The system has been employed by the Macau Government since the Portuguese colonial period and continues to be used after the 1999 handover of the territory.
Similarly to its counterpart romanization system in Hong Kong, the method is not completely standardized and thus is not taught in schools, but rather employed by government agencies to accurately display the correct pronunciation of Cantonese in public signage and official usage.
[2] Therefore, the two governmental standards have differing orthographies for the same Cantonese pronunciation; for instance, the place name known as 石排灣 in Chinese is romanized as Seac Pai Van in Macau but as Shek Pai Wan in Hong Kong.
Prior to this adoption, individuals who studied or conducted business frequently in nearby British Hong Kong would have a tendency to adopt an English-based Hong Kong transliteration for romanizing Cantonese.
As with the system used by the Hong Kong Government, all tones and distinctions between long and short vowels are omitted.