As of noon on Wednesday, millions of Ofo share bike users were waiting in line to get their bike deposits back, China News reported on Thursday.

 

中国新闻网周四报道，星期三中午，排队等待退押金的OFO共享单车用户人数已达数百万。

 

Early adopters of the Ofo share bike service were asked to pay a 99 yuan (14 U.S. dollar) deposit, a figure that was later raised to 199 yuan for new users. Based on this, between 1.1 billion and 2.2 billion yuan is owed to users.

 

At lunchtime yesterday, there had been no comment from Ofo or its CEO Dai Wei whether all of the deposits would be repaid, and if so, when that was likely to happen. Ofo had previously¹ advised that it takes up to 15 working days to a deposit to be returned, however many users have said they are still waiting for the return of their deposit one and a half months after lodging² their application.

 

An Ofo user told a reporter on Thursday morning that the number of users waiting for the return of their deposit had apparently³ decreased to 9.97 million from 9.98 million on Wednesday, but that at this rate, it could take her three years to get her deposit back. Some Ofo users unwilling⁴ to wait for news from the company have started lining⁵ up outside Ofo's headquarters in Beijing to demand their money back.

 

Another sign of Ofo's deep financial woes⁶ was seen this week when the company's CEO was put on a blacklist of debtors⁷ by a court in Beijing's Haidian District that restricts him from spending money on luxury services such as plane flights or high-end hotels.

 

Ofo is not the first company to come under fire from the public over their failure to return deposits. Similar stories have emerged from other companies in what's become known as the sharing economy. According to a report by the China Consumers' Association that was released earlier this month, the number of complaints about sharing economy services has been on the rise this year as several companies in the sector⁸ have struggled and collapsed⁹.

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