CASA - You Can Stick Your Online ASIC Application Up Your ***
I've just wasted an hour of my own sweet and highly valuable time trying to renew my ASIC on CASA's online system, and I am mightily and totally pissed off!
All I can say is that if you call this process "efficient" then God help Australian Aviation!
It started last week when I went to CASA to get a renewal form, to be told politely by the nice lady at the counter that the renewal was "all online now". Good thinks young internet savvy Sunfish, those CASA blokes don't miss a trick to improve efficiency! So Today I have a few minutes to spend so I fire up the new dual core Pentium Vista powered computer thinking I'll get this over and done with right now.
1. However, nowhere on CASA's main ASIC/AVID page is there a simple box marked "Existing ASIC Holders Needing Renewal click here", no, you have to look through their FAQ to find the link to their on line application form. Time wasted a couple of minutes.
2. Oh Goody! I find the form. There is this big warning "" Only use with Microsoft Explorer - so shut down Firefox(a far superior product) and start buggy insecure Explorer...oh well. Now the programmer gets to display their erudition. Two "Ifs" in sequence with no logical link between.....
Am I applying to renew? Tick the yes box. Then appears another little box...
Did CASA issue my original ASIC? Tick the yes box. I'm still at a loss what happens if I tick the "no " box, what does it then say? Another little box appearing saying "You poor bastard" or something" This is plain bad design that a first year interface design student would be failed for.
3. Oh Goody! I get to apply online! No more visits to crowded doctor's surgeries for recertification that I am human, CASA already know, they gave me an ASIC didn't they?
I fill in all the boxes neatly, although by now I'm slightly surprised that they haven't just recovered my previous details leaving me to update them and voila! But this modern technology is still great!
4. I update my long list of criminal convictions and idly wonder where the online comment box doesn't come up for me to explain how it wasn't really my fault that I crashed Aunt Bertha's car into the Police station last month. They must already have the rest of the list of my pathetic explanations on the database from my previous application.
5. I decide to pay online. I give my credit card number to the screen, Idly wondering if I can see the "secure session" lock, but I can't make it out on this new fangled windows Vista screen, but CASA wouldn't be asking me for my Card number and details on an unencrypted link would they?
6. Now comes up another screen with a big "Print" button on it. Oh Good! I get to print a copy out to remember what Lies I told in two years time, surely my submission is online.
7. Vista duly downloads a copy of the form and opens it to be printed, and.......................
I've wasted all this time to fill in a bloody .PDF form application?? And I've STILL got to get new photos, passports, identity documents to prove who the **** I am? And then mail the whole bloody thing to them????
WTF didn't you just tell me to print off the application form and fill the bloody thing in instead of leading me through a phony "On Line" experience.
But wait, there's more....so I goes to print this document on my whizbang network printer...and Vista can't find my printer. In fact Canon and Microsoft are having a bit of a barney about compatibility so I can't print this effing document anyway.
Ah Ha! I think, I'll go to my own old computer and fire that up! I'll print it from there, but when I go to save my application, I get a prim little message from Adobe saying "you can't save the contents of the form"...wonderful.
I've just F***ed around for thirty minutes to fill in a form that could have been done in five minutes.
But now the confusion sets in.. Was any of that session actually "on line?????" Where has my data gone? More importantly where has my credit card number and $186.00 gone?
I'm so F***ing mad at this needlessly complicated mess that I may not even bother with an ASIC at all. I may not even bother with a flight review later this year. I won't be reapplying for an ASIC anytime soon, at least until I cool down.
Why is this crap so needlessly complicated, time wasting and pointless? The farcking terrorists won when they let this toxic administrative crap loose.