PSA: Bid for your own motorcycle COE and dont place $1.5k deposit with shop

[Hightech88]

On 5/18/2023 at 10:52 PM, stkoh78 said:

There was almost 2.5 times bids (ard 1438 bids received) in this recent COE bidding exercise as compared to around 560+ bid in previous bidding exercise. This probably explained the surge in COE bike price back to 5 figure value as the bike shops are bidding merciless as they knew the cost of the COE will be bond by the bike buyer.

A lot of shop sale reps were complaining that they are too busy to answer queries either online or whatsapp when the COE was price at $5002. Now with the COE costing double this amount , there should be lesser people patrolling the bike shops now, however the COE price are likely to remain in this price range for the next 2-3 COE bidding exercises as the shops are clearing their outstanding orders.

I think a good time to bid is in end July - Aug but I doubt we will smell $5002 COE again.

As mentioned, the situation is so ridiculous for COEs even to be imposed on motorcycles. With lower COEs and more car drivers switching to bikes, the traffic will even be better. But seems that under capitalistic society, Govs tend to just use taxes to manage than incentives to solve the problem like the common saying ' what's wrong in collecting more monies? '.

With that stupid higher ARF being imposed to shoot up bike machine price w/o COE to ridiculous levels, in fact, more incentives should be given to reduce COE or remove it altogether.

If I am in charge, I would totally review COE to make it a reverse tax cert compared to cars, i.e. all motorcycle COEs are ARF-reduction certificate for bidding cap at certain amount for first-come-first serve basis or certain quote per bike shop, similar to HDB balloting.

For e.g. assuming we let the current tiered-ARF nonsense remain, one can design the new system such that such COEs validity period are reduced from current 3 mths to one month and the more bike one owns, the higher is the ARF rebate. E.g. 1st bike is 25% ARF rebate, followed by 50% rebate and cap at 90% rebate to close to OMV price, which is how it should be.

Bikes can then be sold close to their true intrinsic value, i.e. OMV, like many other countries, rather than keep worrying about bike prices affecting by SMLJ COEs for profiteering and what is the latest 'COE' price etc.

It is also fairer to motorcyclist, esp. those that need it for daily transport, delivery or work.

I'm sure that the Gov scholars can design such a system to ensure it be workable, equitable and fair for everyone but it's whether the Gov want to allows it or not, especially when their main perceived motivation is 'nothing wrong in collecting more monies' to build up 'reserves'. SMLJ also tax tax tax, NBCB.

This is the only way to reduce cars on the road as they are the major killers of motorcyclists during accidents, whether by banging them, anyhow sudden u-turn send biker flying then to be crushed again by another vehicle and so on. If you look at the race track, even with excessive speeding, there is very little deaths due to zero cars, LOL. It's not that I am against cars, for I'm currently driving one. But one person can only drive a machine at any one time, with more car owners either switching or owning more bikes, there will be less cars on the road, also safer for everybody, including pedestrians. Car COE prices will also drop, everybody happy (but less tax for the Gov, LOL)

This is the way...:

 

Edited May 20, 2023 by Hightech88

[stkoh78]

In last recent COE bidding , there are as much as 840 bids received. This could imply that most shops are still clearing the backlog from the May orders.

With lesser 300 quotes for this quarter COE bidding (Aug - Oct) , it seem that COE price are likely to head upward. What your thought ?