Bad Booking UX

Bad User Experiences are bad and immediately cause resentment and dissatisfaction. Even stress and anxiety too.

On Sunday night I chose to book three train tickets for my family for an upcoming trip with an open return and using a family and friends railcard.

A well known train ticket booking app, asked if I wanted to reserve some seats. Oh yes please.

The booked seats

• Carriage C, Seat 16, Window
• Carriage C, Seat 57, Window
• Carriage C, Seat 61, Window

Yes that’s right, reader, In their infinite wisdom they have decided that my 8 year old child will sit alone, my wife will sit alone elsewhere, and in all probabilities I’ll be sat out of sight at the other end of the carriage.

Looking at the email for our open return it states the return date as the day we depart. Heart begins to race that I’ve wasted loads of money so after my stomach settles. I check again online to ensure I did book the open return we had intended. Thankfully I was right and the app was wrong.

This app also auto selects a checkbox to open a well-known hotel booking site too. Rather irritating experience all told.

Unfortunately, there isn’t really a viable alternative.

Published 17 November 2024, with 209 words.