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The level of services provided by the Trade and Industry Department would not be affected by the implementation of five-day week starting from July 1 this year, a spokesman for TID said today (May 9).
"The utilisation level of our services on Saturdays has always been low and many applications to the department for licences, certificates or registration can be done through other means e.g. by post, fax or electronic means as appropriate," the spokesman said. "Applications for all types of certificates of origin can also be processed at any of the Government Approved Certification Organisations which will continue to operate on Saturday after July 1."
The spokesman appealed to the traders to make their applications to the department in advance as most of the licences, certificates and registration issued were valid for a period of time. This way, traders would be able to avoid any last minute rush.
The department will also take¡¡a number of measures to ensure service delivery and to minimise the impact of the new operating hours on traders. For instance:
- the operating hours will be extended by some 45 minutes every day on average;
- at the Support and Consultation Centre for SMEs, the full range of business and consultation services will be provided throughout lunch-time;
- applications¡¡will be cleared before the end of the working week for the urgent ones as far as practicable; and
- more general service information will be uploaded onto the department website.
¡°With these measures in place and as traders get accustomed to this new pattern of operation, we are confident that traders and users of our services will not experience any significant inconvenience. We will continue to explore measures to facilitate traders in accessing the department¡¯s services via electronic means, and urgent cases will be handled expeditiously and flexibly to meet traders' needs,¡± the spokesman said.
Ends/Tuesday, May 9, 2006
Issued at HKT 18:30
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