At Tsui Wah Restaurant in Wellington Street, Central, ashtrays were put away two hours before New Year's Eve and no-smoking signs were displayed throughout the restaurant.

The ashtrays were available only on demand and customers had to stop smoking by early today.

"Customers who are drunk or refuse to cooperate in observing the ban will be asked to leave. We'll have people dealing with it, don't worry," a waiter told The Standard.

Jeffery Tam Chun-kit, director of marketing and public relations at Shelter and Census Group, which operates 10 bars in Causeway Bay, said it was especially difficult on New Year's Eve.

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"In the real world, it is incredibly difficult to deal with drunk customers," Tam said.

"Nobody is going to enforce this law tonight. The government would be stupid to try to enforce the law, especially when everyone is celebrating.

"I don't even know if they'll actually have people working tonight," said Liberal Party lawmaker Tommy Cheung Yu-yan Sunday. A Department of Health spokesman said inspections were held throughout the city, but he would not disclose the number of inspectors on duty.

Lan Kwai Fong Entertainment managing director Stanley Law Ming-wah said staff would notify customers politely. "But we'll be busy and have to rely on customers to comply with the no-smoking signs."

Although two bars and one club under the entertainment group are exempt from the ban until 2009, 10 of the group's restaurants around Lan Kwai Fong will ban smoking completely.

For Amina Lamarre-Delafoulhouse, owner and managing director of Nzingha Lounge, just three minutes from Lan Kwai Fong, the ban could not have been more timely.

Lamarre-Delafoulhouse said most people, no matter how much they enjoy smoking, will comply with the law. The Nzingha Lounge is exempt from the ban until 2009.

Since the passage of the law October 27, the catering industry, in collaboration with the Department of Health, has provided training for more than 4,000 workers, including those from small restaurants, karaoke lounges and travel agencies.

"Although the response from day- time customers has been good, we have experienced some difficulties with evening customers," said Anthony Lock Kwok-on, managing director of California Red.

Deputy Director of Health Leung Ting-hung urged smokers and venue managers to show understanding.

"We'll enforce it in a polite manner," Leung said but reminded that anyone breaching the ban will face the maximum fine of HK$5,000.

In a related development, a poll said more than two-thirds of young smokers disagree with all or some provisions of the ban.

Nearly half said they would break some of the rules at the risk of being caught.

The Hong Kong Playground Association's Services for Kwai Tsing Youth Night Drifters surveyed 360 youngsters aged up to 24, of whom 129 respondents, or 35.8 percent, were smokers, while 231 were non-smokers.

Among the young smokers, 54.3 percent, or 70 respondents, said they would comply, while 45.7 percent said they would not.

More than two-thirds, 69 percent, said they did not agree with the law, but 31 percent accepted the ban.

The survey also showed that about one-third of smoking youngsters will reduce their cigarette consumption or try to quit altogether.