I’ve noticed major bugs – not just poor design decisions (though that’s some of it), but bugs – when trying to shop on-line at the site of some major bricks-and-mortar chains. Like when Sears had the description of some lawn chair covers for all the items in their microwave ovens section. Or when clicking Details or Add to Cart (can’t remember) on the Bay mobile web site took you to the home page of the desktop web site. Or Movietickets.com, which if you select the theatre first and then choose to buy tickets, knows that the theatre is in Canada, knows that the ticket price is in Canadian dollars, but won’t let you actually buy tickets unless your credit card address has a US zip code.
But if you choose the movie from the Canadian site and then the theatre, it will work. Except the site is in US English, and if you change it to Canadian English, you get an ASP error. But then if you hit the back button, the site will display correctly in Canadian English (normally I wouldn’t care, but since their other localisations are FUBAR…).
And my favourite is that whenever I report any of this stuff, they act like it’s an idiot customer issue. Hellloooooo, your site let me do this and failed to let me give you money.
