(ECNS) – A visually impaired man on Monday sued China Railway Corporation and two other organizations in a court in Beijing. The man is asking for compensation and upgrades to the official train ticket website 12306.cn to make it easier for people like him to buy tickets online.
According to a report by the Zhengzhou-based Dahe Daily, 12306.cn only provides graphic verification codes, which screen-reading software cannot read.
After failing to buy a ticket on the website, Chen Bin, a visually impaired massage worker in Beijing, asked for a day's leave and spent 110 yuan ($17) on taxi fees to buy a ticket at the Beijing West Railway Station.
Chen and his lawyer then filed a lawsuit against 12306.cn's parent company China Railway Corporation, as well as China Railway Information Technology Center and the China Academy of Railway Sciences. He is demanding written apologies, a promise to upgrade 12306.cn, and compensation of 101 yuan and payment of his lawsuit fees.
Chen can operate computers and smartphones proficiently with the help of screen-reading software. His colleagues were not able to help him buy tickets, however, as they are also visually impaired, and Chen hesitated to ask a stranger for help due to privacy concerns.
According to the paper, there are about 18 million visually impaired people in China. Online payment apps, such as Alipay, and online banking services, all offer voice verification to make things easier for the disabled.
In early 2015, 12306.cn upgraded verification codes from a combination of numerals and letters to the current photo-matching model. This immediately sparked protests by more than 100 visually impaired users, who called for the site to be barrier-free, but received no feedback from China Railway Corporation.
A customer service clerk told the paper that the site indeed has no voice verification function, but promised to report users' needs to the Internet technology department. However, the clerk failed to give any timetable.
Chen's lawyer Huang Rui said 12306.cn, as a public service agency, should offer barrier-free communication services for the disabled according to Chinese laws.
A Hangzhou based IT expert surnamed Yang told the paper that the key problem lies in money, not technology. Opening the voice verification function means making an investment in only a small group of customers, which might be why the company had second thoughts.
