I just popped my bumper dead center last week when hooking up my trailer at night and one tab broke or popped up in the middle...my tailgate was rubbing/stuck as well so my method was to slowly pull back/away and up to get all three tabs in the middle off the clips and now I have a slight bulge but my tail gate opens w/o rubbing :) I'll RR my bumper later when I have time.

OK SO does anyone have any pictures of the inside of the rear bumper? today i decided to peel back the bumper again and noticed that i have all the tabs and that the only thing is they all popped out of their "rail" basically there is a channel and a slide in type "rail" i was able to pull back enough to put the center in but the 2 on the sides are very difficult dont have much room and affraid to brake bumper. very annoyed that the dealer said i need to change the bumper. anyone have any ideas how to tell if the actual "clip rail" is broken?

I don't have photos. But I have my story. The clips popped on my bumper a few months after picking up the new car. The lower tailgate used to catch on the bumper, and it scratched badly. Dealer had to replace the bumper. A few weeks after a new bumper, it happed again. Dealer was happy to replace the bumper again. I told them to wait a few years. Why fix something that's going to break again.

Horrible design, obviously a massive problem with the E70 design, and a real PITA. I've just come to a happy place with my crappy looking bumper. If this is the biggest issue with my car, I can't really complain, can I?

They don't 'pop' on their own, someone is hitting it.

I beg to differ. Two days after returning home with my new bumper courtesy of my $tealership (it took almost a week to replace the bumper because it took two tries to get the Carbon Black paint to match!?!? wtf?!?!), the clips 'popped' on their own. How do I know this to be the case? The car was parked in my garage and had not been driven.

And know that the $tealer wouldn't have replaced the bumper the first time if there was any evidence whatsoever that the car has been hit. There was not a mark or scratch or indentation of any kind on the bumper, other than the popped clips which led to the deformed top portion of the bumper, and the scratched lower tailgate. My SA and the service manager checked the car like a used car manager appraises your trade in, looking for any and every mark that might help them justify the lowball trade-price. They found NOTHING, because there was nothing to find!

I say again, it's a horrible design, something my SA was only too happy to admit after he realized this was a defect and not an owner trying to pull a fast one on the BMW warranty overlords. His words--"I am popping these clips back in all the time. BMW needs to change this design." Take it for what it's worth.

Well I have had my bumper right off mine and I can see no way it could come unclipped on its own unless the clips were broken, the bumper was deformed a lot, it was hit or it was incorrectly fitted.

I used this video as guide to remove my bumper for Execuhitch hitch install yesterday:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZWu6uL0abI
At 3:06 they show the clips.

I do see how one of the tabs can pop out. Each tab is held by a couple of plastic pieces. If the bumper moves from side to side even a little, the tab can slide off the first piece on the left, then off piece on the right. There's quite a bit of upward pressure the tab puts on those holding pieces.

I stand corrected if I'm wrong but how would it move side to side once bolted up ?

it takes very little (about 2mm) so slide off one of those clips. The bumper cover could move due to some other damage, too. That is just a suggestion :)

Oh I agree 100% if its damaged after being hit