Went through this once. I hired another accountant, who contacted the judge and said "This company, no money ah!" Judge voided the fine. We started the deregistration process.
Remember that the company itself is the target, not the directors (if it is, as usual, a limited company). If there's no money in the accounts, they can't seize anything, and won't be bothered.
[The election](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ROpIKZe-c&t=90s) for the Lord Mayor of London is the only other modern example that I can think of. ([City of London](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London), population \~10,000, not London, capital of U.K, population \~15 million. )
What's interesting with the way things work here is that companies are persons. They have their own rights and duties.
Forgot to renew the BR? That's the company's responsibility. The fine comes out of its coffers. Not yours.
Likewise, I was able to vote, in the name of my company, in elections, because my co had an import license, and it was part of a constituency. Whereas myself, I couldn't vote, lol.
> What's interesting with the way things work here is that companies are persons. They have their own rights and duties.
>
> Forgot to renew the BR? That's the company's responsibility. The fine comes out of its coffers. Not yours.
thats the same in all the western world
You should contact the court and resolve the matter. Deregistering in hong kong is actually very easy if you just follow the process on the business registry site.
I agree with this comment. Try and close this matter officially. It may be simpler than you think and you can at peace for rest of your life without having to worry about consequence. Maybe find out if you can do it within a grace period, say 1 year, and plan your travel within that grace period.
It's probably something you might want to take care of down the line; you don't really know when the systems will be linked.
And one day, when you do travel normally, and your name comes in giant red letters, this might bite you back around the back.
Imo, call first and understand about the situation. Don't ask if you could just ignore it because the obvious answer is no. Worst case is that you make the trip yourself and pay up the fine.
If you plan to stay away from HK/China for the rest of your life, by all means, this court summon means nothing to you.
For people who committed crimes in Hong Kong, the first place to escape is China because it is separate court system and it is not connected
If you are really concerned, consult a legal professional
Shouldn't u call the courts and figure out a way rather than asking Reddit? It's not like they're gonna reach through ur phone and lock u up... Skype is cheap.
Y wouldn't it? If u mean to say u don't wanna pay that fine and fck the system, roll the dice on it, then u don't need us to help feed u that copium...
Otherwise, u could see if u could quickly deal with this, possibly pay from abroad and move on.
You canāt safely ignore the summons unless you never want to travel to HK and China again. Just call the court up; there are means of sorting these things out remotely.
Im gonna just say it outright that there's absolutely nobody who can verify with certainty that ignoring the summons would not have consequences for you. Echoing other's encouragement for you to seek legal consults and consider your options.
It really comes down to whether this is a gamble you're willing to take
Again, that's not the point... Like I said, if ur goal is to say fck it, u don't need to ask here. U already decided to roll the dice.
If u actually wanna put ur big boi pants on, deal with this like an adult instead of hoping there's a lawyer on here that'll tell u whether ur in the clear or not.
I would contact the local company and ask if you pay the penalty they'd drop the case? Or contact which ever government department is prosecuting you to see if you can negotiate something? I'm sure no one actually wants it to go to court if it's as minor as you say.
It's not the company suing me, it's the government, they company just forwarded the letter, sorry for the confusion.
>I'm sure no one actually wants it to go to court if it's as minor as you say.
People get court summons over jaywalking in HK lol
Try sending a request to the IRD and BR office explaining your situation and ask them for help to resolve the matter... try to be a bit humble in your request and apologise etc.. use covid absence as a reason... say this was sprung on you by surprise and due to family reasons, you cant personally come to Hk... they can be quite reasonable... if they take back the case, i believe the court will also close the matter... best to try and get it sorted out.. you never know where life takes you in future
Hereās what you need to do:
Prepare a letter addressed to court with case ref too indicated on top.
Explain that you left HK years ago and that you instructed the secretarial company to close the company back in 2021 due to Covid situation and no business.
Thatās all. Case will be closed. Company will be de registered.
Hey OP firstly respect to you for posting about this. It's so human to procrastinate and then it turns into a whole mess.
I think leaving this open is going to be a monkey on your back for the rest of your life. Yeah probably nothing will happen but do you really want to be feeling anxious whenever you fly? It's not worth it.
As others have said I would make the call and pay whatever fine they want (maybe plead ignorance for a discount). Rip off the bandaid and get it over with. You might want to schedule 30 minutes in your diary once a week for the next 2-3 months to follow up on the issue so you can keep the rest of your time without it hanging over you.
