BMS and GBK are the same company.....

[Jeremy Harris]

Just a tip for those who, like me, have had somewhat mixed dealings with BMS Battery (see here for my tale of woe: http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=42777).

When my motor etc finally arrived from BMS Battery, there was an error made on my address, which has resulted in a few problems subsequently (essentially BMS Battery changed my address for some reason and made up a fictitious bike company as the addressee, causing me ongoing hassle with the customs payment here).

Having decided to buy a replacement motor for my folder from Greenbikekit.com, after BMS Battery sent me the wrong one, I was careful to make sure that my address details etc were absolutely correct and clear on the order, as I didn't want more hassle with trying to convince officialdom that I'm really a private individual. Guess what? GBK have shipped the goods to exactly the same fictitious company address as BMS Battery! There's only two ways that I can see that this could happen, either (by pure fluke) Green Bike Kit decided to make up exactly the same three word fictitious company name (with exactly the same spelling) or Green Bike Kit and BMS Battery are really one and the same company behind the web storefronts.

I know there have been suspicions that BMS Battery and GBK were linked, but I believe this is absolute proof that they are, in fact, the same company. I have to say I can't fault GBK's service though, they sent exactly what I ordered, didn't pull the "please pay us extra postage" trick that BMS Battery seem to do and parts arrived fairly quickly (around two weeks from placing the order to receiving the goods). The only downside is that I'm now going to have to do battle with officialdom over this being a package sent to a private individual rather than the company that BMS Battery originally made up (and GBK used) on the paperwork.

I can't quite work out why the same company would have two store fronts, but there is a history of this company doing this. BMS Battery had another store front a while ago, IIRC, that they closed down. It seems likely that they have set up Green Bike Kit to take over from the BMS Battery store front in the event that something happens, like them getting a PayPal claim that stops them trading for a while or maybe getting a bad reputation.

 

[The Mighty Volt]

Thanks for the heads up.

Being perfectly honest, I have a fraction of the knowledge {technical/business} that you do....and yet I would never buy from any of that lot.

Why do you bother with them?

Surely they don't have a monopoly do they?

For me, it's a jungle out there, the furthest I have ever pushed the boat out with my limited resources is buying Lithium off Alibaba.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

I originally bought a motor from BMS Battery as they were the only people I could find that claimed to sell the Code 8 Bafang BPM motor. As I discovered, what they claim to sell and what they actually sell aren't the same thing. This time I opted to buy from GBK because they seem to have a good rep here, and TBH I can't fault their service, the price was good, delivery was pretty quick and the stuff that's arrived is exactly what I ordered.

I can't see a reason to not buy from GBK, their pricing is OK and their service seems good, too. I just find it slightly odd that they seem to be the same company as BMS Battery, yet choose to hide their true identity.

 

[The Mighty Volt]

I originally bought a motor from BMS Battery as they were the only people I could find that claimed to sell the Code 8 Bafang BPM motor. As I discovered, what they claim to sell and what they actually sell aren't the same thing. This time I opted to buy from GBK because they seem to have a good rep here, and TBH I can't fault their service, the price was good, delivery was pretty quick and the stuff that's arrived is exactly what I ordered.

I can't see a reason to not buy from GBK, their pricing is OK and their service seems good, too. I just find it slightly odd that they seem to be the same company as BMS Battery, yet choose to hide their true identity.

Well....Black and Decker own Dewalt, and Black-and-Decker stuff never had a great reputation, at least in my family. Ford put a Volvo engine in their Focus. The 350Z by Nissan has some Renault pedigree...if I can use pedigree and Renault in the same sentence.

It is harder and harder these days to know who is who and what is what.

It could be that they don't want the two reputations to mix for fear that good won't quite eclipse bad.

 

[d8veh]

I don't think that's definitive proof Jeremy. Another theory, for which there's substancial evidence, is that the people that defected took a copy of the BMSBattery customer database with them. Maybe BMS battery are the same company and trying to get way from their reputation of less than perfect customer service by masquerading as a new company. In the end they'll be judged on their performance, which so far seems a lot better.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

I don't think that's definitive proof Jeremy. Another theory, for which there's substancial evidence, is that the people that defected took a copy of the BMSBattery customer database with them. Maybe BMS battery are the same company and trying to get way from their reputation of less than perfect customer service by masquerading as a new company. In the end they'll be judged on their performance, which so far seems a lot better.

If that's the case, then the dates don't tie up. I first placed an order with BMS Battery in July this year, when GBK had been up and trading for several months. What's more, my first order wasn't despatched by BMS Battery until late August, which is presumably when the fictitious company name was made up and used to address the package.

