Chinanews client, Beijing, August 1st (Zhang Xu) "I can't even find the door of ofo."
The bicycle-sharing company ofo's official website, official account, APP terminal, offline office... all public channels have been unable to contact ofo. The user's pending refund of the deposit is still far away.
From no executable property to "evaporation "
According to the information from Tianyan Check, the registered address of Dongxia Datong (Beijing) Management Consulting Co., Ltd., an affiliate of Ofo, is Room 620, Building 1, No. 14, West Third Ring South Road, Fengtai District, Beijing.
But ofo is no longer here. In June 2020, Dongxia Chase (Beijing) Management Consulting Co., Ltd. was included in the list of abnormal business operations by the Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Fengtai District, Beijing, because the registered residence or business location could not be contacted.
On May 27, the Beijing Municipal Commission of Transportation announced on its official website the operation and management supervision of the Internet rental bicycle industry in the first quarter of 2020. Among them, Dongxia Datong (Beijing) Management Consulting Co., Ltd., the operating company of ofo's small yellow car, has been interviewed by the Beijing Law Enforcement Corps and investigated by the Beijing Municipal Law Enforcement Corps due to the interruption of data transmission, and requested it to rectify within a time limit.
Data map: On March 3, 2018, Tianjin ofo staff conducted centralized maintenance of bicycles. Photo by China News Agency reporter Tong Yu
But maybe no one has come to rectify it. In January 2020, ofo founder Dai Wei withdrew from the legal representative, executive director and manager, leaving an empty shell of ofo. Nowadays, no matter whether it is the location of the office or the customer service phone, ofo can no longer be contacted.
Those who "evaporate" together with ofo also have their executable property. According to the company’s data, as of July 25, ofo’s main operating entity, Dongxia Datong (Beijing) Management Consulting Co., Ltd., has been listed as a dishonest person for execution 40 times, and has been issued 247 high-consumption restrictions. The case ended 227 The amount involved exceeded 509 million yuan.
The so-called final case refers to a case in which the people's court, after exhausting property investigation methods, did not find that the person subject to execution has property available for execution, and after the applicant's consent or the collegiate panel deliberated and reported to the president for approval, the case was temporarily closed.
Chinanews.com found that the last time the supplier got back part of the payment through mandatory enforcement was in the ruling issued on April 10, 2019. The court frozen and allocated about 2.89 million yuan in deposits of Dongxia Chase (Beijing) Management Consulting Co., Ltd. .
Since then, Dongxia Chase has no more executable assets. Now ofo has only one question mark left in people's hearts: when can my deposit be refunded?
Some netizens shared the tips for refunding the deposit: “Call the official customer service number of ofo, repeat the call, and choose'complaint' directly after connecting to the manual customer service." However, the reporter tried many times, and ofo's customer service phone could not be connected. The robot on its APP The customer service will only say "please be patient".
As of press time, there are still millions of user deposits that have not been refunded. Photo courtesy of respondents
The founder Dai Wei once shouted to "kneel and live"
In the second half of 2018, ofo broke out in a funding crisis, and it was impossible to withdraw the deposit from users normally. On December 17, 2018, ofo launched the deposit refund system, and the number of users who applied for refund within 24 hours exceeded 10 million. Based on the minimum deposit of 99 yuan, the size of the deposit to be refunded was more than 1 billion yuan.
On December 19, 2018, ofo founder and CEO Dai Wei admitted in an internal letter to all staff that the company was under tremendous pressure on cash flow, "1 yuan should be broken into 3 yuan." He felt powerless countless times and wanted to cut all his operating funds, even dissolving the company and filing for bankruptcy. But in the end he chose to take up the pressure and "kneel to live".
Dai Wei also said that he will not evade, and will be responsible for every penny owed by ofo and for every user who supports ofo.
In order to reduce expenditure, ofo has successively carried out a series of actions such as layoffs and moving, and also tried various monetization methods, including doing body advertising, using traffic to make content, and receiving advertisements. However, these methods ultimately proved unable to make Ofo out of the financial crisis.
