A couple of days ago I visited the Web site of financial services company Liberty Life. I wasn`t looking for information on investments but rather some details of a cycling race the company sponsors, which is of no real consequence considering the information on the site is invisible to all but Internet Explorer users.
The brief but pointed message at www.liberty.co.za that greets you if you dare use anything else reads: "If you are viewing this page it means that you are currently running a browser which is incompatible with our site. The Liberty Web site has been designed to be viewed using Microsoft Internet Explorer, version 5 or above. Click here to download."
Apart from Microsoft and Liberty logos, nothing else is offered. No phone number. No e-mail address. Nothing. Yes, this is irritating. But because I am not about to download Internet Explorer so that I can see the site, I suppose I will have to live without the knowledge the company clearly wants to keep close to its chest.
Bad business
Alastair Otter, journalist, ITWeb
Irritation aside, it stuns me that any company would go so far as to exclude potential customers from its site, no matter how small a group the "non-standard" users are. For all they know, I could be sitting on millions of rands that I want to invest and because of a simple oversight in supporting only one platform, I`m unlikely to do that. Of course, being a journalist, it is highly improbable that I have anywhere near as much to invest, but the principle remains.
Another point: exactly what great truths does the Liberty group hold that it feels can`t be entrusted to anything but an Internet Explorer browser? What is it that it wants to say but can`t achieve using straightforward standards-based tools? Not having seen the site, I can only imagine.
If it has the resources and staff to build what I can only imagine to be a highly complex and interactive site, why can`t it throw in a slightly less flashy version for us users who don`t have access to, or prefer not to use, applications such as Internet Explorer?
To add insult to injury, I received an e-mail from the Liberty group last night, thanking me for my business (I recently made some changes to policies I have with the company). The e-mail informed me that in an effort to improve communication with customers, electronic copies of documents would now be sent to clients. For more information, or to download the Acrobat reader required to open the attachment, the e-mail recommended I visit the www.liberty.co.za Web site. Clearly that is not going to happen.
Liberty is by no means unique as many businesses are going the proprietary route and in the process excluding a growing group of users who work in other environments. This is not so much criticism as it is surprise that any company would purposely limit its market size and lose business as a result.
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