V/Line 4+

Some work needed

Have been using this app for some time and find it pretty useful but with some tweaks it could be great!
- There is a problem if you tap out of the app wile booking a ticket: when you return to try and carry on where you left off you find yourself back at the home screen with no idea how to return to your booking, so you have to start all over again. If you have already reserved a seat the system holds on to that and you can’t have it back.
- There is not much seat information visible. If booking a Velocity service on the Gippsland line, you can’t see which is the quiet carriage. It happens to be the first one that comes up. The result is that the “quiet” carriage is always full, often with groups having loud conversations, while the other ones can be pretty empty. It would probably better if the default carriage was the standard one and you specifically had to tap in to book into the quiet one. Please clearly indicate when booking into the quiet carriage as I love the concept of a quiet carriage.

Journey planner doesn’t show journey

What kind of journey planner doesn’t show the actual journey???. Yes it shows depart and arrive times but not the stops along the way, even when you select a trip. There a plenty of reasons a user may want to see this when planning a trip. This simply takes you to a booking page where more often than not you can’t book online anyway. Also it doesn’t do much if it’s a myki zone - tells you to go to the ptv app if you want fare info.
Also the app does not show real time arrival times on the next 5 (or anywhere else). It only shows the scheduled time and anyone who uses V/line regularly knows this is hardly ever the actual time.
Unless you call the station and speak to someone you have no way of knowing your train is delayed. So you show up at the station only to find the train is delayed. The delay info is shown on the station display, why on earth is this not in the app? Pretty pathetic in 2022.

Developer Response ,

Hi Kathy, thanks for your feedback. Our app is aimed at commuters who use our train services, hence why you can only view the next 5 departures in the app. We will take your other feedback on board for future releases. Thank you.

Don’t think the designers of this app actually commute

It’s got some good features, we’ll really only one the (next 5). It’s clearly Melbourne centric since the live (arrivals and departures) are only for Southern Cross. But you know, not everyone commutes in and out of Melbourne, and there’s also a second station involved the one from where you live.

For example: where I live, quite a lot of people commute to Bendigo. So the live arrivals/departures is defunct because it only caters for Southern Cross. My daughter also uses the train to get to school, it would be so handy to know when her train is due to come in (for picking her up - especially with the frequent delays). But that’s not an offer because the app only services Southern Cross.

And then next 5 whilst handy, is annoying because you can’t extend out beyond that. If I want that information I have to then search for it specifically.

Why can’t you show a specific line with all the times from your station to the destination easily?

So it gets a 2 star rating. It’s definitely below average.