Hello List,
I just received the below message from the gentleman who has been very good about keeping me up-to-date about my request to make the Booking.com app more accessible. I sent my initial message which is at the very bottom of this thread on May 15, just 2 weeks ago. I received a prompt reply and on May 21, only 9 days ago, I received an email saying that the team was going to look into making improvements. This is definitely an example where a company seems to take accessibility seriously and I hope others on the list who travel for business and leisure will give this app a try and, if it works better, use it to book hotels. So far doing the initial search is easy and also selecting a room and completing the booking is easy. It's mostly browsing through the list of search results that is slow and sluggish. I'll post a review once the update is out and I have a chance to check it out. Regards, Sieghard From: Iphone Feedback [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2013 7:18 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app Dear Mr. Weitzel, This time I am in the happy position to let you know that our development team managed to make some improvements for the Voiceover accessibility of our app. Please note that these changes will be included in the upcoming release of our iOS app, version 5.6. Please feel free to download the update when released and let us know if you still encounter usability issues. I will be more than happy to pass any of your feedback to our developers. Once again, thank you for using Booking.com for your reservations and we hope to remain your first choice for your online hotel reservations. Kind regards, Stavros Pantermalis iOS Feedback Team Rembrandt Square Office, Herengracht 597, 1017 CE Amsterdam The Netherlands E-mail: [email protected] <http://www.booking.com/> Description: cid:[email protected] Subsidiary of the Priceline Group (NASDAQ:PCLN) 41 languages, 100+ offices worldwide, 41.000+ global destinations, 475.000+ room nights booked every day No booking fees, best price always guaranteed From: Sieghard Weitzel Sent: Tuesday, May 21, 2013 4:03 PM To: Iphone Feedback Subject: RE: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app Hello Stavros, Thank you very much for this information, I am very grateful that the Booking.com development team is going to take a look at Voiceover accessibility. I once again would like to offer my help, if there is anything I can do or if your team would like me to beta test any potential versions with improvements I would be happy to do so. Please note, I am switching my correspondence to my private email, I initially sent my request from y business address accidently. I will also post on the Viphone list that Booking.com has been responsive in this and while there is not yet an improved version, I really do appreciate the fact that you are looking into this. Best regards, Sieghard From: Iphone Feedback [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, May 21, 2013 4:37 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app Dear Mr. Weitzel, I hope that you are doing fine. I have no big news, but wanted to let you know that our development team will soon start working on the accessibility of our app and they hope to be able to improve it. I will keep you posted in case I have more concrete details. Once again, thank you for contacting Booking.com with your feedback and don't hesitate to come back to us in case you have more feedback or queries regarding our app. Kind regards, Stavros Pantermalis iOS Feedback Team Rembrandt Square Office, Herengracht 597, 1017 CE Amsterdam The Netherlands E-mail: [email protected] <http://www.booking.com/> Description: cid:[email protected] Subsidiary of the Priceline Group (NASDAQ:PCLN) 41 languages, 100+ offices worldwide, 41.000+ global destinations, 475.000+ room nights booked every day No booking fees, best price always guaranteed From: Sieghard Weitzel Sent: Thursday, May 16, 2013 6:16 PM To: Iphone Feedback Subject: RE: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app Hello, Thanks for acknowledging my message. I really hope Booking.com will take a good look at the accessibility of the app. I recently learned from another member of the Viphone google list that the Booking.com app was perfectly accessible until about a year and a half or 2 years ago (he mentioned 2011), but then a new update broke some of the accessibility. The same list member mentioned that he now uses Wotif and I just downloaded the app and found it much more accessible so for the time I will also most likely book my hotels via Wotif. You should know that I recently booked almost 20 nights of accommodation via your Booking.com app for my trip to Thailand, one night in Vancouver, one night in Beijing, 2 nights in Bangkok, 5 nights in Chiang Mai and 8 nights on Phuket. I would say in an average year I book 20 to 30 nights of accommodation and if you add up the commission Booking.com earns even over 3 or 4 years from that it should be worthwhile for your iOS team to spend a few hours to review accessibility. If your team finds that accessibility improvements can be made I will also most happily put an app review up on the Viphone list and it is almost a