Electric bike grants and tax reductions for an Île-de-France company

Île-de-France Mobilités (IDFM) runs two cycling schemes with different audiences, purposes and amounts. One is closed to legal entities, the other is reserved for them.

The purchase grant, reserved for residents

The public Île-de-France Mobilités page announces a grant of up to 50% of the cost of the bike, capped according to its type: up to 400 euros for a pedal-assist bike, a folding bike or a non-assisted cargo bike, up to 600 euros for a pedal-assist cargo bike and up to 1,200 euros for an adapted bike. Eligibility is limited to residents of Île-de-France who are of full age or emancipated minors, and the beneficiary must keep the bike for three years without selling it. These are conditions of residence and of age: they only make sense for a natural person.

A company therefore cannot apply for this grant to equip its employees. It concerns the employee who buys their own bike, the case dealt with by our calculator devoted to the personal bike. The page even carries a section headed “Et pour les entreprises ?” (in our translation, and what about companies?), which points to another scheme, the aide à la location de vélos (the bike rental grant).

The rental grant, the only scheme designed for employers

The page for this grant, dated 8 January 2026, sets out its purpose: to encourage the rental of bikes for work-related journeys, from journeys between home and work to trips between several sites. The award regulations, dated 19 December 2023 and in force since 1 January 2024, open the grant to companies that rent bikes for their employees. The amount is 150 euros per bike per year, within the limit of the expenditure excluding VAT actually incurred and evidenced, of five bikes per year per applicant, and of three years, consecutive or not, per applicant. The five-bike cap is indeed annual, not an overall cap across three years.

The conditions come down to three points. The applicant must be entered in the répertoire Sirene (the French national business register) and be in the administrative state “entreprise active” (active company) when the application is filed, a company in the state “cessé” (ceased) being unable to claim the grant. The headcount of the applicant establishment must be below fifty people. The establishment must be located in the Île-de-France region on the date of the application. On this point the regulations refer to articles of the code du travail whose numbering is inaccurate in the text itself; headcount is in fact governed by articles L. 1111-2 and L. 1111-3 of the code du travail.

The regulations cover “all types of bicycle (mechanical bicycle, pedal-assist bicycle, cargo bike, folding or adapted bicycle, electrically assisted trailer)” (our translation), compliant with the regulations in force and which are the subject of a rental between the applicant and a private bicycle rental company. Bikes rented from a local authority, a grouping of local authorities or a public body are excluded. Only bikes rented by the applicant itself give rise to the grant: bikes rented by employees, where the company would meet all or part of the cost, are not eligible. Accessory and maintenance costs are taken into account when they appear on the same invoice as the rental.

The timetable is strict. The applicant files a single application per calendar year for all of its bikes, during the year concerned and no later than 15 February of the following year. Invoices must be paid, drawn up in French, denominated in euros and dated within the current calendar year. If the application is accepted, payment is made within four months at most.

The Région Île-de-France ran a grant for the acquisition of clean vehicles by Île-de-France businesses. That funding window is closed: according to the practical factsheet of the CCI Paris Île-de-France (the Paris Île-de-France chamber of commerce and industry), updated on 25 June 2026, vehicles had to be ordered before 1 December 2024, the paid invoice dated no later than 1 March 2025 and the complete application sent by the same date at the latest. The regional FAQ sums it up in one sentence: “Since 2 March 2025, the Région no longer offers a grant for the purchase of electric vehicles” (our translation). It now supports only the conversion of combustion-engined two-, three- or four-wheeled vehicles to electric or hydrogen power, known as the “prime à la non-casse” (the non-scrappage grant), and the acquisition of hydrogen vehicles.

The same FAQ, in its version updated on 25 March 2025, settles two points for the current scheme. First on the range of equipment: “Bicycles and scooters, unregistered vehicles and vehicles with a lead-acid battery are not eligible” (our translation). A pedal-assist bike remains an unregistered cycle: it falls outside the scope of this grant. Then on the financing arrangement: crédit-bail, leasing and location avec option d'achat (rental with a purchase option) are treated there as rental, and are therefore not eligible.

