Photo: BBC.
Under a government voucher plan, Austria will pay residents to repair broken machines instead of throwing things out.
A new plan in Austria could lead to the emergence of a whole class of tinkerers. There’s money to be made.
Bethany Bell writes at the BBC, “Has your washing machine broken down, or is your electric kettle, laptop or mobile phone refusing to work? Well, if you live in Austria, the government will pay up to €200 ($219) towards getting it repaired.
“The Repair Bonus voucher scheme is aimed at trying to get people to move away from throwing away old electrical appliances – and focusing on getting things mended.
“Erik’s laptop is broken, so he has come to Helferline, a computer and mobile phone repair workshop in Vienna. Because of Austria’s Repair Voucher scheme, he will only have to pay 50% of the repair costs to get it fixed. … Erik has already used the Repair Bonus to mend an old CD player, which is now working well. He says the scheme makes it easier to decide whether or not to throw something away. …
“Helferline’s chief executive, Clemens Schmidgruber, says the Repair Bonus scheme has been great for his business. ‘Our revenues have doubled since it was introduced. So we’re very happy about it,’ he said. …
” ‘Customers benefit because it helps them save a lot of money. Of course, it’s good for local businesses because they generate additional revenues. And the environment benefits, because there’s less electronic waste.’
“Mr Schmidgruber says customers have to download a voucher from a government website and then pay the repair shop upfront. ‘Then you get back half of the costs after three to four weeks.’ …
“The City of Vienna runs a separate scheme – which works in a similar way and helps people pay for repairs to old clothes, bicycles or furniture.
“Markus Piringer, the co-ordinator of the Repair Network in Vienna, says ‘if the costs of the repair are more than 20-30% of the cost of the new product, people tend to buy new. And as the Repair Bonus lowers those costs, it’s a big incentive to repair more. … [But] for many people, it’s still very positive to have always the newest product and to throw away your clothing after half a year or even less. And so this is also something where we need awareness raising.’
“And he warned that while the number of repairs was rising in Austria because of the voucher schemes, there were still too few technicians and craftspeople to do it. ‘We have a problem that we don’t have enough repairers. So we also need a system which is promoting repairs as a job.’ …
“At his bicycle shop in Vienna, Marc Warnaar and his team are fixing a bike, which has rusted brake and gear cables. ‘They don’t make spare parts for this gear system,’ he says, ‘Especially the gear cables, you cannot buy them anymore. So what we’ll do is exchange them with a newer model, so it will run again.’
“He says the Vienna Repair voucher has made a big difference to his business. ‘Normally we see a large decline in repairs, especially in winter. But now we see a lot of people coming because of this voucher and getting their bikes repaired also in winter.’ “
More at the BBC, here. And check out my 2012 post about Dutch repair cafés, here.
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