For the three out there who don’t know, Road Angels is a roadside assistance company. A towing company in simple terms. If you ever have problems with your vehicle while on the road, it’s one of the companies you want to have on speed dial. If you have that ex-Jap approaching 200,000km on the odometer, you already know about this service.
Road Angels has had a presence on the interwebs for a while. Members can check out the services on offer, sign up, check out details on their plans etc.
Now, considering most Zimbabweans are actually on mobile and not using computers, Road Angels has decided to give mobile users a little love. They have released a new app, available for Android and iOS users. Being a progressive web app it’s also available to use and/or install on desktop and other platforms where compatible browsers can be found.
This move makes sense, making the app a progressive web app as opposed to a native mobile app. A good looking app at that, complete with a dark mode. Long forgotten is the native mobile app they once had in the Play Store and App Store.
No one needs visit an app store and for download-shy Zimbos, this is a good thing. So, users get an app experience whilst actually, technically just on a webpage.
Yes, I know, web apps have their disadvantages, the big one in the context of Zimbabwe being that they need an active internet connection to run in some cases. When offline, the Road Angels app has limited use, all it can do really is direct you to place a call. However, this isn’t much of a problem at all.
Let’s be honest, how many times is a member going to be opening the app? After going through the services on offer and picking a plan, a member has little to do in the app. Roadside assistance is like insurance, you want to be able to call them when you face a problem but other than that, you have nothing to talk about.
The Road Angels app will help you call for service in the event of an emergency, all while offline. So, being a web app does not really affect the app’s ability to offer its most important feature.
Then again, if all you’re getting from the app is a contact number, are you not better off just saving the number in your contacts directory and forgoing the app? Uh, …
What you can do in the app
Well, at least the app will give you emergency contact information – police, ambulance, fire brigade etc. You can also get contact information for insurance providers if you need that. It gets better, you can view the location of toll gates in Zimbabwe, you know, so you can plan your journeys accordingly.
What is missing from the original Road Angels Assist native app is the traffic fines tab. They used to list State-approved traffic fines as a FYI to users. Feedback back then showed users were frustrated that the police completely disregarded those. So, that info is missing for now.
What is also missing from the O.G is the distance calculator. A nifty little feature that’s probably not as necessary on a web app. If you’re going to need an internet connection to use the app, why not just use Google Maps. Probably why the feature was scratched.
Low utility apps
I remember back when smartphones were starting to gain popularity. Everyone was fascinated with apps and checking out the latest on offer. At the height of the frenzy, an app that could only send the word Yo! got millions of downloads.
We seem to have moved past that madness. People have settled on their essentials and when setting up a new device, those are all they look for. ‘There’s an app for that,’ used to be an exciting proclamation. Not so much today, we don’t much care for downloading apps that have a limited use case anymore.
However, web apps offer the advantage of not having to download anything really and yet getting an app experience. So if you’re going to have an app that you open once every couple of months, it might as well be a web app.
Considering that you can place an icon on your phone’s home screen which works as a shortcut to a website. Why not just bookmark the website of the service provider and call it quits though? Uh,…
I don’t know. I wonder what you think about low utility apps. Should companies be spending time and energy on creating native or even web apps that are likely to be used once in a while even by die hard customers? Or should resources go into improving the mobile browsing experience which unfortunately still sucks for most companies.
Road Angels’ mobile site works well enough that personally, I don’t think the web app was necessary. However it is at least a nice-to-have for sure. But, considering that at launch you cannot even register to become a member in the app, it removes a bit of the shine because you can do that on the mobile website.
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What’s your take?