ITWire

If you need more proof that government organisations are usually the worst service providers on the planet, then take a look at the slamming the public has given West Australia’s “biggest” website, Transperth.

The WA-m bam crowd-sourced slam comes courtesy of the Crowdies, an awards ceremony that uses “crowd-sourced” responses to determine which are the state’s most and least popular sites.

The Crowdies Awards is an event put on by the Australian Web Industry Association, or AWIA, where members of the public nominate, rate and vote on the awards, with the final, live-streamed event due to occur at the “Leederville Bowling Club” on September 9, 2012.

AWIA is an organisation that represents over 700 companies and freelancers, and one that I must admit to never having heard of before, although it must said, I certainly have heard of them now and says it aims to “educate the public about the industry and help members with professional development” through “Port80 networking events, the Edge of the Web Conference and the Australian Web Awards, which recognise excellence in web development and design across the country”.

AWIA says in a revealing press release that “more than half of all negative responses from West Australians relate to the Transperth site, reputed to be the highest trafficked web site in the state. No positive ratings have been received.”

The crowd-source slam continues, stating: “The Crowdies invites people to score a web site from -100 to +100 on three criteria; aesthetics, usability and content. The Transperth site has a number of -100, -100, -100 scores.

“One of the complainants cited this page as the worst presented document repository he’d ever seen, also mentioning old content that has not been removed and the lack of easy logins for regular customers using SmartRider and TravelEasy products.”

Bret Treasure, the AWIA Crowdies project manager notes the public’s annoyance and anger at such an important site delivering “such a poor user experience”, with Mr Treasure stating: “More than almost any other type of site, this one should work automatically on mobile phones. It is practically useless unless you know the address of the special mobile version.

“Despite having a full secured back end, Transperth still requires users to fill in paper-based forms, rather than filling them in online. Not only is this annoying for users, it requires more work by Transperth staff and substantially increases the risk of data entry errors.

“This site is probably the most visible representation of WA efficiency to people visiting from interstate and overseas and they could be forgiven for concluding we have a stone-aged economy.”