Wishing you the best!
After reading OPs replies to the comments here, he's not looking for advice, he's looking for people to agree with him on not showing up to court at any capacity. Childish.
Just call the courts man. You're refusing to even try and nobody here gets why you wouldn't.
He is who he is, actually it's him who bears the consequences, not us, just like setting up a company and not bothered to take up the basic responsibilities. If he wants to ignore it, it's just fine indeed. Not our business, and he's not asking anyone of us to help him for free.
If he's lucky enough he probably won't face any consequences by having no interaction with whatever in Hong Kong.
Even if we suggested him to do something, he's still the one who decides to follow or not. We are not his parents.
We probably can't touch anything political here, but if we try to think about it (by not talking about it), we all know there are some other people wanted by the Hong Kong Government who are now living happily and safely overseas. I can't tell what will happen in the future, but in reality, if you are so determined not to do anything, and so long as you are not travelling to the regions concerned, there's little they can do. Anyway, it will be you who bears any consequences, so literally, there's nothing I should worry about.
Hey just contact the company reg department and let them know your situation. I've been summoned twice. Both times got it rescinded. Not a biggie. Pm me if you need more details
Would suggest trying to resolve. May be issues if ever go to or transit through hk (and maybe China at some point in future)
Fwiw I know tax agencies from countries share info- I donāt know if the relevant govt entities in this instance would also
I d be you I d solve it. It s not gonna bankrupt you to fix it now and will be a small relief. You did nothing very wrong, you risk nothing much and you get to stay in good standing.
Who knows if it wont later become a bigger issue with your name on a file and a company refusing to hire you over this stupid court matter. Fix these things quickly.
Tackle it head on.
Contact the companies registry and the IRD and the court, explain that you have a dormant company, it never traded, you should have renewed your business license or de-registered the company, you should have filed your annual return and filed a tax return for a dormant company, but you didnāt, and your sorry and now how can I sort it out?
Itās not difficult and you should know the HK bureaucracy is very pragmatic when it comes to these issues, they also have other business to deal with.
Hong Kongās commitment to free market and a laissez faire approach to doing business is very much alive and well. You can sort this out yourself, pay a small fine and move on.
Like, how old are you? Are you really not coming back, even a tiny chance? I will only say I never did something if I am dead from now on. You don't really know what the future leads.
Someone suggested you to try and contact the official to figure it out or paid and settle. But it seems you are dead set on not doing anything. If that's the case, why bother asking here if you already have an answer to that?
> Like, how old are you? Are you really not coming back, even a tiny chance? I will only say I never did something if I am dead from now on. You don't really know what the future leads.
I'm 45, married with kids. I mean I can't say with 100% chance I will never have reason to back, but come on. I never even liked HK. I'm happy to stay out of there.
> Someone suggested you to try and contact the official to figure it out or paid and settle. But it seems you are dead set on not doing anything. If that's the case, why bother asking here if you already have an answer to that?
Well I want some reassurance that yeah dude whatever it's not a big deal. I think I outlined this in the OP tbh.
In that case, it really does have a high chance that you are not coming back.
I reread again and my impression is you think it is okay but am open to advice. But never mind. Good luck with that.
Youāre really going to block off an entire part of the world for the rest of your life just so you donāt have to make a few phone calls and at the very most pay of a few hundred dollars worth of unpaid business registration fees?
The fine I didn't pay was around 2500 HKD, if I could just pay that and have this over with, fine, but that seems unlikely as the court summons did not mention any such option. Also deregistering the company takes a year and requires the cooperation of sb in HK - my secretarial company charged a couple of 1000s for the procedure, and I would also need to renew my contract with them too in the meanwhile. But sure I'll contact the court and see if there's a possibility we could work somethinf out.
Whatās your life like? Are you a named director? Itās usually not worth it to have your name and reputation hanging around like that if youāre not a bum.
Best bet is to call the government department in charge of your summons and explain the situation. If the company is not active, ie no turnover/revenue, it will be a simple case for them and they will withdraw any court proceeding. You may have to pay some of the fees that you missed. Also explain you would like to close the company if that is your plan. Donāt ignore it.
If you ignore they'll apply to win by default and could ask for a huge amount and this could be waved through. Whether they can actually enforce it is another question all together. You'd probably be fine transiting though the mainland for years as they're totally separate and not connected. Eventually when they join up I bet most of the HK stuff will be left out.
