justloveplanes From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 761 posts, RR: 1 Posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 606 times:
I am posting this topic on the Civil Aviation forum since it touches Trips Reports, Tech/Ops and the user community in general.
I used the UA/CO Android app for my leg back from Hawaii to IAH yesterday. While impressive in some ways, it has a few flaws, one very significant IMHO, but overall, a travel game changer for sure. Haven't tried other airlines apps and curious how they all stackup.
Re: A travel Game Changer, this thing for basic reservations and monitoring and travel is better than the website IMHO. It is simpler and more direct to the 80% of the stuff you do, plus it's anywhere you are. Generally, I love it. It worked at both the United Club and the gate to check in. I showed it to the TSA checker at HNL and she said it was fine to use and didn't need a paper boarding pass for a security check.
Major Flaw: it seems that once you display the boarding pass, it stores it on the phone for a few cycles, but turning the phone on or off, and a few other modes of app switching I couldn't nail down, loses the pass so you have to reload it. The potential problem is that if you are relying solely on the Phone (as UA/CO want you to do to save paper), there is a possibility of losing your pass and needing to reload. Not a huge risk except if you are overseas w/o a data plan, or if you have some other problem after you are at the airport. The thing should stay there for a longer time.
Minor Flaws: No rewards travel inteface that I could find. Also the airport maps don't let you search the places by type or name. Say you want to list restrooms only, or restaurants only or a specific place like a subway. The maps just bring up a useless jumble of icons.
Wondering what othe users may be thinking on this and similar apps.
Sulley From United States of America, joined Jan 2010, 400 posts, RR: 1 Reply 1, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 600 times:
Love the app. It makes life so much easier when you're non-reving. It will be even easier after PSS Day One, when everything is on one system, as the app and Apollo sometimes do not get along.
I've never had an issue with my boarding pass disappearing, but that's just me.
Farewell, Continental. Thank you for all the memories.
justloveplanes From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 761 posts, RR: 1 Reply 2, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 569 times:
Quoting Sulley (Reply 1): I've never had an issue with my boarding pass disappearing, but that's just me.
To be fair, I was trying to provoke a failure, not likely in normal use. However this feature should be idiot proof, espeically if you are in a hurry and depending on the device to skip check in steps and get to your plane on time.
greenwichsud From United States of America, joined May 2008, 33 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 534 times:
My first impressions:
1. Overall, it's not nearly as polished as the Delta app. One of the features that I loooooove about the Delta app is that you can pop an itinerary directly into the calendar. It saves a lot of time for someone like me who flies every week.
2. The "splash screen" is frustratingly slow with bad graphics (even on a relatively high end phone - Samsung SGS II). The Delta splash screen is also a bit too long, but at least the graphics are better.
3. The UA-CO transition has been frustrating on the Android front. One day the CO Android App just simply stopped working, and it took several weeks of UA/CO to notify users (via. unitedhub.com of all places) that the CO App had been disabled.
4. As a followup to point 3, there should be/have been a way to store both my CO and UA credentials simultaneously. merging the info from both carriers onscreen would have been icing on the cake. It's frustrating to have to switch back and forth. Perhaps that's a few weeks away from being a moot point.
5. I can't seem to log into my UA account at all recently via. Android - I haven't had a chance to follow up with support.
6. When I am successful logging in (to my CO account), it doesn't seem to maintain my credentials after I close the app. This isn't exactly a banking site - why such high security (especially if you ca do the same from your PC)?
kgaiflyer From United States of America, joined Jul 2008, 3049 posts, RR: 1 Reply 4, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 494 times:
Quoting greenwichsud (Reply 3): The "splash screen" is frustratingly slow with bad graphics (even on a relatively high end phone - Samsung SGS II). The Delta splash screen is also a bit too long, but at least the graphics are better.
Slow !!!
Not on my LG Optimus T -- and its only 3G. Maybe it's your provider
greenwichsud From United States of America, joined May 2008, 33 posts, RR: 0 Reply 5, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 13 hours ago) and read 461 times:
Not on my LG Optimus T -- and its only 3G. Maybe it's your provider
The splash screen graphics are stored locally on the phone - it has nothing to do with the provider throughput. It's painfully slow (in reality we are talking 3-4 seconds) for a feature that provides absolutely no functional value.
justloveplanes From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 761 posts, RR: 1 Reply 6, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 12 hours ago) and read 412 times:
Quoting greenwichsud (Reply 3):
1. Overall, it's not nearly as polished as the Delta app. One of the features that I loooooove about the Delta app is that you can pop an itinerary directly into the calendar. It saves a lot of time for someone like me who flies every week
IrishAyes From United States of America, joined Jan 2008, 978 posts, RR: 4 Reply 7, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 12 hours ago) and read 384 times:
Lots of interesting points here.
Quoting greenwichsud (Reply 3): 1. Overall, it's not nearly as polished as the Delta app. One of the features that I loooooove about the Delta app is that you can pop an itinerary directly into the calendar. It saves a lot of time for someone like me who flies every week.
Quoting greenwichsud (Reply 3): 5. I can't seem to log into my UA account at all recently via. Android - I haven't had a chance to follow up with support.
Agree entirely. The Delta APP is way sleeker and superior than the UA or AA version. It also seems to be much better "synced" with the theme of their websites (which, I think can point to the parent site as a paradigm for how the app is designed). Delta happens to have a sleeker website so therefore its app follows the same format.
Additionally, this may indicate that once UA moves its res systems to Apollo and adopts the CO website (way more user friendly) it will have a much more user-friendly app.
I like the Delta notifications and how the widget pops up!
greenwichsud From United States of America, joined May 2008, 33 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (3 months 2 weeks 3 days 12 hours ago) and read 368 times:
Sponsor Message: 
From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 761 posts, 
Printer friendly format 
