Thursday, September 25, 2008

nationalrail.co.uk

The National Rail Enquiries site www.nationalrail.co.uk sucks on mobile devices, really sucks. The javascript often does not automatically insert the correct date or time and the auto-completion on station names slows typing to glacial speeds. You're also not allowed to search for journeys minutes into the past, which is annoying as the minutes are grouped into 15 minute intervals (eg, if it is 4:35 you must choose the 4:45 option, not the 4:30 option). In fact the site was so frustrating that I started to develop my own alternative.

Just days after starting that page I visited nationalrail.co.uk on my iPhone and was stunned to be forwarded to pda.nationalrail.co.uk. Apparently they do have a mobile site. I was so impressed that I emailed them to compliment them on it. When I later visited nationalrail.co.uk again on my iPhone I was no longer forwarded to the mobile site and had to type in the address manually. I emailed them again to point out that their device recognition and forwarding was a bit flaky only to receive the following: "You are not automatically directed to the mobile version of our website." How the fuck are people supposed to know about these things?

I have now also noticed that the search results are not even the same, try getting the direct weekday 8:36 Brighton to London Bridge service on the mobile site.

Incidentally there is also a mobile TfL site that you may not know about.

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