Consumer Council enhanced its 'Supermarket Price Platform' mobile phone app by expanding the scope of the embedded price comparison function. Consumers are now able to browse items with price differences of over 50 percent from their iPhone and Android apps.
The Council continues to enhance its 'Supermarket Price Platform' mobile phone app for the convenience of consumers to check price data on the Platform more easily. After launching the updated version of its iPhone app, the Android version has now also been updated. Both versions include six functions: 'Supermarket price watch', Rankings for Supermarkets with Lowest Prices', 'Rankings of products with price differences of over 50%', 'Shopping basket', 'Specific Product Price Platform', and 'Certified Shops'. The Council enhanced the app by listing all products with price differences of over 50 percent instead of just showing the top 20 products with greatest price differences. Consumers can check all the items with price differences of over 50 percent and see which supermarkets those products are from with the said function.
The Council states that since its launch in 2011, the iPhone 'Platform' app has accumulated about 46,000 users with a browsing record of over 2.5 million hits. For the Android version, it has been downloaded by almost 36,000 users since its launch in 2012, with a browsing record of over 2.8 million hits. The average usage time of the 'Platform' app is about 10 mins. The continuous increase of both the number of users and browsing records shows the increasing demand of consumers to use mobile phone apps, the Council will keep on improving the various functions of the 'Platform' app according to its survey work and demand of consumers.
Consumer Council increased the number of surveyed supermarkets to 96 in late 2013, collecting over 32,000 price data each month. The Council has launched the website version and an updated version for both the iPhone and Android app for its 'Supermarket Price Information Platform'. Each version enables consumers to make comparisons according to their shopping preferences, further, the mobile phone apps allows user to lodge online complaint, which makes it more convenient for consumers. The 'Supermarket Price Information Platform' is available in Chinese, English, and Portuguese for the convenience of local citizens and tourists. The Council has also generated a QR Code for the 'Platform' app and the code is listed in local supermarkets for easy download. For inquiry, please call 8988 9315.
