it.” At the same time, the exempt mileage allowance has increased from 15 to 25 cents, “then 35 in 2024. And I admit, it is very annoying to calculate: who is going to have fun manually noting down trips for sums of €4.28?” The developer would not be surprised to learn that “some employers impose this modus operandi to discourage employees.”
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Expense report
Jean-Paul de Ville’s idea is simple: use technology to automatically detect that you are riding your bike. Via your connected objects, Sweel starts as soon as you pedal and stops when you stop. “Start and stop are automatic: you never have to launch the app and never connect to it: everything is processed without any user intervention on their phone.”
quotation markThe monthly report is clear, precise, with data that allows each trip to be proven to the FPS with accuracy.
“Everything” is a monthly report of all your journeys and the calculation of the related allowance. This downloadable expense report in PDF format indicates the departure and arrival points for each journey with clickable GPS coordinates. “It’s clear, precise, with data that allows you to prove each trip to the FPS with precision”. All 100% free. “The app is very geared towards the self-employed. For example, I ‘earn’ the €3,500 easily and without doing anything”, enthuses the web designer. “And I completely forget about my app”. But there’s no reason for an employee who benefits from the home-work allowance paid by their employer to do without the tool. “We also offer a paid program for companies, which allows them to manage their employees’ bicycle kilometers automatically”.
To set up Sweel, you download the app. Once registered, you enter your data (days and times to be taken into account, your email details, etc.) and the mandatory reimbursable amount for your employer (€0.35) or more if it is more generous. Or even another amount if you operate on a foreign tax system. Then, everything is automatic. “The user does absolutely nothing,” boasts the designer. “The monthly report can be uploaded to a cloud, sent by email or saved in your accounting via the Accountable app if you are self-employed.”
Other options enhance the use. “We work as a trio and are all three cyclists, so we know the needs. We can configure our type of lock to ask the app if the insurance accepts it, we have integrated a speed alert if we go too fast and it becomes dangerous, and also a ‘my bike on paper’ file in PDF to download in one click to submit to the police in the event of theft”. GPS navigation is also part of the package, “which works very well for alternative routes via quieter roads”, says Jean-Paul de Ville. “But the essence of the app is the expense report”.
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Error after… jogging
To develop Sweel, the team tested dozens of contemporary phones. “A constraint came to us from devices that do not trigger automatically. This is the case with some Android phones”. A shortcut was then cleared that allows Sweel to be connected to widespread apps. “We can indicate in Strava whether we distinguish between ‘work’ and ‘leisure’ journeys so that Sweel only takes the former into account”, explains the founder of Devside. “We also tested bicycle batteries connected to Apple Health and Google Fit”. And thus imported the data collected by these trackers.
quotation markThe user himself obviously cannot modify a trace manually, otherwise the app loses all its reliability.
Finally, a button in the app lets you report if the recorded route is incorrect. Causes? “GPS calculation error, loss of signal, ‘eco’ mode activated, tracking that continues when you walk around your arrival point…” Or, in a very rare case, “if a jog is confused with a bike ride. But you have to be very fit and go the distance”, jokes the designer. Who gets serious again: “This feedback allows us to improve our algorithm and reconstruct the route afterwards”. The tracking is said to be “90% accurate”, which is a minimal waste compared to the reimbursed km accumulated. “The user himself obviously cannot modify a track manually, otherwise the app loses all its reliability. He can therefore only delete routes. Not add any”. At €0.35/km, the SPF would probably not like that…
