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Fast-food chain TGI Friday’s has come out with an Android app that not only allows you to do the basic stuff (such as find a TGI Friday in the first place, display the menu and also share promotions), but also allows you to open a tab and pay straight from your phone.
They also say that you can find “some of our bartenders’ best tips on life…and living it up.” Or, as I would suggest, you can just keep your phone in your pocket and live your life.
So far, so good. However, just looking at the thumbnails in Google Play has me going “my eyes! my eyes!”. Grey tabs? That too at the bottom? And screenshot from a FroYo device? What year is this, 2010?
I don’t know how the app is inside, since it’s not available in India, but it’s sad to see their marketing people to put in such a poor effort.
[Google Play via Android Police]
It doesn’t look anywhere near as bad as you’re describing it. What’s your problem?
Edit: I see, those are persistent tabs, not just pop-up options. Oh dear. But still, if they used tabs at the bottom like gmail etc. do, would that be so bad?
Yeah I overdramatized the “my eyes! my eyes” bit, but that’s just for humor. However, considering they shifted the tabs to the bottom in the first place, and spent some time to do it, what I don’t like is that they didn’t change the design of the tabs to something custom. We all know the grey bits in the older versions of Android were a bit of an eye-sore, and that was what Matias Duarte immediately got rid of with Gingerbread. So it’s just surprising the dev decided not to make some pretty simple changes.
TGI Friday’s is half-asked all around. Their food is mediocre at best and I have fallen for coupons in the past that they send out then refuse to honor once you get the check. The location near me understandably closed down. It’s a poorly run company in my opinion so it’s no surprise that their app is poorly done.
It’s surprising that restaurants would do this, since you’re entirely of the right to just walk out and not pay if you feel the restaurant is not fulfilling their their end of the ‘contract’.
Nothing illegal about it either (unless you’re just dine-and-dashing — I’m sure there are various laws against that) — at worst you’re breaking a contract and the restaurant can sue you (which, really — good luck).
(for the record though, the above is not actual legal advice… ^_^)
Indeed, google’s UI guidelines explicitly say to use the action bar and bottom action bar instead of bottom tabs, but whatever, they probably wanted to minimize headache while maintaining iOS versions at the same time. Talk about no effort though: use an app like Market Enabler and you can get US apps in other countries without even needing a proxy. “I am physically somewhere else” is not a valid excuse when it comes to digital goods. :)
@ Jason: From another Jason, thank you for your insight!!! It would do businesses some good if they actually listened to customer feedback!!! Whether it’s feedback on Google Maps, Facebook, or any sort of restaurant based website or smartphone app.