Criticizing the cost and delays in releasing the Taiwan Railways Administration’s (TRA) upgraded ticketing app, two Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers yesterday asked the agency to release all the procurement contracts related to the app.
The upgraded app was released on Sunday, but on Tuesday some people complained about being disconnected as they tried to purchase tickets.
The TRA spent about NT$1 billion (US$32.4 million) to develop the new app, which was an extraordinary amount, Legislator Jason Hsu (許毓仁) told a news conference he held with colleague Alex Fai (費鴻泰).
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
He had followed the app-development project for a long time, and its budget was apparently increased by NT$850 million after it was incorporated into the Forward-Looking Infrastructure Development Project, Hsu said.
Prior to that, the TRA had spent NT$200 million to create the app, he said.
“I am very curious about the technology used to develop this app,” Hsu said.
The TRA said it had developed the app itself, and it is equipped with “top-notch” functions, but it cannot guarantee that people can always book the tickets they want, Hsu said.
The agency repeatedly delayed the app’s release, Hsu said, adding that it had not been launched before the Lunar New Year holiday last year because the TRA feared it would not be able to pass a stress test.
The TRA and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications should release all the contracts involved in the creation of the app so the public can know where the money went, the lawmaker said.
It would already be a lot if someone spent NT$10 million to develop an app, yet the TRA’s upgrade cost NT$1 billion, Fai said as he also called on the agency and the ministry to tell the public what exactly they did with taxpayers’ money.
Franklin Wong (翁佳驥), a member of the Software Liberty Association of Taiwan’s board, told the news conference that the app’s program code would show whether it was worth NT$1 billion.
TRA Information Center Deputy Director Liao Wan-hui (廖萬輝) said the app has two parts: One for the public to use, which can be used on both IOS and Android systems, and another is for the palm pilots used by train conductors when they are working aboard a train.
Developing the two parts cost NT$10.8 million, Liao said.
Asked about complaints about users being automatically disconnected when trying to book tickets, Liao said that he was not sure what caused the problem.
Meanwhile, the TRA said that in July 2015 the National Development Council approved the allocation of NT$1.07 billion to improve the TRA’s ticketing system, which covered the establishment of the system’s core network, printing magnetic tickets, a ticketing app and a back-up network.
Then in April 2017, the Executive Yuan said that NT$850 million of the budget would come from funds designated for the Forward-Looking Infrastructure Development Project, it said.
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