Police fixed-penalty push 'not to meet quotas'

Police commissioner Raymond Siu Chak-yee reassured the public that officers are mainly looking to bring irresponsible road users to heel and stop them obstructing traffic, and not targeting achieving key performance indicators or increasing revenue with fixed penalties.

Siu's denial came after the government said it hoped fixed penalties would bring HK$1.27 billion in revenue this fiscal year, which means that 3.97 million fixed penalty tickets needed to be issued, an average of 10,000 tickets per day.

In an interview with an online media outlet, Siu said he is aware of people saying that the police have been "striving to meet key performance indicators" by issuing more fixed penalty tickets.

"I guarantee there are absolutely no KPIs and that the move is not made to increase revenue," Siu said, adding that officers are not targeting quotas on tickets issued, just irresponsible road users.

A plan to enforce traffic law compliance through electronic means by sending notices of fixed penalties to offenders via text messages or emails has sparked worries that offenders may miss the messages or forget to pay the fine.

Siu said he understood the concern but pointed out that people receiving hard copies of penalty notices could also forget to pay fines.

The most important thing, he said, is that they should find a way of reminding themselves to pay the fixed penalties on time.

He also said with people these days relying on mobiles and computers so much, they can pay the fines easily through digital means.

The police will enhance public education and promotion to make sure Hongkongers are aware of how digital penalty notices work, he said.

The police will also promote anti-deception messages using a placement marketing strategy, whether people like it or not, including playing announcements in government road tunnels and anti-scam ads in cinemas, as well as printing anti-scam messages on coffee chains' cups.

The anti-fraud push comes as 37,238 scam cases were recorded in the first 11 months of last year, which is an increase of about 50 percent that saw losses amount to about HK$8.3 billion.

He added that police are still investigating virtual asset exchange platform JPEX but need more time to trace the flow of funds.

Sixty-seven JPEX arrests have been made, with the fraud taking in 2,600 victims and costing losses of more than HK$1.6 billion.

The police and the Securities and Futures Commission have set up a dedicated working group to exchange information at least twice a week to prevent the recurrence of similar frauds, he added.