A group of disgruntled mainland online merchants aim to bring their plight to Hong Kong's attention with a series of protests against Taobao Mall and Taobao Marketplace, the retail e-commerce divisions of the privately held Alibaba Group.
Around 20 protesters handed a petition yesterday to the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in Sai Wan, so that their complaints could be passed on to Prime Minister Wen Jiabao.
A demonstration will be staged today at Times Square in Causeway Bay, where the Hangzhou-based Alibaba Group's local offices are located, and at the Golden Bauhinia Square in Wan Chai tomorrow.
The demonstrations come after angry protests that erupted on the mainland in October whenTaobao Mall, the country's leading business-to-consumer e-commerce platform, with more than 50,000 registered online sellers, raised its annual membership fees and charged hefty merchant security deposits in an attempt to discourage vendors of counterfeit goods and boost online customer service. Thousands of small business owners claimed they were put at a disadvantage on the online shopping site compared with large merchants.
Complaints were also raised against the customer ratings system implemented by Taobao Mall and Taobao Marketplace, the mainland's largest consumer-to-consumer e-commerce platform.
A protester who identified herself as 'Sheng' said yesterday: 'We've come to Hong Kong because there is no interest in us on the mainland. We want dialogue. We want to negotiate with Taobao on an equal basis, but nobody will listen to us.' She alleged that police in Hangzhou detained protesters and barred buses carrying online merchants from other provinces from the city.