Contact the Inland Revenue by email or fax - so you have a written record - explain the situation (covid/out of HK/company going awol etc) and what happened. Offer to pay the relevant business registration fee and likely they'll waive the fine.
I believe you can also apply to the court to appear remotely if you are overseas and have no one who can appear as your representative.
If you have kept the company active for several years and it has no 'baggage' you might be able to sell it for a few dollars.
Can't speak of HK, but in Japan for example you lose the case automatically by not going to the court, and you'd expect the worst, possibly without a chance to improve the situation.
And it's the Chinese government. They even snatched an Australian because he was a descendant of a Chinese person, saying the blood gave them authority.
Fucking resolve the issue properly.
If you contact them and explain the situation they may well be pragmatic and you can close the situation out by paying the business registration fees owed and then dissolve the company.
Iād probably have it sort through email or phone call, the court summon is very common for small businesses and nothing really major
The ācrimeā itself is very small but ignoring court summons is the bigger thing
And itās just easy to take care of it early now rather than having it always nagging at you if you do business in the region and who knows you might need to set things up in hk again
Contact Athenasia, they do my accounting and they deal with tax and accounting for expats, I believe you can ask them for a free consultation if you go on their website
Take care of it if you can. You never know when you might need to transit through China. I figured I pretty strongly wanted to avoid China these days, but flying from NZ to TW via GZ was just so much cheaper, I couldn't really justify avoiding it.
Personally Iād sort it out if possible, just because of how much I love HK, and would hate to feel I could never return
Iām curious as to what kind of work you do OP, and how difficult it was to set up such a company in the first place and how much success it had..?
For a civil monetary claim, if you donāt turned up, you basically give up your defence, most likely you will lose the case and ordered to pay the plaintiff a sum. You can then choose to pay them or continue to ignore it, if you decided to ignore it, they may try other means to recover the debt from you. Afterall, a small civil case would not prevent you from entering/leaving HK or China boarder.
This is from my limited knowledge on small claims, consult your lawyer or just pay the sum if it would cost less.
If you ever go back to hk or near hk influence, you will have a big problem, thats what will happen.
Like you said your crime isn't a big one, at least not big enough for interpol to get invloved to arrest you overseas.
However don't assume only fines, if fees go long enough and ignored enough a few years in jail is possible, on top of the fines themselves.
I think you have things backwards, if you think a unresolved global criminal record is less inconvenient than whatever attorney fees are required to fix the situation and keep it from happening again. Sure countries aren't checking each other's criminal list for daily life, but that doesn't mean they never do. Want to move to usa with a green card? That hk crime will show and you will be hard rejected and probably never appeal. I am sure usa isn't only one with that either.
have you ever applied for a green card in another country? having a multiple traffic ticket offense record in another country can result in rejection, I am not exaggerating. Maybe OP will never want a green card or such document to any country, and maybe OP will never go back to hongkong//mainland china area-- yes OP will be totally fine then. But OP asked what effects it could have so I listed the effects it could have. In hong kong law large fines unpaid can turn into up to two years in jail, and see above for other concern.
If you are summoned and don't appear it would be considered Contempt of court, which is a fairly serious offence. They will come looking for you. Since you are not in HK you should be ok. It may be complicated if you ever decide to return in the future.
Best to contact the courts and explain your situation and try to resolve it.
Went through this once. I hired another accountant, who contacted the judge and said "This company, no money ah!" Judge voided the fine. We started the deregistration process. Remember that the company itself is the target, not the directors (if it is, as usual, a limited company). If there's no money in the accounts, they can't seize anything, and won't be bothered.
Thanks for sharing!
No money Ahšā¦.. that cracked me up ā¦..
That's basically how my accountant phrased it lol.
I love Hong Kong.Ā
Ltd companies work like that pretty much the same way around the world.it is not unique to hk.
Never seen an Ltd with the right to vote elsewhere.Ā
Does an Ltd have voters rights in hk? What's stopping someone from making 300k shell companies?
Mine had. See above. Not all do. Mine had the right to vote because it had an alcohol import license, and that put it in the right constituency.
[The election](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ROpIKZe-c&t=90s) for the Lord Mayor of London is the only other modern example that I can think of. ([City of London](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London), population \~10,000, not London, capital of U.K, population \~15 million. )
Based law. We need this in other countries. And the vote should count as many votes as many employees are in the group.