Not only that, but the invoices, include spelling mistakes (like "Mister" being spelt as "Masser" )are absolutely identical, same format, same type face, same "Made in China" rubber stamp, same odd phrasing of the parts descriptions, just different trading addresses at the top.

I don't think there's the tiniest shred of doubt that BMS Battery and Green Bike Kit are one and the same company, or at least fronts for the same company. The only difference seems to be that customer service from GBK is significantly better than that from BMS Battery.

 

[dnmun]

i have seen a picture of the inside of a charger the guy said was from GBK and it looked like the inside of the BMS Battery charger. i asked him to post a picture of the cover but he won't so i cannot confirm but they look identical.

 

[d8veh]

I don't think that's definitive proof Jeremy. Another theory, for which there's substancial evidence, is that the people that defected took a copy of the BMSBattery customer database with them. Maybe BMS battery are the same company and trying to get way from their reputation of less than perfect customer service by masquerading as a new company. In the end they'll be judged on their performance, which so far seems a lot better.

If that's the case, then the dates don't tie up. I first placed an order with BMS Battery in July this year, when GBK had been up and trading for several months. What's more, my first order wasn't despatched by BMS Battery until late August, which is presumably when the fictitious company name was made up and used to address the package.

Not only that, but the invoices, include spelling mistakes (like "Mister" being spelt as "Masser" )are absolutely identical, same format, same type face, same "Made in China" rubber stamp, same odd phrasing of the parts descriptions, just different trading addresses at the top.

I don't think there's the tiniest shred of doubt that BMS Battery and Green Bike Kit are one and the same company, or at least fronts for the same company. The only difference seems to be that customer service from GBK is significantly better than that from BMS Battery.

In that case it must be true, but I can't understand why shipping costs are less at GBK.

 

[miuan]

They may also be two differents resellers of the same supplier, who may also happen to ship orders for all resellers from one place, thus make up names, require additional shipping charges, etc.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

In that case it must be true, but I can't understand why shipping costs are less at GBK.

My experience has been that the shipping costs may be pretty much the same, I think.

I bought two 20" rims, a BPM motor and some other stuff from BMS Battery and paid $104 shipping for an 8kg package. The order from GBK was the same package size (it was a rim and a Q100 motor and some other bits) and weighed 4kg (so half the weight) and the shipping was $54 (pretty much half the cost). I think that had I ordered the same weight package from GBK the shipping cost would have been similar to that from BMS.

Having said that, BMS tried to get me to pay more shipping, plus they just went quiet when I complained about them sending me the wrong motor, and GBK seem to have much better customer service.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

They may also be two differents resellers of the same supplier, who may also happen to ship orders for all resellers from one place, thus make up names, require additional shipping charges, etc.

I guess that may be possible, too. As I recall, BMS Battery used to trade under another name until around a year ago, when they merged their two "company" names and only traded as BMS Battery. Now we see GBK popping up, with an identical product line and identical prices, using identical invoices and making identical spelling mistakes. I predict that BMS Battery will quietly disappear at some point, probably when their poor customer service starts to impact on sales, to be taken over seamlessly by GBK.

 

[Samd]

It's a common strategy to set up multiple storefronts for the same backend fulfilment service. You can advertise different prices and see what people will say.

And if you have a quality incident with one, you can still have revenue from the other.

I used to work for the Mars Corporation. They used to brag that you could walk down the petfood and confectionery aisles, and 72% of the different brands belonged to them, the consumer was none the wiser. Flood the market with your offerings and you'll get market share. An extra few websites costs no more....

 

[GrayKard]

They may also be two differents resellers of the same supplier, who may also happen to ship orders for all resellers from one place, thus make up names, require additional shipping charges, etc.

I guess that may be possible, too. As I recall, BMS Battery used to trade under another name until around a year ago, when they merged their two "company" names and only traded as BMS Battery. Now we see GBK popping up, with an identical product line and identical prices, using identical invoices and making identical spelling mistakes. I predict that BMS Battery will quietly disappear at some point, probably when their poor customer service starts to impact on sales, to be taken over seamlessly by GBK.

Took me a bit to find it but their other site was ecitypower. I remember buying on the bmsbattery website but getting email from ecitypower when it was about the battery purchase.

Gary

 

[Jeremy Harris]

Took me a bit to find it but their other site was ecitypower. I remember buying on the bmsbattery website but getting email from ecitypower when it was about the battery purchase.

