This Motorcycle Airbag Vest Stops Working If You Don't Pay

Motorcyclists around the world routinely take their lives into their hands, sharing the roads with inattentive drivers. There is a lot of different safety equipment designed specifically for motorcyclists to help protect their lives in an accident. One of those safety devices is a vest that motorcyclists wear called an airbag vest.

Just as the name implies, if the motorcyclist is involved in an accident and falls off the motorcycle, the vest inflates to help protect them from an impact. One airbag vest on the market is made by a company called Klim. The vest is the Ai-1 and sells for $400. Rather than selling the vest for that price and calling it done, the manufacturer has a subscription scheme.

The airbag system is made by a company called In&Motion and is known as the In&Box detection module. The module has sensors and computer components inside that can detect a crash and inflate the airbag. After buying the vest for $400, which includes the module, users download an app and choose how to unlock the module to make the vest work.

That means either spending another $400 for permanent access making the vest cost $800, or subscribe for $12 a month or $120 per year. The catch for those who subscribe is if your payment fails to go through, the company deactivates the vest. That opens the door to the life-threatening situation of having a motorcyclist wear a deactivated vest and have their lives put at risk by an airbag vest that the manufacturer has purposefully deactivated.

The manufacturer does say users have a 30 day grace period to update the payment method before the vest is deactivated. The manufacturer also says that the vest has indicators that show if it is in ride-ready state and functional. The manufacturer says if the writer chooses to wear the vest while it isn't in a ride-ready state, that choice is on them.