diff --git a/numpy_groupies/utils_numpy.py b/numpy_groupies/utils_numpy.py
index 41ec2c9..545829a 100644
--- a/numpy_groupies/utils_numpy.py
+++ b/numpy_groupies/utils_numpy.py
@@ -222,21 +222,25 @@ def offset_labels(group_idx, inshape, axis, order, size):
     Copied from
     https://stackoverflow.com/questions/46256279/bin-elements-per-row-vectorized-2d-bincount-for-numpy
     """
+
+    newaxes = tuple(ax for ax in range(len(inshape)) if ax != axis)
+    group_idx = np.broadcast_to(np.expand_dims(group_idx, newaxes), inshape)
+    if axis not in (-1, len(inshape) - 1):
+        group_idx = np.moveaxis(group_idx, axis, -1)
+    newshape = group_idx.shape
+
+    group_idx = (group_idx +
+                 np.arange(np.prod(newshape[:-1]), dtype=int).reshape((*newshape[:-1], -1))
+                 * size
+                 )
     if axis not in (-1, len(inshape) - 1):
-        newshape = (s for idx, s in enumerate(inshape) if idx != axis) + (inshape[axis],)
+        return np.moveaxis(group_idx, -1, axis)
     else:
-        newshape = inshape
-    group_idx = np.broadcast_to(group_idx, newshape)
-    group_idx: np.ndarray = (
-        group_idx
-        + np.arange(np.prod(group_idx.shape[:-1]), dtype=int).reshape((*group_idx.shape[:-1], -1))
-        * size
-    )
-    return group_idx.reshape(inshape).ravel()
+        return group_idx
 
 
 def input_validation(group_idx, a, size=None, order='C', axis=None,
-                     ravel_group_idx=True, check_bounds=True, method="ravel", func=None):
+                     ravel_group_idx=True, check_bounds=True, method="offset", func=None):
     """ Do some fairly extensive checking of group_idx and a, trying to
     give the user as much help as possible with what is wrong. Also,
     convert ndim-indexing to 1d indexing.