How Much/Many of your Mobile Functions do you Use?

[Bill1945]

Good Afternoon,

As I sat here today and admired the picturesque and photogenic winter scene outside my house (and took pictures with my mobile) I asked myself the following question:- how many of the functions of this magnificent device do you use? 

Including the default apps. I reckon that I use my phone extensively but the comms side much less than the calendar, calculator, camera and music. Toting that lot up I would say I use 75% of the phone functions.

I would really like other thoughts on the Subject.

Bill1945

[pgn]

I can quite happily do most of what I need to do on the smartphone I have today, but I do sometimes get the laptop out for anything that benefits from the bigger screen. I tend to do my banking on the laptop, but have been known to do it on the smartphone on occasion - apps seems to exist for everything these days!

[Glory1]

Like you @Anonymous I use email a lot. Also Skype and Whatsapp. Haven't used SMS in ages though I get a text from Waitrose when a delivery is 15 minutes out.

Don't tweet or post on FB or Instagram or any other messaging site.

The one thing I rarely use my phone for is making calls. It's easier and doesn't interrupt whatever my friends are doing to email them. Then they can email me back, Skype or message me on Whatsapp.

Most of my friends still work and have families. So as a single pensioner my time is more my own then theirs is.

Oh, and I do have voicemail enabled on my phone. I don't want to miss possible important calls from my doctor's surgery for example.

[pgn]

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@Glory1 wrote:
Oh, and I do have voicemail enabled on my phone. I don't want to miss possible important calls from my doctor's surgery for example.

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I find many doctors, dentists, hospital clinics mask the number so you cannot bypass the queuing system when you call back - it's vary rare I'll answer a number showing as "number withheld" on either my mobile or my landline, and ditto for numbers that are not in my phone's address book!

[Cleoriff]

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@pgn wrote:

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@Glory1 wrote:
Oh, and I do have voicemail enabled on my phone. I don't want to miss possible important calls from my doctor's surgery for example.

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I find many doctors, dentists, hospital clinics mask the number so you cannot bypass the queuing system when you call back - it's vary rare I'll answer a number showing as "number withheld" on either my mobile or my landline, and ditto for numbers that are not in my phone's address book!

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That's the problem @pgn Many people who expect Doctors, Hospitals and District nurses to call will always have Number Withheld  showing. You can't afford to miss those.

[pgn]

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@Cleoriff wrote:

That's the problem @pgn Many people who expect Doctors, Hospitals and District nurses to call will always have Number Withheld  showing. You can't afford to miss those.

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It's not impossible, just that the people who install and set up the surgery's, practice's or hospital's phone system don't set it up correctly.

I've worked on the replacement of an entire phone system twice, each time it has been perfectly possible to have any extension behind that main number set up to show either the extension id to the outside world, if required, or to show just the main phone number which whould be used for people to call back on.

How do you think these scam callers get the number to show up as if it's coming from Ayr or from Gravesend when in reality they are in the Himalayan foothils or back-streets of some Ukrainian suburb?

If you push back on the place that insists on having all calls come to you as "caller withheld", they should be able to feed that back and have the system set up to show the main contact number, at the very least.

[Anonymous]

The calls from my doctors surgery show as 'private'

There was a time when I was quite anxious about nuisance calls ... from advice gained on the community I now don't fear them ... block the number after the call ... & ... I generally say something like = will you please speak slowly (they talk way too fast anyway) when they percieve me as eg not worth the bother, I ask them to delete me from their database ... they are usually pleasant about this ... I'm content with this arrangement as I don't manage confrontation well at all

I'm happy with voicemail disabled = callers can leave me a text

[Cleoriff]

I'm sure the NHS and associated services haven't the money to invest in a new system @pgn

If the call goes through a central switchboard then it will show up as withheld.

As an aside, that's why our Hospital still runs Windows XP

[Anonymous]

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@Cleoriff wrote:

I'm sure the NHS and associated services haven't the money to invest in a new system @pgn

If the call goes through a central switchboard then it will show up as withheld.

As an aside, that's why our Hospital still runs Windows XP

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My daughter-in-law @Cleoriff works as a pharmacist ... their IT system is Windows XP, the set up is on a trolley, when it 'goes down' another similar replacement comes

When last in my local NHS hospital the computer which dealt with the men went down so we were all waiting what seemed like a long time ... only 1 obnoxious la-di-da woman was loudly voiciferous = I sorted her out *smirks* ... we were all glad when she was called for her appointment

God Bless The NHS 

[Glory1]

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@pgn wrote:

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@Glory1 wrote:
Oh, and I do have voicemail enabled on my phone. I don't want to miss possible important calls from my doctor's surgery for example.

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I find many doctors, dentists, hospital clinics mask the number so you cannot bypass the queuing system when you call back - it's vary rare I'll answer a number showing as "number withheld" on either my mobile or my landline, and ditto for numbers that are not in my phone's address book!

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That's quite possibly so but my doctor's surgery doesn't mask the number so I always know it's them.

I am totslly with you on withheld numbers and numbers that aren't in my phone's address book. Also numbers I just don't recognise. While I may be useless at remembering names, my memory for numbers is very, very good.

[pgn]

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@Cleoriff wrote:

I'm sure the NHS and associated services haven't the money to invest in a new system @pgn

If the call goes through a central switchboard then it will show up as withheld.

As an aside, that's why our Hospital still runs Windows XP

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Oddly enough, @Cleoriff, the calls that go through a switchboard are the easiest to set right - the switchboard has a base number, that's what gets passed on to the telephone network as calls are passed from the switchboard onto the telco or call carrier.

But yes, quite often, for cost reasons, the NHS in particular puts up with whatever they get when the system was set up initially, and that's the way it stays. From their perspective, it's cheaper to get people to modify their behaviours rather than engineer the correct solution.