The Galaxy Note occupies an odd space in the smartphone segment, positioning itself deliberately between phone and tablet, as evidenced by Samsung’s marketing material for the device. We take a look at the Note and see whether it’s all it’s cracked up to be.
Review: LG Optimus 3D (P920)
If you haven’t been living in a secluded cave in the mountains somewhere, you’ll know that three-dee is a bit of a fad at the moment (or, that’s what the manufacturers want you to think). Everybody and their dog is jumping on the bandwagon. Yes, we’re even seeing phones getting the 3D treatment. The LG Optimus 3D is the first of these to have landed on South African shores. We spent some time with it to see whether the 3D helps or hinders an otherwise solid device.
Application Showcase: Android South Africa
We take a look at a few South African centred applications, either developed locally, or targeting the local market.
Application Review: Swiftkey X
Android is known as a mobile operating system that gives you choice. One of the choices presented to you as a user is which input method you would like to use. Quite a while ago, Swiftkey appeared as a beta, and we’ve been using every iteration of it since then, the latest being Swiftkey X.
Application Review: Powertime
Have you ever wanted to buy pre-paid electricity, but couldn’t get to a place that actually sells tokens? Now, all you need is an Android device and a credit card, and you can buy pre-paid electricity tokens right from your phone with Powertime’s application.
After installing the application on my phone, I had to go through the registration process, seeing as this would be the first time I used the Powertime service. Unfortunately, this was a user experience nightmare. You are asked to provide the sort and quantity of information that would be more at home on some kind of governmental application form. Is my gender really relevant? Why do you want my ID number? Form field after form field is also not ideal on a mobile device. Powertime really needs to re-think the registration process, because at the moment it is a massive barrier to entry. If I wasn’t reviewing the application, I probably wouldn’t have bothered with it after seeing what’s required to register. Another niggle is that I had to provide my meter number during registration, but that information doesn’t seem to be used, as I had to add the meter again after eventually getting into the application proper.
Once I was registered and logged in, it became quite evident that a lot of thought had actually been put into the application. The home screen consists of clear actions, and main tasks like adding a credit card for payment, adding a meter, and actually buying electricity were quick and painless. There are quite a few nice touches throughout the application as well, like being able to SMS or email tokens, and being able to see your purchase history.
The application does a few clever things in the background, learning your electricity usage habits. This means that you’ll be able to set up notifications that’ll let you know when you need to top up your electricity, or glance at the “virtual meter” and see how many units of electricity are left. It’ll even suggest ways to reduce your power consumption. This functionality may make the Powertime application worth the horrendous registration process.
Final verdict? It’s an extremely useful application, that does one thing and does it well, but they’re going to have to do something about the registration process. You shouldn’t need more than my email address, a password, and a name. Once I’m actually logged in, I’d be more likely to add a meter and credit card – and actually use the application.
I should note that only South African power meters are supported, and that you can also buy prepaid cellphone airtime using this application, I didn’t test it, but I’m sure it’s just as painless as buying electricity tokens.
Rating: 6/10
Price: Free
Powertime on the Android Market | More information from Powertime
7 Responses to Application Review: Powertime
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Albert says:
Thank you for the reply. It’s good to know there are still companies out there that listen. Looking forward to the improvements!
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Support no good says:
Power time is a very convenient app but fails to deliver on it’s promise. There is no telephone number offered to call, so you can only communicate via e-mail, which is slow and inconvenient if you have an immediate query. Upon receiving your query there is seldom a proper explanation even if you have requested one. It appears as if the company has no real interest in retaining it’s customers.
An example would be the addition of a new meter. Any new meter that you request must be authorized by them first. Why is this? An e-mail request to them remains unanswered. But this is not the real problem. You get the meter authorized, which takes a day or so, then you may want to add another one. This gets added. But suppose you want a third? The system then informs you that you cannot add more than two meters without authorisation. So you delete one of the existing ones. BUT You still cannot add a new one without authorisation, so you try to place the original one back onto the system. No go. Authorization is required! Why if the original meter was authorized already?
I then attempted to purchase R500 of electricity on or about the 1 June 2011. The system refused the transaction. Their support department said that R500 is the maximum allowed and should go through, but no go. So I end up driving to an outlet to purchase the electricity because the system does not work correctly. Then on the 13 June 2011 the R500 is processed through my credit card! Wow. After many e-mails I finally get a call from Powertime support who promise to look into the transaction. Do I need this aggravation? Probably not.The system is full of these inconsistencies and these problems coupled with no telephonic support makes the system inoperable. I am going to remove it from my iPad the moment that the R500 is corrected.
There are many other systems on the market that allow the purchase of prepaid electricity. While this is the most convenient app on the market in South Africa, it is not worth the inconvenience to use.
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Thank you for highlighting these problems. We don’t always keep applications installed after the review period, so getting feedback like this is very valuable. Let’s hope Powertime sees your comment and takes it to heart.
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s lombaard says:
I want to cancel my registration to powertime. What can i do?
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Thanks for your review.
Powertime is the leading mobile merchant service in South Africa with iOS, BlackBerry and Nokia apps complementing mobi and web services.
Our customers are entrusting us with payment method details and we have to ensure the highest level of screening and security, whilst complying with the requirements of Eskom and municipalities. It is for this reason that we have to capture essential details about users. It is a small once-off effort that should be negligeable considering the great benefits of the service. Not having to drive in the middle of the evening to find a vendor when you run out of power, receiving alerts before your meter is about to run out, and saving electricity should be worth it!
Having said that, we take your comments with great interest and will strive to improve the registration process so that this will be an even better experience for all of us. Watch that space.
Thank you for your interest and all the great work at ZADroid.
The Powertime team