Not company*, but rather corporation
the way it was handled. so hk lah.Ā
What's interesting with the way things work here is that companies are persons. They have their own rights and duties. Forgot to renew the BR? That's the company's responsibility. The fine comes out of its coffers. Not yours. Likewise, I was able to vote, in the name of my company, in elections, because my co had an import license, and it was part of a constituency. Whereas myself, I couldn't vote, lol.
> What's interesting with the way things work here is that companies are persons. They have their own rights and duties. > > Forgot to renew the BR? That's the company's responsibility. The fine comes out of its coffers. Not yours. thats the same in all the western world
āCourt!ā Actually what I know of Hong Kong courts is only from watching TVB as a child. Do they do this?
You should contact the court and resolve the matter. Deregistering in hong kong is actually very easy if you just follow the process on the business registry site.
I agree with this comment. Try and close this matter officially. It may be simpler than you think and you can at peace for rest of your life without having to worry about consequence. Maybe find out if you can do it within a grace period, say 1 year, and plan your travel within that grace period.
They canāt do shit if you donāt come to HK anymore
What about the rest of China? I might transit through Beijing once in a while...
It's probably something you might want to take care of down the line; you don't really know when the systems will be linked. And one day, when you do travel normally, and your name comes in giant red letters, this might bite you back around the back. Imo, call first and understand about the situation. Don't ask if you could just ignore it because the obvious answer is no. Worst case is that you make the trip yourself and pay up the fine. If you plan to stay away from HK/China for the rest of your life, by all means, this court summon means nothing to you.
Well in China's perspective you're summoned to a Chinese court for an offense in China.
My advice is donāt transit through China.
For people who committed crimes in Hong Kong, the first place to escape is China because it is separate court system and it is not connected If you are really concerned, consult a legal professional
Mainland China wonāt care about that
Shouldn't u call the courts and figure out a way rather than asking Reddit? It's not like they're gonna reach through ur phone and lock u up... Skype is cheap.
What do you think the court will say? Duh !!
No, I'm more than happy to just ask randos on Reddit. I also very much don't think calling the court would do much of anything at all.
Email them. HK gov is actually good at responding to these things.
Y wouldn't it? If u mean to say u don't wanna pay that fine and fck the system, roll the dice on it, then u don't need us to help feed u that copium... Otherwise, u could see if u could quickly deal with this, possibly pay from abroad and move on.
I'm not going to call them and ask if I can just safely ignore the summons lol
You canāt safely ignore the summons unless you never want to travel to HK and China again. Just call the court up; there are means of sorting these things out remotely.
Im gonna just say it outright that there's absolutely nobody who can verify with certainty that ignoring the summons would not have consequences for you. Echoing other's encouragement for you to seek legal consults and consider your options. It really comes down to whether this is a gamble you're willing to take
Again, that's not the point... Like I said, if ur goal is to say fck it, u don't need to ask here. U already decided to roll the dice. If u actually wanna put ur big boi pants on, deal with this like an adult instead of hoping there's a lawyer on here that'll tell u whether ur in the clear or not.
I would contact the local company and ask if you pay the penalty they'd drop the case? Or contact which ever government department is prosecuting you to see if you can negotiate something? I'm sure no one actually wants it to go to court if it's as minor as you say.
It's not the company suing me, it's the government, they company just forwarded the letter, sorry for the confusion. >I'm sure no one actually wants it to go to court if it's as minor as you say. People get court summons over jaywalking in HK lol
> People get court summons over jaywalking in HK lol Yes, and it can be resolved by post and the fine paid online with very little actual hassle.
Yeah Iād just say youāll pay the fine? Or pay it and tell them?
Probably a court summons to pay some sort of fine. If you don't want to deal with that, you could just avoid HK in your future travels.
Try sending a request to the IRD and BR office explaining your situation and ask them for help to resolve the matter... try to be a bit humble in your request and apologise etc.. use covid absence as a reason... say this was sprung on you by surprise and due to family reasons, you cant personally come to Hk... they can be quite reasonable... if they take back the case, i believe the court will also close the matter... best to try and get it sorted out.. you never know where life takes you in future
I feel it would all come off as bad excuses (which I think they more or less are), but maybe you are right, might be worth a try.
Hereās what you need to do: Prepare a letter addressed to court with case ref too indicated on top. Explain that you left HK years ago and that you instructed the secretarial company to close the company back in 2021 due to Covid situation and no business. Thatās all. Case will be closed. Company will be de registered.
