Octopus Card - Taxis

Taxis

Although a popular form of transport, taxis in Hong Kong do not accept the Octopus card. On 27 June 2006, after 10 years of negotiations between Octopus Cards Limited and the taxi industry, the first trial of taxis equipped with Octopus card readers was launched in the New Territories with taxis operated by the Yellow Taxi Group. But it was reported on 30 October that of the 20 taxis that participated in the trial, eight had dropped out. Part of the reason was technical—drivers must return to the office every day for accounting. The Octopus card company said it would be upgrading the system to allow automatic account updating in the future. Wong Yu-ting, managing director of the Yellow Taxi Group, also noted that they had been "trying to convince restaurants and retailers" to offer discounts to Octopus taxi passengers, but the Transport Department had been a major obstacle. The Transport Department is against this approach for legal reasons.

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