Low Carbon Enterprise

Low Carbon life

Low Carbon Living starts from reducing carbon footprint Since its establishment, HLC regularly arranges its staff to attend lectures on environmental protection and promotes low carbon business from every aspect of daily work life. It also encourages and subsidizes its staff to participate activities on promotion of low carbon living organized by BGCA and other non-profitable charity organizations. These includes tree planting, clean the beach, eco-tourism, taking public transportation when travelling and much more. Through internal propaganda and forums, information and guidelines on environmental protection are delivered to all staff. Discussions and activities amongst staff on environmental-protection measures are also encouraged with an aim to promote the following low carbon business in our workplace:

1.When performing office renovation, independent sets of switches and temperature controls are installed in appropriate areas. Whenever a staff member has to leave his/her workplace for a long period of time, he/she can simply switch off the air-conditioner in corresponding area without affecting the other staff. Besides, all air-conditioners and filters are arranged to be washed and cleaned up by registered technicians to ensure they are in good condition.

2.Air travel increases carbon footprint substantially. Since 2007, HLC has adopted online video conference with overseas clients and workers. Jet lag on staff could also be avoided.

3.Since early 90's, HLC has started to use energy-saving laptops to replace traditional desktops, thus saving up to 80% of electricity consumption.

4.It is an era of rapid development in information technology. To promote paperless office culture, staff is encouraged to deliver internal messages or information for their clients by e-mail. All receivers are also friendly reminded not to print out the e-mails unless extremely necessary. If printing is inevitable, double-side printing with smaller fonts and narrower line spacing should be adopted and on recycle paper. This also applies to photo-copying.

5.Collection boxes are placed in workplace to collect re-usable paper. There are also bins for collection of recycle paper with both sides fully used. When the “toner low” signal is on, staff is requested to take out the toner cartridge and slowly rock it end-to-end for a few times and put back into the printer. This will repeat until the tone cartridge is fully used up and the cartridge will then be sent for recycling.

6.When sourcing and purchasing paper and office furniture, producers or suppliers with FSC certification and their FSC-certified products will be considered with first priority.

7.Multi-zone lighting controls are adopted in the office. When a staff has to leave his/her workplace, he/she only needs to turn off the light of his/her area without affecting the others. This will help saving energy. Besides, LED lightings are gradually used to replace traditional florescent lamps.

Low carbon business

The following developments can further illustrate HLC contributions in Low Carbon Business:

Since its establishment in 1991, HLC has put much effort in optimization of its website to provide real-time information on helpers. This enables prospective employers can select their helpers at home comfortably without bordering to travel

In 1995, HLC uploaded in its website recipes which it prepared for publication by Property Times, a magazine published by HKET. Employers can view daily recipes and share with their helpers on monitors without printing out the recipes.

In 1999, HLC addressed the needs of new and existing customers through our uploading the "Handbook for Employers of Domestic Helpers" in its website and is free for navigating by all visitors. The handbook was a joint promotion with Hong Kong Economic Times in 1997 and the publication is currently re-edited to its 5th edition and has been well received in Asia, with approximately 10,000 copies sold.

In 2005, HLC started to send out e-mails and SMS to inform its customers the latest application progress and further in 2011 to follow up periodically the performance of the helpers after their arrivals.

Starting from 2008, HLC, the pioneer in its industry, launched online web interviews for prospective employers to interview with overseas helpers. This eliminates the unsuitability of helpers after their arrivals.

Since 2009, HLC stopped sending hard copies of letter for helpers who have to complete when returning to their country of origin on holiday. Instead, these documents were converted into electronic form and sent to the employers by e-mail.

In 2010, HLC set up its fan page in facebook and invited its helpers in Hong Kong and overseas to join this fan page. Activities organized by HLC and other useful information are announced through this fan page. A staff is also assigned to answers queries from helpers online.

In 2012, HLC distributes and uploads videos in various media formats so that prospective employers can view the self-introduction video of helpers through different platforms including traditional desktops, laptops and mobile phones (both IOS and Android) anytime, anywhere and at their choice.