Dear LPG

Did you know that over half of UK pensioners now have a smartphone? I know because I googled it and also because well over half of my friends and I have one, too. The pandemic was the reason I ended up with one, and the long days of lockdown were the reason I learned what little I know about using it.

The one good thing about them is that when they ring, you can see who is calling you, or at least the number that is calling, but when it starts to ring, it can take ages to remember what I did with the thing.   As my fingers have got a little clumsier, the slim shape of the latest ones makes picking it up quickly a hit-and-miss activity, especially when it is ringing.  Either I am out, and it is at the bottom of my bag, or I am in the dining room, and I leave it upstairs.  After the scramble to find it, I have to press the green answer button so quickly that I had no time to look at who was calling. 

They are a wonder if you can get the hang of it, but the downside is that once one of those sales callers gets your number, they have a habit of calling again and again.   Many of us also have a friend who perhaps calls too often and talks for too long. In general, we older people hate to be rude, but once we are rid of some callers, we would rather not hear from them again unless it suits us.  Blocking the numbers of the people you don’t want to hear from is one way of dealing with the problem.  Then, they will get your engaged tone or message, and it won’t take them very long to work out what you have done.  It is a message that might hurt their feelings, which I would hate to do, and there are some people you might want to call back later because you are concentrating on something else at the time. 

I recently learned of another solution. There is one more way to get a good idea of who is calling without having to rush to focus on the number on the screen before deciding to press or not to press; why not use your ears?

Did you know that your phone can offer more than one ringtone? When I first bought it, my son helped me choose one, and there are many to choose from before you even learn about the notification and alarm tones. By mobile phone standards, my smartphone is pretty old, but it has more than 40 different ringtones to choose from. I have also found a video showing you how to make any song your ringtone. 

The technicalities can be tricky, but you can put all your callers into categories.  The first one should include the friends that you look forward to answering the phone to, and then you could have one for your family (I have my children as a separate category again); then there are the people you would rather not talk to that often because they keep you talking, and you need to make time to have those conversations. I also have a particular classification for the sales assistants who get your number and keep bugging you or the so-called friend that only ever phones when they want something, etc., who deserve a category all their own. 

Having done that, you might need someone who knows more about your mobile phone's settings than you, but with patience and video education, you can choose a ringtone to go with each caller category. It is surprising how quickly you learn to regulate your dash speed for the phone when it rings, depending on which ringtone you hear.

I have found a few online videos explaining how to do it yourself, but I suggest you get someone who understands how to do the technical bit for you…  

GF, Catford.

GF offers those videos…

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