given that at least a few of the over 1,500 members there would use your app. Lastly, if accessibility improvements can be made in a future version, please make sure your iOS team mentions "Accessibility Improvements" or "Voiceover Improvements" in the "What's New" section of the app description. Best regards, Sieghard Weitzel From: Iphone Feedback [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, May 16, 2013 7:27 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app Dear Mr. Sieghard, Thank you for contacting Booking.com about this issue. It is true that you must be the first person to have contacted us for such an issue and thank you for sharing your remarks with us. For the moment, we cannot promise anything or propose any solution to you, but I will definitely forward your message to our development team so as to make them aware both of the issue and your willingness to participate as a Beta Tester for this feature. Here in Booking.com, we're always looking for ways to improve your experience, so if you have any further feedback please don't hesitate to get in touch with us again. Kind regards, Stavros Pantermalis iOS Feedback Team Rembrandt Square Office, Herengracht 597, 1017 CE Amsterdam The Netherlands E-mail: [email protected] <http://www.booking.com/> Description: cid:[email protected] Subsidiary of the Priceline Group (NASDAQ:PCLN) 41 languages, 100+ offices worldwide, 41.000+ global destinations, 475.000+ room nights booked every day No booking fees, best price always guaranteed From: Sieghard Weitzel Sent: Wednesday, May 15, 2013 4:27 PM To: Iphone Feedback Subject: Voiceover accessibility of the Booking.com iPhone app To whom it may concern: I am a blind iPhone user and use Voiceover, Apple's built-in screenreader on the iPhone to use my phone and apps. I also travel a fair amount both for business and for pleasure and your Booking.com app/service is my preferred way to find and book hotels, B&B's and other accommodation. However, unfortunately, the app is quite inefficient to use for somebody in my situation. While I find it useable and accessible, the one area where there seems to be a problem is the main listing of search results. The first step, entering a place/destination, selecting the check-in date, number of nights and number of people per room, is no problem. Once I tap "Search", however, the list of hotels that is displayed is not easily navigated. My iPhone 4S becomes very slow and sluggish with Voiceover in that list. This does not effect the rest of the phone, e.g. if I switch to a different app everything is fine. Normally I should be able to drag my finger down the screen and hear the search results announced or, and this is my preferred method, I should be able to place my finger near the top to find the first hotel and then I should be able to flick right with a single finger to move through the results just as I can flick through, for example, the apps on my home screen or google search results in Safari. This last method does not work at all and the only way to review the search results is to place my finger on the screen and wait a moment for Voiceover to tell me the information. As I said, this process is sluggish and unreliable. If I do find a hotel I think I miht like and double tap on it (the gesture in Voiceover which opens apps, activates links, buttons etc.) everything is fine again. The hotel details open, I can add the hotel to my Favourites or, if I want to go ahead with the booking continue to the room selection. I am not sure if I am the first user to send in Voiceover related feedback, but the iPhone is definitely by far the most accessible smartphone for a visually impaired person. Apple has set very high standards and the accessibility built into the iPhone is fantastic, very powerful and it gives many blind people equal access to mobile computing. At the same time more and more developers either take accessibility into consideration right away or make accessibility improvements after they realize that their app is of use to the visually impaired user. I am member in a google list called Viphone where currently over 1,500 blind and visually impaired users of iPhones or other iDevices help each other out with instructions for new users, provide advice on apps, features and hardware accessories. I have posted about Booking.com to the list asking if others are using the app or if they are using other hotel booking apps. I prefer Booking.com because I like the competitive prices, ratings/reviews and also the fact that you offer Passbook integration. However, if I am in a hurry I often use Kayak because it has better accessibility. If your development team has questions regarding Voiceover accessibility, I'd be happy to answer them by email or on the phone and if you consider looking into improving the accessibility of the app, I'd be happy to join your beta tester team and provide feedback. I have been and still are beta tester for several apps and I'm an experienced user. Best regards, Sieghard Weitzel, British Columbia, Canada -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google Group. To search the VIPhone public archive, visit http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
<<image001.png>>
