...And go through the usual dance of registering an account, confirming my email, sacrificing my firstborn son, etc, etc. Next, I want to add my company credit card as a payment option. I tap the Add button and expect to be able to scan the card with the camera, because, look, it's 2025... /6
Instead, I get a form to fill in my address, because of course. All this has taken so much time that the 30ish minutes are almost up, the train arrives any minute, so I decide I don't have time to fill in my fucking address and just use the Google Pay option, which amazingly is preconfigured. 7/
So I go back to the fare purchase view, select Einzelfarhausweis because sure, why the fuck would you localize THAT part of the app to English? Luckily I read German pretty well so I actually know what the options are. So I start to fill in the form to buy a single fare ticket... 8/
Because I have clearly time traveled to 1854, the app can't seem to fill in my departure location based on, you know, my actual location. So I tapety-tap S, Ü, D, K, R and select the station. (I'm not sure why the point of departure is even relevant, as I'm buying a zone fare, but whatevs...) 9/
Speaking of zones, the next field is for selecting the zone. I'm not at all familiar with Berlin fare zones, so I'm relieved to see there's a map! Unfortunately, the map is an unzoomable image approximately 4cm wide on my screen. A thumbnail. None of labels on it are even remotely legible. 10/
There is, however, a helpful little text below the BC option that says it includes, and I quote: "BER airport (Schönefeld)" Schönefeld was one of the old airports of Berlin. It has been closed since 2020. So I have no idea if zone BC includes the new airport I'm heading to. 11/
Great stuff, Rolf 👍 I'm so proud of you to master this challenge 😁 You could turn that into a short clip using Veo or something similar and I bet it will be even more hilarious 😂
Thanks, @rene-wilby.de 😁 I feel that I persevered in the face of an insurmountable UX challenge. I think next time in Berlin I'm going to record the experience as it unfolds...
The S45 will arrive any fucking second now, so I pick BC. Then I check the options for the Regeltarif selection field (because again why the fuck would you localize field labels?), but leave it at the default adult fare. The last field is Valid From, set to Now, and readonly. Sure, ok... 11/
I'm finally at the finish line! I tap the Purchase Ticket Now button at the bottom and... I get a form validation error: missing field. I double and triple check. THERE ARE NO OTHER FIELDS. I tap each field to make sure they indeed have values. They do. 12/
The S45 is rolling in to the station now. I decide to do a last second hail mary : I tap back, then select 24-Stunden-Karte because in this household we do NOT LOCALIZE the most important strings in the app. I quickly select BC, Adult fare, valid from Now, tap purchase, and... 13/
I have now paid, from my own Google Pay account, €10,60, for a 24 hour ticket that I will use for a single journey to the airport. I actually have no idea if this is a valid ticket for the S-Bahn, but I'm pretty far past caring at this point. At least I tried. /fin