BikeLink Bike Parking 4+

Good but needs improvement

Card should be linked. For those of us with chip cards, the app is basically useless other than to check availability. We should be able to check $$ balance and add funds to the card via the app. The technology to connect the cards is not that difficult.

Could be an angle to gain more profit, since use of the app to rent lockers likely results in more rental time than using the card (w/card it starts only when you open the door; w/card people tend to rent in advance).

Developer Response ,

Thanks for the feedback! The BikeLink card, introduced in 2003, is a stored value card (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stored-value_card), so, by nature, the value on the card is not stored on the internet. If every BikeLink location were independently connected to the internet, then we could report the value on the card to you. Unfortunately, for legacy reasons (Gateways were released in 2017)), most BikeLink locations are not connected to the internet and 40% of facility owners have not yet opted for this service. We recommend you use the app instead of a BikeLink card if you want to see your purse value online. Note that BikeLink does not make a profit on rental fees. The sole purpose of the very low rental fee is to deter monopolization and encourage proper use of the lockers.

Was good until it wasn’t

Beeen working relatively well until today when it wouldn’t open the locker. Took ~30 minutes with phone support to get it open but it still thinks it’s in there on the app and is now charging at a higher rate. ??? I tried longing out of the app and now when I try to log back in I get error -1009 , which appears to be some sort of domain related error. Maybe that’s why the end rental button was stuck with some sort of highlight cycling across it. This needs to be more reliable. Don’t know if the support is 24 hours but I’d hate to be stuck somewhere late at night because I can’t get my bike out of the locker.

…

Update - I guess the issue I was having was due to a UI change where you now need to swipe the end rental button instead of pushing it. Agreed with the person I spoke with at BikeLink that this is a great idea as it makes it less likely that one might inadvertently push the button and not notice the door pop open as they walk away. Just the UI wasn’t expressive enough with what action was necessary and the app auto updated, so, no chance to be notified of the change. Maybe a text with a link to a “new features” page would help. The inability to log in was also resolved and something I’d still consider a bug but, since I now know the workaround, I’ll just call it an odd behavior.

I’ve bumped my rating from 2 to 4, which means some things still can be improved but a worthy app.

Developer Response ,

Thanks for the feeback! We have updated the swipe to end button UI to make it super clear how to use it. We are working on a fix for the sign-in issue (it does appear to be related to your home network setup somehow). Happy biking!

Apple watch!!

I think the app is great. That’s why I gave it 5 ⭐️’s. However I just wish y’all could make it compatible for Apple Watch too instead of it just being for the iPhone cause I forget that I need my phone out to unlock the locker and I already had put my phone away. So now you know I got to get my phone again just to unlock the locker. But other than that I think the app is great. Can y’all please do this for the update!!