Gary

Thanks for that, that's the name I was trying to recall. It looks as if this time they are being a bit more discreet about trying to keep the true identity of their other store front quiet than they did last time they switched.

 

[amberwolf]

I used to work for the Mars Corporation. They used to brag that you could walk down the petfood and confectionery aisles, and 72% of the different brands belonged to them, the consumer was none the wiser.

It's certainly true in petfood. Between Proctor&Gamble and Mars, almost all of the brands we carry where I work are owned by one of those two (sometimes thru yet another intermediary). Purina owns a number of others but they put their logo clearly on all of theirs, rather than "hiding" their ownership. Most of the ones now owned by P&G or Mars were not owned by them when I started there, but are now, 5 years later. FWIW, the companies that got bought always say they're not changing anything about their products, but very often within a few months they change ingredients, packaging, and/or location of manufacture...and lose longtime customers (but of course they gain new ones becuse of the changes).



Regarding multiple fronts for one reshipper, there's several of them that are the same one, listed over in one of the Prodeco threads, and some of them have taken money but never shipped products.

 

[Gordo]

80% of the sunglasses in the world are produced by one Italian company, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxottica as are most of the prescription frames and optical companies. The Chinese are not alone in this scam.

 

[Jason27]

So what's the problem here Jeremy? Are they selling you a sub standard product or what?

 

[Jeremy Harris]

So what's the problem here Jeremy? Are they selling you a sub standard product or what?

Did I say there was a problem?

Absolutely no problem at all as far as I can see, having additional knowledge about the people we're buying stuff from may be useful, that's all. I've seen several posts here and elsewhere praising GBK, and several being critical of BMS Battery, and thought that knowing they are one and the same company behind the scenes might be useful for folk to know.

 

[sacko]

Had exactly the same problem with BMS Battery making up a fictitious bike company, I have ended up with a £65 Fedex bill, even when the declaration was only $60.

Fedex have decided to charge customs on the postage. As it wasnt declared in HK, they have used their own Postage rates which was £229!

 

[Jeremy Harris]

Had exactly the same problem with BMS Battery making up a fictitious bike company, I have ended up with a £65 Fedex bill, even when the declaration was only $60.

Fedex have decided to charge customs on the postage. As it wasnt declared in HK, they have used their own Postage rates which was £229!

Tell me about it...........

I'm currently still doing battle over this very issue, compounded by the fact that they think I'm really a bike manufacturer, not just a private individual. I can't for the life of me understand why BMS/GBK should decide to make up a company name like this, especially when they are savvy enough to know how to declare the customs valuation etc to keep costs down for us this end.

 

[Samd]

Hmmm, placed an order with Greenbikekit on friday to Aus. Will be interesting to see what unfolds from here....

Unlike other companies they didn't send an order confirmation email. I can see the order if I log into the account.

But I paid via Paypal, so the insurance should cover me if there is an issue in the long run. *I think*.

What this says to me is that there is a great opportunity for someone in each country to deal direct with the likes of Bafang, Cellman or Ananda for hubs & controllers and have them located domestically. Batteries would get interesting...

 

[Lessss]

Compared stuff on both websites, products have different photos, products are for the most part different. Probably use the same shipping company.

 

[chvidgov.bc.ca]

They charged me an extra 63 dollars on top of the regular shipping just for a 700C Cute 100 kit, "because of the additional volume", after I paid Paypal. BMSBattery routinely pisses me off, but they kinda have a monopoly on cheap product with Paypal, which does eventually arrive.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

Compared stuff on both websites, products have different photos, products are for the most part different. Probably use the same shipping company.

And exactly the same invoices, and make exactly the same spelling mistakes, and make up exactly the same fictitious company name on the invoice AND on the package AND on the customs paperwork.........

Seems like far too many coincidences to me, plus they do seem to be selling exactly the same stuff, the rims and throttles I received from BMS were identical to those from GBK, even down to the same tape used to wrap the packages.

 

[Jeremy Harris]

They charged me an extra 63 dollars on top of the regular shipping just for a 700C Cute 100 kit, "because of the additional volume", after I paid Paypal. BMSBattery routinely pisses me off, but they kinda have a monopoly on cheap product with Paypal, which does eventually arrive.

Seems a common tactic, as others have reported BMS doing the same. BMS tried it on with me, saying that the shipping would cost more because my city wasn't served by Fedex. I just told them it was, that I'd had Fedex deliveries before, and magically the extra charge disappeared (but they did take weeks to actually ship the order). By contrast GBK were quick to deliver, the same price and no demand for extra shipping.

The bottom line is that you really don't know who you're dealing with with any of these companies.