Computers Clever, Users Stupid?

The other day I was trying to plan a short break away next February so I hopped on over to Expedia to get some prices on flights. I’ve used Expedia many times before and it’s always been reliable, easy to use and a pretty good web experience. Though now they’ve made a subtle change which is damned annoying. I put in my date preference but noticed that there was nowhere to put the year. No problem I thought. It’ll obviously know that February has been and gone for this year so will automatically know I’m looking for 2004. But instead I get this error message: We can only accept dates that occur between 14/12/2003 09:22 and 7/11/2004 09:22. Please enter a new date. I then get the chance to input the entire date and correct the year. But hang on - it never gave me the chance to enter a year in the first place! Yet I get told it was my “error” and I should correct it! How dumb is this? The user was not at fault here. The system was at fault. If they feel the need to not have a year input on the first page then fine, but for Christ’s sake make it intelligent enough so it doesn’t then make out the user is a bloody caveman. In contrast check out a really beautiful web experience, form and function working together - Tablet Hotels.