[usr1106]

As a privacy-aware user, when making a contract with a bank (or buying a flight ticket or whatever) you should get assertions that their web site meets certain quality standards so you can use your browser to access the account or actually check in.

Paper did not have those incompatibility problems...

However, from the BBC article I conclude that even customers with a default browser could not necessarily use their account

Edit: Forgotten not added.

[ryandrake]

Businesses can change, too. My credit union[1] recently made a web site change causing me to no longer be able to log in. The new shiny red login button they probably paid $millions for an incompetent developer to provide does nothing when you click it (desktop Safari). I vetted the old site which worked perfectly, but now it doesn’t. I’m working on moving my business elsewhere.

1: https://www.techcu.com/

[LeifCarrotson]

Hopefully they didn't pay $millions...the source is completely unminified, it checks a cookie, calls Google Analytics, then changes the login link from display:none to display:block.

    function LoginButtonClick() {
        var selAccount = $("#accounts").val();
    
        LoginCookieSet(selAccount);
    
        if (typeof ga !== 'undefined')
            ga('techcu.send', 'event', 'button', 'Click', 'Member Login');
    
        var formAction = "https://online.techcu.com/User/AccessSignin/Password"; // testing url
    
        switch (selAccount) {
            case "1":
                formAction = "https://online.techcu.com/User/AccessSignin/Password";
                if (window.location.host === "dev.techcu.com" || window.location.host === "qa.techcu.com") {
                    formAction = "https://onlinetest.techcu.com/User/AccessSignin/Password";
                }
                break;
            case "3":
                formAction = "https://businessbanking.techcu.com/";
                break;
            case "2":
                formAction = "https://businessbanking.techcu.com/smallbusiness";
                break;
            default:
                formAction = "http://online.techcu.com/User/AccessSignin/Username";
        }
        if ($('#UsernameField1').val().substr(0, 2) == "**") {
            $('#onlineBankingLogin #UsernameField').val($('#UserNameHidden').val());
        } else {
            $('#onlineBankingLogin #UsernameField').val($('#UsernameField1').val());
        }
        $('#onlineBankingLogin #PasswordField').val($('#PasswordField1').val());
    
        $('#onlineBankingLogin').attr('action', formAction);
        $('#onlineBankingLogin').submit();
    }

The direct login link is then visible, you can bookmark https://online.techcu.com/User/AccessSignin/Start for later...but yeah, nonfunctional for ~10% of desktop browsers is not a good look for a technology credit union.

[ryandrake]

Nice debugging and thanks! Didn't expect someone to actually dive in and figure it out. I'll bookmark the direct link to hold me over until I find a new bank but I've already totally lost confidence in the business. They can't even be assed to test their main web site. I wonder if they see the failure from analyzing the before-and-after browser share in their logs. I wonder if anyone's even monitoring the logs.

[justinclift]

Found similar kinds of things happening with the occasional website too, mainly due to my use of Firefox. eg buttons that used to work, suddenly "do nothing"

Pretty sure its caused by "Chrome-only" developers, as going through the hassle of installing a Chrome/webkit based browser gets things working. But really, fuck that. ;)

Ubereats made this change recently. Naturally, there's no way on their website to contact them about it. :/

[usr1106]

Yes, they can change. But if technical compatibility were part of your contract they might end up paying damages if they break it. Well, I am dreaming...

[foldr]

The login button works for me on Safari (15.2).

[zaphirplane]

> you should get assertions

I think you’d get blank looks if you asked that question followed by generic we use modern blah and new improvement next blah