Octopus has always shown its concern for society and has made generous contributions to those in need, particularly children. In this spirit, the Octopus Rewards programme was utilized as a platform for a fund-raising campaign on behalf of local charity, End Child Sexual Abuse Foundation (ECSAF). The charitable campaign encouraged all members of society to participate, and between November 6 and December 5, citizens responded with a new record for the highest number of transactions to contribute to a charity donation in Hong Kong. More than five million transactions were contributed, enabling Octopus Rewards to donate HK$200,000 to End Child Sexual Abuse Foundation.
Mr. Eric Tai, Chairman of Octopus Rewards, remarked, "The rewards system technology and high penetration rate of Octopus cards allowed us to create a new kind of charitable donation campaign, and that was the key to involving so many people from across society. In just one month, the campaign achieved an incredibly good result, with more than five million transactions contributing to the fund raising."
The Octopus Rewards donation will fund the development of a new ECSAF programme, "The Education Bus", which will teach children how to protect themselves against sexual abuse. Mr. David Roper, Managing Director of Octopus Rewards Limited, expressed his hope that the donation to ECSAF will help to increase awareness of sexual abuse among children, so that they may enjoy a healthy and happy childhood.
Mr. Roper thanked citizens for their participation and for their enthusiastic response to the Octopus Rewards programme. Up to 5 December 2005, more than 400,000 individuals had registered for Octopus Rewards. He expressed confidence that as more and more merchants join the programme in the coming year even greater numbers of citizens will register for Octopus Rewards and enjoy the many everyday benefits of the "DooDn' Gain" programme.
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