QR Code Embedded Browser Hell

A friend of mine is a digital nomad, and he was in Taipei for a few weeks. Feeling a bit bored and in the mood to do some traveling I flew over to visit him. Back in 2019 this friend left Hong Kong and asked me to hold onto his snowboard for him. Since I was going to see him, he asked me to carry over his snowboard. I agreed, but then when I picked it up I realised it was very heavy and I didn’t want to carry it on the plane. I was also worried EVA Air wouldn’t allow me to check it in and I would miss my flight.

This friend mostly lives in Chiang Mai, so I told him I’d mail it to him in Chiang Mai when I got back from Taiwan. Taiwan was fun, I hung out with him and some other friends and did some comedy open mics.

I got back to Hong Kong and searched around online to figure out how much it would cost to mail the snowbard. DHL said they’d do it for around $3000, some other were a bit cheaper, but SF Express quoted me $1700. I began to regret not carrying it on the flight.

I went for SF Express and started filling in their online form. It took a while to fill in, and I had to fudge some stuff here and there, but eventually I got it filled in. When I finished it, gave me a “waybill number” and a “reference number”. It didn’t really say what I was supposed to do next, but I ticked the “drop off at store” box, so I figured I should go to the store give them the numbers, and they would look up my record in their system.

There is a SF Express store 1 minute away from my house, so I carried the big heavy stupid snowboard over there. I got there and the woman at the counter said “Hmmm not sure if we can mail that. Let me check with the dispatch center”. She disappeared for a few moments then came back.

“They say it might be okay, but you’ll have to find a pallet, place it on the pallet and tie it down to the pallet, and we don’t have any pallets or rope to tie it down, so you need to get that stuff yourself”

“Ah okay”

“But yeah just go over to Fortress Hill and talk to the dudes there, they’ll have more information”.

I walk over to the Fortress Hill store and find it isn’t really a store. It’s a dispatch center with lots of dudes wandering around everywhere carrying packages and tying stuff down. There’s no customer service desk so I interrupt one of the guys.

“Hey I want to mail this snowboard to Thailand”

“Thailand?! That’s a bit weird.”

“Alright”

“Also, you might need to package this stuff separately, take the clothes out and send those in a box, while we send the board in the bag”

“Alright”

Then an original gangster type dude chimes in

“Nah fuck it, it’s already in the bag, just send the whole bag to Thailand.”

“Okay boss.”

Then the dude asks me “Do you have a waybill number?”

“Yes, and I show him the number on my phone”

“No like… like a sticker like this thing”

He shows me a sticker with a QR code on it.

“Nope”

“Okay, just take one of these and fill it in online. You need to describe everything in the bag. The jacket, the pants, the boots and the snowboard. One line item for each thing.”

Motherfucker! I’ve already done this! Whatever, things in life are mostly annoying, so I scan the QR code and start working on the 100-step form. It goes something like this:

1. Fill in your name and phone number
2. Verify your phone number
3. Fill in your return address
4. Fill in your destination address

At this point, I go over to WhatsApp to find my friend’s address. Then I try to return to the web form. Oh no it has disappeared. When you scan a QR code using iOS’s default scanner, it opens in an embedded web browser. If you switch to another app the embedded web browser closes. Which means you lose the embedded browser’s state.

I scan the QR code again, hoping the form has been saved on their servers. Instead I get an error message .

This QR code has already been used

Yeah, it was used by me, and I would like to continue using it. I try a few things, but I can’t continue with the form. So I find one of the dudes and ask him for another sticker. He gives me another one. I use a different QR code scanning app, it does the same embedded browser thing.

This other QR code app does not close the browser if you switch apps. It also lets me copy the url, so I copy it and paste it into the Google Chrome App. I get the “This QR code has already been used” error.

Okay, I’ll just fill it in nice and carefully. It should be okay. Don’t do anything stupid. I click into a section, discover I don’t need to fill it in, so I swipe back to go back in the embedded browser. Except, the app I’m using thinks “Ah he wants to close the embedded browser”. Once again I have soft-locked the form.

I go over to the man with the stickers.

“Hey can I have another sticker, I messed up the form again”

“How many of these stickers are you going to use up man? We’re going to run out of stickers if you keep going like this. What do you mean you messed it up?”

“I filled in the form, closed the browser and lost the form. Now I can scan the code again”

“Yo… you should use the Apple QR code scanner, that’s better”

“Nah that one closes the browser if I change apps”

“Why did you change apps?”

“Because I needed to see my friends address in WhatsApp”

“Ah yeah that makes sense, here take these”

He hands me a fat stack of stickers. At this point my phone is on 10% battery.

“I’m going to go home and scan this QR code on my laptop”

“Alright dude, see you in a bit”

I walk home, download some QR Code scanner on my laptop. I scan one of the QR codes with my laptop, get the URL and hit it in Google Chrome. The web form is designed to be used on a mobile phone. The layout is borked on a large screen and a lot of the buttons don’t have text on them. Luckily this is the fourth time I’ve filled in this form, so I’m quite familiar with it.

I spend the next half an hour filling it in. It works. I walk back to my bros at SF Express and hand them the QR Code. He scans it.

“Nice all good.”

I can’t believe it.

“Yeah so… this is just a bag with stuff in it. We can’t really guarantee that it’ll get there in one piece. Are you okay with that”

Seeing as it’s not my snowboard and I just want to be done with it, I say

“Yeah man no problem”

“Cool, that’ll be $360”

That is a lot less than I was quoted. I don’t question it, I hand him the cash, he does not give me a receipt, then I leave. I message my friend and tell him the snowboard is on the way.

Conclusion

I reckon Apple and SF Express are both to blame for this. If Apple’s QR code app would redirect to the Safari/Chrome this wouldn’t happen. If SF Express designed their system so the QR codes could be scanned multiple times this wouldn’t happen.

I think this is why people hate computers and software.

What does this have to do with AngusForm

It ain’t got nothing to do with AngusForm, I just thought it was a funny story.