TfW Can't purchase Railcard discounted PlusBus for Return

[HandyHat]

I am trying to purchase an Off Peak Return between Newport and Swansea via TfW discounted using a Railcard (the exact Railcard doesn't matter, as long as it's one that gives you a corresponding discount on a PlusBus ticket). Once I get to the basket, if I try to add a PlusBus ticket for the return journey (for Newport or Swansea), it fails to update my basket.

I've been going back and forth with TfW Support since the 22nd of July, who have acknowledged the issue and keep telling me they'll let me know when they have an update, but seemingly aren't actually doing anything to fix the issue. I've now filed a formal complaint.

I am aware I could buy from a ticket office and other retailers are available, but does anyone know any way to get this to work online/via the TfW app? Or am I going to have to wait for a response to my complaint...

 

[Watershed]

It isn't a bug which results in misselling or overcharging, and it doesn't cause the site to be in breach of its retailing licence or the accreditation requirements. PlusBus is also not a particularly widely purchased product. So with it being low severity and impacting only a small percentage of users, there will be many other issues that TfW's supplier will likely be looking to fix ahead of this one.

Even once a fix has been identified, it will need to be tested internally to make sure it works and doesn't break any existing functionality, then rolled out as part of a software release (which may only be done once or twice a week). If something else causes issues during a software release then the release will be postponed until the problem can be resolved.

So being realistic, you can probably expect it to take at least a couple of months for an issue such as this to be fixed. That's probably not what you want to hear, but if TIS suppliers jumped straight onto fixing every new issue that's reported, they would never add new functionality, pr get round to larger upgrades/fixes etc.

 

[kkong]

Even once a fix has been identified, it will need to be tested internally to make sure it works

Are you sure about this bit?

Based on recent experience with ScotRail, it seems that not all developers carry out this stage!

Do we know which developer codes the TfW app?

 

[Watershed]

Are you sure about this bit?

Based on recent experience with ScotRail, it seems that not all developers carry out this stage!

Do we know which developer codes the TfW app?

That is the standard software development process.

I don't know what happened in the leadup to the ScotRail release, but it sounds a bit like a 'MVP launch' along the 80/20 principle, i.e. make sure that the 20% of the functionality that is used 80% of the time (or by 80% of people) works. Personally speaking I'm not a fan of the MVP principle - it can be used to justify launching things when they are not entirely ready - but it is a common practice across software development.

Just because something is launched before everything works, that does not mean that the process I have described hasn't been followed. The remaining issues are likely known limitations that were accepted to get the launch done by the deadline (a 30th July launch sounds suspiciously like ScotRail's contract with Trainline was due to come to an end on 31 July).

To come back to the issue the OP raised, it will be a question of prioritising the issues that have the greatest severity and which affect the largest proportion of users, as it clearly isn't possible to fix everything all at once.

I'm not sure who does the TfW app.

 

[HandyHat]

I completely appreciate the software development process and I realise my purchase is very niche - I just thought I'd ask in case anyone has encountered this issue and knows a workaround.

In any case, it means TfW lost out on £160 worth of ticket sales and Trainsplit gained instead!

 

[81A]

Don't Silverrail (the developers behind the ScotRail and GWR app/web updates) do TfWs app? If so, hardly a surprise some things are broken...