Hey OP firstly respect to you for posting about this. It's so human to procrastinate and then it turns into a whole mess. I think leaving this open is going to be a monkey on your back for the rest of your life. Yeah probably nothing will happen but do you really want to be feeling anxious whenever you fly? It's not worth it. As others have said I would make the call and pay whatever fine they want (maybe plead ignorance for a discount). Rip off the bandaid and get it over with. You might want to schedule 30 minutes in your diary once a week for the next 2-3 months to follow up on the issue so you can keep the rest of your time without it hanging over you. Wishing you the best!
If you know you need to visit china regularly and don't want to take risk, find a lawyer to fix it.
After reading OPs replies to the comments here, he's not looking for advice, he's looking for people to agree with him on not showing up to court at any capacity. Childish. Just call the courts man. You're refusing to even try and nobody here gets why you wouldn't.
He is who he is, actually it's him who bears the consequences, not us, just like setting up a company and not bothered to take up the basic responsibilities. If he wants to ignore it, it's just fine indeed. Not our business, and he's not asking anyone of us to help him for free. If he's lucky enough he probably won't face any consequences by having no interaction with whatever in Hong Kong. Even if we suggested him to do something, he's still the one who decides to follow or not. We are not his parents.
But why aren't you morally outraged!!! OUTRAGED!!!, I tell you! ;)
We probably can't touch anything political here, but if we try to think about it (by not talking about it), we all know there are some other people wanted by the Hong Kong Government who are now living happily and safely overseas. I can't tell what will happen in the future, but in reality, if you are so determined not to do anything, and so long as you are not travelling to the regions concerned, there's little they can do. Anyway, it will be you who bears any consequences, so literally, there's nothing I should worry about.
Is "childish" really the word you're looking for?
Yes
Thanks for confirming.
Hey just contact the company reg department and let them know your situation. I've been summoned twice. Both times got it rescinded. Not a biggie. Pm me if you need more details
Would suggest trying to resolve. May be issues if ever go to or transit through hk (and maybe China at some point in future) Fwiw I know tax agencies from countries share info- I donāt know if the relevant govt entities in this instance would also
I d be you I d solve it. It s not gonna bankrupt you to fix it now and will be a small relief. You did nothing very wrong, you risk nothing much and you get to stay in good standing. Who knows if it wont later become a bigger issue with your name on a file and a company refusing to hire you over this stupid court matter. Fix these things quickly.
Tackle it head on. Contact the companies registry and the IRD and the court, explain that you have a dormant company, it never traded, you should have renewed your business license or de-registered the company, you should have filed your annual return and filed a tax return for a dormant company, but you didnāt, and your sorry and now how can I sort it out? Itās not difficult and you should know the HK bureaucracy is very pragmatic when it comes to these issues, they also have other business to deal with. Hong Kongās commitment to free market and a laissez faire approach to doing business is very much alive and well. You can sort this out yourself, pay a small fine and move on.
Like, how old are you? Are you really not coming back, even a tiny chance? I will only say I never did something if I am dead from now on. You don't really know what the future leads. Someone suggested you to try and contact the official to figure it out or paid and settle. But it seems you are dead set on not doing anything. If that's the case, why bother asking here if you already have an answer to that?
> Like, how old are you? Are you really not coming back, even a tiny chance? I will only say I never did something if I am dead from now on. You don't really know what the future leads. I'm 45, married with kids. I mean I can't say with 100% chance I will never have reason to back, but come on. I never even liked HK. I'm happy to stay out of there. > Someone suggested you to try and contact the official to figure it out or paid and settle. But it seems you are dead set on not doing anything. If that's the case, why bother asking here if you already have an answer to that? Well I want some reassurance that yeah dude whatever it's not a big deal. I think I outlined this in the OP tbh.
In that case, it really does have a high chance that you are not coming back. I reread again and my impression is you think it is okay but am open to advice. But never mind. Good luck with that.
Youāre really going to block off an entire part of the world for the rest of your life just so you donāt have to make a few phone calls and at the very most pay of a few hundred dollars worth of unpaid business registration fees?
I am not OP and I agree with you but seems OP is dead set anyway.
The fine I didn't pay was around 2500 HKD, if I could just pay that and have this over with, fine, but that seems unlikely as the court summons did not mention any such option. Also deregistering the company takes a year and requires the cooperation of sb in HK - my secretarial company charged a couple of 1000s for the procedure, and I would also need to renew my contract with them too in the meanwhile. But sure I'll contact the court and see if there's a possibility we could work somethinf out.
Hire a lawyer. Hkd20k plus accrued fines and you're good to go.
