A file photo shows a screenshot of the webpage of 12306.cn on Dec 28, 2013. [Photo/IC]

The Spring Festival holiday is always a peak period for train travel; and with tickets now on sale for trains during that period there has been a scramble to purchase tickets online. This has resulted in the railway authority receiving its annual deluge of complaints from users dissatisfied with its ticket booking website.

A large number of ticket buyers have complained that the online ticket-booking procedure this year, which requires users to input verification codes, has actually made it harder to purchase tickets.

According to the verification procedure, users must click on a photo they are asked to identify from a selection. Many hopeful buyers said they were denied access several times even though they correctly selected the photo required, and when they finally did gain access they were informed the tickets they were hoping to purchase were all sold out.

In response to the complaints, the railway authority said such a procedural requirement is aimed at making it more difficult for people attempting to buy tickets to resell. In the past, such ticket buyers have used specially designed software to snap up tickets.

The photo selection procedure is aimed at verifying the potential purchaser is human and denying access to such software. However, such a procedure is also proving a hindrance to genuine buyers, given that buyers cannot waste a second if they are to get a ticket for peak travel days.

Although it has made continuous efforts to reduce passengers' ticket-buying difficulties and provide them with more convenience, the railway authority has rarely won public approval and instead been criticized for its poor design.

The huge pressure on the railway network during the Spring Festival holiday means it will always be difficult to satisfy everyone, but the inconvenience its latest ticket booking system has caused ordinary passengers shows the long-criticized railway authority still has a long way to go to win the praise of the public.