The Beijing-based bike-sharing company Mobike confirmed on Monday that its relocation of registered office has led the authorities to list it among "abnormally operating" firms, noting, however, that the action would not affect its users.
Mobike was categorized as "abnormal operation" in the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System on March 7 by the Haidian District Branch of the Beijing Municipal Administration for Industry and Commerce because the company couldn't be reached through its registered location, the China News Service reported on Sunday.
Mobike has moved to a larger office in Beijing and the documents related to the address change are being processed, a public relations employee from Mobike told the Global Times on Monday on condition on anonymity. "The documents are expected to be processed very soon. The company is operating normally and the change will not have any impact on users," he said.
The new office of Mobike, selected in January, is a few times larger than the previous one located in Haidian, according to the employee.
Mobike, founded in 2015, has launched bike-sharing services in 20 cities in China, such as Beijing and Shenzhen in South China's Guangdong Province. The capital city alone has more than 200,000 bicycles of Mobike.
Since the bike-sharing services sprung up across China in recent years, problems ranging from bike maintenance and loss to refund have been reported by media. According to the Shanghai Consumer Council (SCC), the organization received about 180 consumer complaints in the second half of 2016, and more than 460 in the first two months of this year.
Many consumers turn to the consumer council to lodge their complaints when the Mobike customer services cannot be reached, most of which are related to wrong charges and deposit refund. "(The complaints show that) it's very easy to top up but difficult to get refund," the SCC revealed, news portal thepaper.cn reported.
But the PR employee from Mobike said that the deposit is immediately refunded through Alipay or WeChat when a user submits a refund application. But some users need to wait for two to seven days if their payment account is problematic, as the problem needs to be resolved through manual operation.
The deposit required by Mobike is 299 yuan ($43) for each use, while its competitor ofo requires 99 yuan, and Cloudbike 200 yuan. The online cycle-sharing startups are racing to capitalize on China's return to a simpler form of transportation.
