Another week has passed, and Steamship Authority officials still don't know what caused the technical glitch behind the online reservation system.
Steamship originally planned to open the Vineyard route's summer public reservation season on Jan. 19, but officials said the start would be delayed while the glitches were addressed.
Ferry companies have struggled in recent years with overloaded systems on days when thousands of travelers are trying to make summer plans.
James Malkin, president of Vineyard on the Steamship Board of Directors, said the problems with the reservation system highlighted the poor reliance the ferry company had had on its own IT infrastructure.
“There are a myriad of technical issues,” Malkin said. “His IT infrastructure on Steamship, which has been maintained through the hard work of individuals, is in critical need of reassembly and restart.”
Malkin said new systems should be built by outside companies with appropriate application expertise.
“We're not a technology company. We're a ferry company,” Malkin said.
This year, the technical issues began with the Head Start program in early January. The Head Start program is an opportunity for local residents to reserve a vehicle before visitors. Users then reported glitches and long wait times, repeating the problems from previous years.
As of Wednesday, Steamship had not yet announced a new date for the start of the summer booking season. Malkin said Steamboat is still trying to figure out what's wrong with its reservation system before it opens.
One bright side, Malkin said, is that Islanders can now make appointments through the Head Start program.
Summer vehicle reservations for Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard were scheduled to open on January 23 and January 30, respectively.
SSA General Manager Robert B. Davis said in a statement earlier this month that the agency is investigating issues surrounding technical issues. Davis said the delay will allow SSA to conduct further testing and resolve technical issues that existed during Head Start's rollout.
“Our IT team takes preparation for this day very seriously every year and has been working hard for weeks, running multiple load tests of our booking process and testing our waiting room products.” Davis is quoted in a sent release. It was put to sea by the Steamship Bureau on Friday afternoon. “The preparations did not indicate that there would be any problems with opening reservations this week.
“We want to be completely sure that we have identified and addressed any remaining issues before making the decision to open reservations,” Davis continued. “These booking opening dates are the start of your summer journey and we always strive to make it as smooth a process as possible. We look forward to announcing our new opening dates to our customers as soon as possible.” I am.”
During the Head Start rollout earlier this month, Steamboat responded to complaints about technical issues with its reservation system.
“After further investigation and consideration, the Steamship Authority's IT team, in conjunction with our system vendor, has determined that today's reservation issue is related to connectivity issues on a subset of our web servers.” says the update. “We believe the issue has been resolved and the reservation process is now running successfully. Additional testing of our servers was conducted overnight and senior management will review the results on Friday before making it available to the public.” We will determine whether additional measures need to be taken.”
The next day, SSA announced the postponement of summer reservations.