In December 2018, Dai Wei was taken by the Haidian District Court of Beijing to restrict consumption for failing to fulfill his payment obligations. According to the company's data, in July 2020, Dai Wei was restricted from consumption by the court for the 35th time and was not allowed to take the high-speed train by plane. Becoming an "old man" may be harsh for other entrepreneurs, but Dai Wei may be used to it.
According to the company's data, Dai Wei has been restricted from high consumption 35 times.
Under financial pressure, Ofo began to play routines on deposit refunds.
As early as November 2018, ofo issued a notice stating that users with a deposit of 99 yuan can upgrade to a new user of the Internet financial platform PPmoney with one click, agreeing to change the deposit into a specific asset of 100 yuan for the above financial management project, and the lock-up period is 30 days. After the upgrade, users can ride forever without deposit.
Most users questioned about ofo's cheap sale of user personal information, and PPmoney eventually went offline. But it turns out that ofo has never given up playing routines in refunding deposits.
APP becomes rebate online shopping website, public account becomes marketing account
Today’s ofo Little Yellow Car App is more like an online shopping website with suspicious diversion and rebate. The subtitles on the screen are "Rebate on the whole network, save money on shopping", and the icon becomes "ofo rebate" and "share bicycle". The word has been squeezed to the bottom of the screen.
Ofo APP’s QR-scanning cart button is surrounded by shopping guide buttons on various shopping platforms.
Recommendations on the homepage of its APP are occupied by advertisements, promoting online loan platforms. "Get 880 yuan immediately and earn a maximum of 246 yuan in 15 days" to attract users to buy.
The button of "Scan QR Code and Use Car" is surrounded by "I want to borrow money", "Deer Mall", and "9.9 Special". Ofo APP now features "money back", and this change dates back to last year's revision.
In March 2019, ofo launched a discount mall, guiding users to upgrade the 99 yuan deposit to 150 gold coins, and the 199 yuan deposit to exchange 300 gold coins for shopping. However, the payment model of "cash + gold coins" determines that users need to buy something else. Pay.
Today, this model has not changed. In Xiaolu Mall, take "2L Qingdao Pure Yellow Beer" as an example, the price is 59.9 yuan, prompting customers to buy at a discounted price of "10 gold coins + 49.9 yuan", but the product is priced at 76 yuan on JD. , Which is 38 yuan per piece, not only consumes gold coins in Xiaolu Mall, but the price is also significantly higher than other e-commerce platforms.
Other types of goods also have varying degrees of premium, and users do not buy it. Some users said that "not counting gold coins, cash alone is more expensive than direct purchase"; others said, "I don't want to buy things, I just want to get the deposit back."
Even in the large cash back area, the percentage of cash back in escrow does not exceed 10%, and daily necessities are even lower. ofo APP screenshot
If the deposit was converted into gold coins before, the only way to refund the deposit is to cash back on shopping. The reporter found that even in the "large cash back" area, the cash back ratio is only less than 10%, generally less than 8%, and the commodity cash back ratio is even as low as 5%.
If you want to get back the deposit by cash back on shopping, users have to spend at least thousands of dollars here.
If ofo APP can barely find cycling options, the official account of ofo small yellow car has nothing to do with "cycling", and it becomes like a marketing account. Entering the official account, what caught your eye was the push article on July 23, "Husband and wife arguing late at night: Some things are far more terrifying than disharmony in sexual life".
The last time the official account mentioned his main business, it was the "I'm Coming!" on August 26, 2019. Ofo has a new model covering the whole city of Shenzhen." What is the difference between the stub model and the past? Ofo said that according to the new rules for changing cars, please return the car according to the parking point on the mobile phone. If you break the car, you will be prompted with a text message for the first time, 5 yuan for the second time, and 20 yuan for the third time and thereafter. .
The picture comes from ofo public account.
In the face of ofo's various operations, some netizens expressed dissatisfaction: Isn't this just trying to cut leeks?
Today, ofo lost contact! "Can the millions of users whose deposits are to be refunded get their money back" has become a difficult puzzle. (Finish)