THE operating company of the Shenzhentong transport cards was named and shamed by the city’s consumer council for its unfair treatment to customers, the Daily Sunshine reported yesterday. According to the company’s policy, passengers have to pick up invoices at designated places after topping up their transport cards, which is deemed as an “unreasonable rule” by the council. The company said that passengers can get e-invoices via its official phone app, and it has set up 70 invoice pick-up sites around the city. There were only seven pick-up sites previously. The company also promised to cooperate with Shenzhen Metro Group to make sure passengers can get invoices from service windows at Metro stations. The council also criticized the company for not properly notifying passengers that they couldn’t report a lost Shenzhentong card or redeem the remaining money from a lost card. The company said that it plans to set up a real-name system by partnering with telecom operators to link passengers’ phone numbers with their Shenzhentong card numbers. According to the council, it’s also unfair that Shenzhentong card holders can’t get a refund for the purchase fee of a souvenir card when they change or return a faulty card within the warranty period, even though they can redeem the remaining balance on the card. The company said that it would introduce new rules that allow a passenger to get a refund for the purchase fee of a souvenir card within seven days of the first time they use the card. The company also promised that passengers could continue using a souvenir card after they changed the pattern of the card, as its existing policy, which doesn’t allow passengers to change the pattern on their card, was criticized by the council. According to the company, it has issued over 36 million Shenzhentong cards as of January this year, and the number of active card users is above 10 million. Statistics show that there are around 3 to 4 million people in the city using Shenzhentong cards every day. (Zhang Yang) | 