The firm which operates the Octopus Card on Tuesday said it hopes to shorten the process needed to implement the government's plans to scale back the HK$2 elderly transport subsidy scheme.

In the budget last week, the government proposed limiting the HK$2 subsidised trips to 240 a month.

Elderly passengers would also have to pay 20 percent of future trips that cost more than HK$10.

Labour minister Chris Sun said last week it would take around 18 months to adjust each and every Octopus machine to adopt the changes.

At a media gathering, Octopus chairwoman Jeny Yeung said it would take time to implement the scheme because different transport operators have different discounts and fare calculation methods.

She said it should take the company at least a year to discuss these issues with them to adjust the system, as well as conduct trials.

Yeung said Octopus would seek to finish the work in less than 18 months.

She said the firm wants to introduce a new function in the second half of the year that would allow users who installed the Octopus mobile app to send money to another app user, or an actual card.

Such payments would require entering the card details of the other user.

Yeung added the firm is trying to extend its services to Japan in the third quarter of this year.

She said the idea is that transactions would go through the Octopus mobile app, as the firm is discussing cooperation plans with platforms that have wider coverage in the country.

In the past year or so, the firm extended services to mainland China and Thailand.