I recently read a newspaper article about The New White Lion at Llandovery in Wales and thought I would check them out with a view to a short stay with my family later this month. The first thing that strikes me is that there’s an air of quality about the site, a nice choice of colours and font… but then I find myself waiting… and waiting… I’m sitting in front of a Flash intro and there’s no means to skip it. That’s more than half a minute of my time wasted every time I choose to visit the site – that’s not right, I think to myself. Anyway… moving on… I decide to click on the Rooms page. It tells me that there’s a family room… great. But hang on… which one of the six rooms is the family room – it doesn’t say! I click on the ‘door’ to each room, but all I get is a single picture (often a close-up of something like a lamp in the room) and no text. That doesn’t help me. OK, so how much does this place cost anyhow…? Oh, no… there’s no tariff anywhere to be found. I email them and say that the site looks beautiful but politely point out that it’s very poor from a usability point of view, and could they please tell me which room is the family room and what the rates are. I get a fairly prompt reply saying that I can call them on the telephone to discuss if I wish. I would have sooner just been told the information I was after, but I ‘phone anyway. And guess what… I get an answering machine! I left my details so they could call back but that was now over 4 hours ago…