The “regional bike grant” sometimes mentioned is not this scheme. The regional news item devoted to clean vehicles itself refers, under the heading “Et toujours des aides à l'achat de vélos” (and still grants for buying bikes, our translation), to the two grants described above: the purchase grant for private individuals and the 150-euro rental grant for companies with fewer than fifty people. As at 10 October 2026, no regional grant for the acquisition of bikes by a legal entity has been identified.

The certificats d'économies d'énergie scheme follows two routes. The fiches d'opérations standardisées (standardised operation sheets), published by arrêté, set the requirements and the flat-rate energy saving attached to a specific operation. The programmes d'accompagnement (support programmes), also defined by arrêté, allow the parties subject to obligations under the scheme to obtain certificates in return for a financial contribution to information, training or innovation actions. The scheme's sixth period began on 1 January 2026 and will end on 31 December 2030. For equipping a company with bikes, neither route is open as at 10 October 2026.

Two bike sheets, none open to a company

Two fiches d'opérations standardisées in the list published by the ministry concern the bike. Sheet TRA-EQ-121 “Vélo à assistance électrique” (pedal-assist bike), which the ministry's page of sheets still offers in its version applicable since 1 January 2024, covers the purchase, or rental for at least six months, of a new pedal-assist bike by a natural person, for operations begun before 1 July 2028: it does not apply to a company equipping its employees. Sheet TRA-EQ-131, the only one open to legal entities, was reserved for cargo bikes. An arrêté of 19 February 2025 repealed its first version, entitled “Achat ou location, par une personne morale, de vélos-cargos neufs ou reconditionnés” (purchase or rental, by a legal entity, of new or refurbished cargo bikes, our translation). An arrêté of 18 August 2025 created a new one, “Achat ou location longue durée de vélos-cargos à assistance électrique neufs” (purchase or long-term rental of new pedal-assist cargo bikes, our translation), applicable to operations begun on or after 1 September 2025 and valued at 83,000 kWh cumac per bike. An arrêté of 29 September 2025, published in the Journal officiel of 30 September 2025, repealed it in turn, keeping it only for the operations recorded in a list to be sent to the minister responsible for energy within three calendar days. The recreated sheet lasted a month.

The consolidated version of the arrêté of 22 December 2014 defining standardised energy-saving operations, in force as at 10 October 2026, still carries the statement that sheet TRA-EQ-131 is repealed, and no other sheet in the transport-sector list published by the ministry covers the purchase or rental of bikes by a legal entity.

The programmes for employers and for bike parking have ended

The Objectif Employeur Pro-Vélo programme (the French pro-cycling employer scheme), run by the Fédération française des usagers de la bicyclette (the French cyclists' federation), co-funded 40 to 60% of approved pro-cycling equipment and services, including parking, on employers' sites. The ministry lists it among the programmes that have ended, with an end in 2024, and its website states that registration is closed. The Employeur Pro-Vélo label remains available, on quotation, outside the programme.

The Alvéole Plus programme, which funded sheltered and secure bike parking for schools, stations, public spaces, co-owned residential buildings and social housing, has also ended: the ministry lists it among the programmes that have ended, with an end in 2025, and its website announced an end date of 31 March 2026.

The bike-related programmes still running, according to the ministry page updated on 3 September 2026 and the catalogue of programmes of August 2026, do not fund the equipment of an employer. “Mon vélo de A à Z” (my bike from A to Z) supports people in energy poverty, AVELO 3, run by ADEME, supports until 31 December 2026 the cycling policies of territories with fewer than 250,000 inhabitants, and the third, devoted to raising awareness among and training professional players, does not fund the equipment of employees with bikes either. As at that date, the ministry page publishes no open call for programmes for the sixth period. As at 10 October 2026, no certificats d'économies d'énergie programme funds the equipment of a company with bikes or with bike parking.