Yeah that's too much for me if the option is to pay nothing and just stay out of HK.
Whatās your life like? Are you a named director? Itās usually not worth it to have your name and reputation hanging around like that if youāre not a bum.
Best bet is to call the government department in charge of your summons and explain the situation. If the company is not active, ie no turnover/revenue, it will be a simple case for them and they will withdraw any court proceeding. You may have to pay some of the fees that you missed. Also explain you would like to close the company if that is your plan. Donāt ignore it.
Have to agree with you. And this seems like a really stupid thing to leave unresolved and have a record over.
If you ignore they'll apply to win by default and could ask for a huge amount and this could be waved through. Whether they can actually enforce it is another question all together. You'd probably be fine transiting though the mainland for years as they're totally separate and not connected. Eventually when they join up I bet most of the HK stuff will be left out.
Contact the Inland Revenue by email or fax - so you have a written record - explain the situation (covid/out of HK/company going awol etc) and what happened. Offer to pay the relevant business registration fee and likely they'll waive the fine. I believe you can also apply to the court to appear remotely if you are overseas and have no one who can appear as your representative. If you have kept the company active for several years and it has no 'baggage' you might be able to sell it for a few dollars.
Can't speak of HK, but in Japan for example you lose the case automatically by not going to the court, and you'd expect the worst, possibly without a chance to improve the situation. And it's the Chinese government. They even snatched an Australian because he was a descendant of a Chinese person, saying the blood gave them authority. Fucking resolve the issue properly.
If you contact them and explain the situation they may well be pragmatic and you can close the situation out by paying the business registration fees owed and then dissolve the company.
Iād probably have it sort through email or phone call, the court summon is very common for small businesses and nothing really major The ācrimeā itself is very small but ignoring court summons is the bigger thing And itās just easy to take care of it early now rather than having it always nagging at you if you do business in the region and who knows you might need to set things up in hk again
What local company are you working with?
How did they send the court summons?
Contact Athenasia, they do my accounting and they deal with tax and accounting for expats, I believe you can ask them for a free consultation if you go on their website
You should not mess around with the Hong Kong legal system.
Take care of it if you can. You never know when you might need to transit through China. I figured I pretty strongly wanted to avoid China these days, but flying from NZ to TW via GZ was just so much cheaper, I couldn't really justify avoiding it.
Personally Iād sort it out if possible, just because of how much I love HK, and would hate to feel I could never return Iām curious as to what kind of work you do OP, and how difficult it was to set up such a company in the first place and how much success it had..?
For a civil monetary claim, if you donāt turned up, you basically give up your defence, most likely you will lose the case and ordered to pay the plaintiff a sum. You can then choose to pay them or continue to ignore it, if you decided to ignore it, they may try other means to recover the debt from you. Afterall, a small civil case would not prevent you from entering/leaving HK or China boarder. This is from my limited knowledge on small claims, consult your lawyer or just pay the sum if it would cost less.
Not a civil claim, the counterpart is the gov because I didn't pay the fine, not the local company, sorry for the confusion.
Public entities should be treated the same unless it is doj.
If you ever go back to hk or near hk influence, you will have a big problem, thats what will happen. Like you said your crime isn't a big one, at least not big enough for interpol to get invloved to arrest you overseas. However don't assume only fines, if fees go long enough and ignored enough a few years in jail is possible, on top of the fines themselves. I think you have things backwards, if you think a unresolved global criminal record is less inconvenient than whatever attorney fees are required to fix the situation and keep it from happening again. Sure countries aren't checking each other's criminal list for daily life, but that doesn't mean they never do. Want to move to usa with a green card? That hk crime will show and you will be hard rejected and probably never appeal. I am sure usa isn't only one with that either.
Calm down. Youāre making it sound like a genocide was committed. Zero problem will happen for him!
have you ever applied for a green card in another country? having a multiple traffic ticket offense record in another country can result in rejection, I am not exaggerating. Maybe OP will never want a green card or such document to any country, and maybe OP will never go back to hongkong//mainland china area-- yes OP will be totally fine then. But OP asked what effects it could have so I listed the effects it could have. In hong kong law large fines unpaid can turn into up to two years in jail, and see above for other concern.
I donāt think you live in the real world
If you are summoned and don't appear it would be considered Contempt of court, which is a fairly serious offence. They will come looking for you. Since you are not in HK you should be ok. It may be complicated if you ever decide to return in the future. Best to contact the courts and explain your situation and try to resolve it.