The Green Bike program is up and running after being on hold for several months due to software issues in the midst of negotiations over a recently-finalized contract between the university and software providers.

The contract came through on May 17, nearly a year after discussions began in the summer of 2015, and the bikes returned to the stations on Friday.

Because their docks are solar-powered, the Green Bikes are put into “hibernation” each year during the colder months.

After this winter, however, program leaders found the software which allows them to track bike use had stopped working, said Green Bike Program Coordinator Ben Phaneuf.

“Without that back door, it would be a free for all,” he said. “We’d probably never get our bikes back.”

The failure occurred during efforts between WSU and 8D Technologies, the Green Bike software manufacturer, to finalize a contract required for the exchange of money and services.

Though Phaneuf said program leaders originally believed 8D had denied access to the software until the contract’s completion, President and CEO Isabelle Bettez said the malfunction was likely due to lack of maintenance.

“We don’t use pulling the plug on customer systems,” she said. “It’s a bad idea from our standpoint.”

The contract issue arose in 2013 when the company functioning as a liaison between WSU and 8D went bankrupt. Since 8D began to work directly with its clients it has had difficulty sorting out responsibilities, Bettez said.

As a university, WSU must follow certain financial rules which are not typical of 8D’s clients, making adjustments necessary. However, Bettez said the primary problem has been in figuring out who would do what.

“At the end of the day we can make it happen,” Bettez said. “The challenge has been more where we’re coming from with this one.”

Though 8D was aware of the lack of contracts between itself and clients, conversations with WSU did not begin until last summer. Bettez said they had many organizations to deal with it took until then to get to WSU.

“It has been one crazy time for us,” she said.

Joanne Greene, UREC director of programming, believes that as a large company with an international market, 8D forgot about WSU because it is such a small system.

“During that transition, smaller clients like us just kinda got lost in the shuffle,” Greene said.

Once contract negotiations began, 8D did not produce a first draft until January. After this, several versions passed between 8D and the program’s legal office, Phaneuf said.

WSU returned revised contracts within a day or two, Phaneuf said, while 8D typically took about two weeks.

WSU has never paid 8D since the two started dealing directly, Bettez said.

Though the system continued to work during most of this time, Phaneuf said WSU did not receive the software maintenance and updates which would be expected with a formal agreement.

Now that a formal agreement is in place, the Outdoor Recreation Center reported WSU will pay a monthly fee of $525 for the Green Bike stations, as well as a $100 monthly fee for the backdoor software used to track bike use.

Two stations are currently broken, and 8D technicians will repair them and perform a software update in coming weeks at $150 an hour.

After this, however Phaneuf said he expects the program will be fairly autonomous.

“We scrambled the jets and got the bikes out,” he said. “Now we’re just working out the small kinks.”

The broken stations are located at the Student Recreation Center and the CUB, both of which have two stations.

With approximately $400,000 invested in equipment for the program and about $80,000 in student-funded costs each year for staff salaries, student wages and repair supplies, students expect to be able to use the bikes.

“Students expect the bikes to work,” Phaneuf said. “Very few people know the challenges that really go into that, and problem solving that we go through to do it.”