Article 220 undecies A of the code général des impôts provides a reduction in corporate tax, often called a tax credit, rather than a subsidy. It allows companies subject to that tax to benefit from a reduction in respect of the costs incurred in making a fleet of bikes available free of charge to their employees for their journeys between home and workplace. The reduction is equal to those costs, taken into account up to 25% of the purchase or rental price of the fleet: the 25% is a cap, not a percentage of the costs. It applies to costs incurred until 31 December 2027, in the version of the article in force since 31 December 2023 and still applicable as at 10 October 2026. It is set against the tax for the financial year in which the costs were incurred, and any excess is neither refundable nor carried forward, which is what distinguishes it from a true tax credit. It is declared on form no. 2069-RCI-SD.

The administrative commentary, BOI-IS-RICI-20-30 in the BOFiP (the French tax administration's published body of commentary), in its version published on 8 January 2025 and still in force, adds four clarifications. Pedal-assist bikes are eligible, by reference to the definitions in the code de la route, the French Highway Code (paragraph 20). The expenditure taken into account comprises depreciation of the bikes, safety equipment, theft insurance, maintenance, and the construction, fitting-out or rental of a bike parking area or bike room (paragraph 40). Rental expenditure is taken into account only if the company has entered into a contract with a rental company for the rental of a fleet of bikes for a minimum term of three years (paragraph 50). Finally, the 25% limit is assessed per purchase or rental and not per financial year: it is a single cap, and the price may be taken inclusive of all taxes, since value added tax is not deductible on these vehicles (paragraph 60).

The text targets a specific use. Paragraph 30 requires the company to be able to show that its employees use the bikes for their journey between home and work, while allowing other journeys, business or private. A company bike, which the employee keeps to go home, fits this logic. A pool bike reserved for journeys during working time, which is never used for the journey between home and work, does not meet the condition laid down by the text.

For a fleet financed under a crédit-bail, eligibility is not established. The doctrine reasons in terms of the owner's depreciation charges or of rentals paid to a rental company, and does not mention crédit-bail. This point is to be secured with the tax administration through a request for a rescrit (a binding advance ruling), and we do not present it as an acquired advantage. The social security treatment of the avantage en nature (benefit in kind under French payroll rules) and the detail of the calculation are set out on our page devoted to the company bike and the avantage en nature.

The forfait mobilités durables concerns only the employee's own bike

The forfait mobilités durables covers costs incurred by the employee who travels to work on their own bike, or on a bike they rent; it is neither a grant to the company nor a means of financing a fleet. The page of the ministry responsible for transport, updated on 27 March 2026, expressly lists “les vélos et véhicules de fonction” (company bikes and company vehicles, our translation) among the modes not eligible to date. A company bike cannot therefore, for that same bike, give rise to an entitlement to the forfait. Its treatment, the caps of 600 and 900 euros and how to put it in place are detailed on our page devoted to the forfait mobilités durables.

Other grants may exist in Île-de-France. The eight départements franciliens and the Métropole's établissements publics territoriaux have not been audited one by one, and some communes run cycling policies of their own. A company based outside Paris would do well to ask its commune and its intercommunalité, putting the same two questions each time: is a legal entity a beneficiary, and is ownership of the equipment required.

Several neighbouring subjects are documented on other pages of this site. The forfait mobilités durables, which compensates the employee who uses their own bike, has a page of its own. The social security treatment of the company bike and the calculation of the tax reduction are set out on our page devoted to the avantage en nature. The full cost of a bike fleet, compared with that of your current business journeys, is dealt with separately. So are the ZFE and Crit'Air rules applicable to company cars in Paris and in the Métropole. Parking and storage constraints for the bikes are detailed on our page devoted to folding and compact bikes in the workplace.

No payment is automatic. The Île-de-France Mobilités grant is paid within the limit of an annual budget envelope, the Ville de Paris grants are awarded or refused application by application, and a compliant application is not a paid application.