Web watch: we review what’s hot on the net

ARNOLD Clark Finance has recently revamped its website.

The homepage consists of a top menu which, when scrolled over, reveals a series of sub-sections. This is a particularly good way to reduce the page clutter.

There are also two menus on either side of the homepage which act as quick links to some of its practical features including a tax calculator, launch diary, hot deals and newsroom.

Each of the features has a button, but they aren’t clickable. The actual hyperlink is buried underneath in some text. The word is underlined, but it goes against the grain of standard website design. Visitors could end up clicking away with no results.

Past the navigational niggles, the site is packed with reams of factual text. This might prove to be a bit too in-depth for busy fleet managers. Those who stick around can learn about Arnold Clark Finance’s contract purchase schemes and its many solutions for managing fleets. There are pockets of useful features all over the site.

The tax calculator is one of the best features. It is easy to use and there is extra information available which shows how to work out national insurance contributions and national mileage rates, among others.

Another gripe with the site is the ‘interactive section’. Fleet managers just browsing through the site will be greeted with two blank boxes to input a password and user ID. You can click ‘here’ if you’ve forgotten the password… hang on a minute, what password? There was nothing in this section to tell you what it was about.

The other problem was that all the navigational bars at the top of the page and left-hand side disappear.

There was also no way back to the page you were on previously, apart from using the web browser or clicking through to the launch diary.

An email was sent asking what the section was about but there was no reply by the time Fleet News went to press.