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Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm
by northernlovely
When my dad had a stroke back in 2006 I was worried and nervous when he came out of hospital, even though he had an alarm cord in his bathroom, bedroom and hallway, he had nothing in the lounge and nothing about his person should he slip or fall, or have any problems in and around the home.
That's when a friend told me about ... Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm. Here is my review based on our experience with the phone over the last 18 months since he moved into his new disability bungalow.
**Price and Availability**
The Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm is available from specialist disability shops, which is where we bought ours from, and online at retailers including Amazon. I paid £65 on the high street and it's currently £61.25 on Amazon so the prices seem to be both fair and consistent.
**Why Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm?**
The Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm is more than just a standard big key handset, it comes with an emergency alarm which can be worn on a lanyard (supplied) around the neck or on the supplied wrist strap like a watch. Just press the big alarm button and it will call your emergency contacts in turn (you program three into it so it's more likely you will reach at least one of them).
Obviously your emergency contact needs to have their phones on them (I always recommend a mobile) as missing an emergency call would be unthinkable. For that reason I use my always-on work mobile, husband's mobile, and my dad's sister's landline. It would only ring hubby and then my aunt if I for some reason was unavailable. If I was on the phone the system would try the next number. If I answer it gives a pre recorded emergency message along the lines of 'Mr Bloggs requires assistance, press zero to confirm'.
Aside from the emergency button (which was the main draw of the Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm for me) you can also press one of the red emergency buttons on the phone to make an alert.
This is why we bought the Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm over a standard phone. You can buy systems which connect to a live emergency service but we reckoned this would be a good stop gap as he already has that service corded into his bungalow and this is an added extra, also there is no subscription fee as it just uses your regular telephone connection.
**In Use**
My dad is partially sighted so the three line big letter screen is a welcome sight not only for caller display but for making calls via the phone book too. The big keys mean using the phone is a doddle and the cord is long enough to mean he can sit comfortably and have a conversation. He sometimes uses handsfree, and this is excellent in volume and with the mic.
The build quality of the phone is excellent, very sturdy and styled in silver plastic with black buttons and white text.
In terms of setting it up, I did this for my dad and most elderly or disabled (or both) people would probably go down this route, however for the record it was easy to set up, the instructions were clear and the setup took about 30 minutes. It took my dad a few days to get used to the phone.
If you have a hearing aid this is a hearing aid compatible phone and it also features a red LED light which flashes when there is an incoming call. You can set the phone to 'read' using an electronic type voice from the phone book so for example if I was calling it would say 'Kate calling'. If the number is not stored it reads out the number, which is handy for my dad because if the number is 'international' he will ignore it as it's always a sales call.
I think more than anything this phone is excellent for peace of mind, though it's a great all round disability phone too and my dad certainly is glad he has it. With it's wealth of features for the partially abled like my dad, it's well, well worth the money and is sure to last him. I've never had a real emergency call from it though we test it every 6 weeks to be sure, but it reassures us both to know that he won't have to ever feel alone or scared should anything as bad as his stroke happen again.
**Recommend?**
If you have the need for it, the Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm is an absolute marvel and it will do you well. It's a lot pricier than a standard phone of course but it is worth the money and I highly recommend it not only as a phone for the disabled or elderly but as an emergency system which is very effective. I highly recommend the Audioline Bigtel 50 Alarm, for the money it's the best non subscription emergency contact phone / system out there today.
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Panasonic KX TCA155
by MEL0611
It is very rare that I use our land line phone, these days it is so easy to pick up my mobile and chat away to friends and family whilst on the go, I often catch up with friends when I am walking home and as the mobile phone deals are so cheap I would be lost without it, but I did find myself at a loss when our landline phone went down a ... few weeks ago, My Nan and a couple of Aunts just don't seem to be able to get the hang of phoning my mobile so I need the landline for them as much as anything so when I was using it and the line was so faint and crackling, after getting the electrician at work to look at it for me, it was deemed dead! So I had to look for a quick fix and after looking around I decided to invest in the Panasonic KX TCA155 and here are my thoughts on it.
I made the purchase from the Argos store, it was easy for me to be able to go into town and pick it up. The phone is also available from the Amazon website and the Curry's store. I know this as I did a price check, the phone will cost you around the £25.99 price tag so in my opinion that is not too expensive. I would not have really wanted to pay a great deal more the product and this seemed to fit in with the specifications that I had for the phone as well as it being a good known brand.
The Panasonic phone came well packaged and upon opening I found that it had a detailed instruction booklet as well as a 2 year manufacturer's guarantee. The phone has quite a sleek design about is as well as the base being nice and compact. It is brushed silver in colour and the buttons are black with the numbers printed in white and they do stand out really well and are very clear. The phone is cordless and it is run of rechargeable batteries, there is 600 minutes of talk time and up to 120 hours of standby time. I guess like my other phone we just got used to charging it overnight and this seems to work fine, I have never know the phone go flat on me!
The phone is quite lightweight to handle and it is also comfy to use. There is a very clear display on the phone, it is a LCD display screen and when the phone is in use it will light up. Because we don't tend to use the phone that much I guess we have not taken full advantage of the memory on the phone but you can add some favourite numbers. One thing that we did access on the menu button of the phone was the ringer and volume controls. I set the volume to the highest as only having the one handset, I needed to be able to hear it all across the house, I set it at the highest but even this is still a little bit quiet but that is just my personal tastes.
I have to say that after using the phone for some time now, I am really pleased with it. The phone has a good reception and when using it I find that it is really clear. Whilst I may not really understand all of the technical stuff that goes with a phone, I do like that it works well, is really easy to use and is reliable, as I mentioned, it charges well and I would hate not to have it now.
There is no answer machine facility with this phone, that is something that was done on purpose as we have the BT answer phone but it is worth me pointing it out.
In summary, as I am sure you have guessed, I am really pleased with this phone and it is really easy to navigate around, reliable and good quality.
5 out of 5 from me
Thank you for reading
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Panasonic KX TCA101
by MEL0611
Whilst it is not every night that I sit at home after work on the phone chatting the evening away, it was when our old landline broke that I suddenly realised that I was quite lost without it. My Nan also struggle with the amount of digits a mobile gives her (She only needs the 5 digits to get me on the land line bless her!) so I was ... quite put out when I had to get a replacement and quite quickly as well. I didn't have a great deal of specifications with the new phone, after all, both myself and my partner have mobile phones so it was just for friends and family to be able to reach us really and after looking around I opted to buy the Panasonic phone, model number KX TCA101. Here are my thoughts on the phone.
I wanted to be able to purchase the phone quickly so got this one from Amazon. I knew that the details Amazon put on their site are always accurate and whilst I would have rather had a quick look at the model first; Amazon was also the cheapest place to make the purchase from. This phone will cost you £34.99 which in my opinion is not too expensive and you are still getting a good branded named phone. The phone can be found at a couple of electrical retailers for the same price but it was still quicker for me to order the phone off Amazon than to try and get into town and collect them.
Within 5 days the phones arrived and I was soon to unpack them and get them charged up. The phone needs a couple of batteries placed in the back of it (These do come as part of the package) and then it needs charging for a few hours so that you can begin to use it. The phone has a lovely sleek look about it, it is mainly black in colour and it is really comfy to hold as well as have up to your ear.
The phone has an LCD display that when in use will shine a light blue colour. The buttons also show up in a blue colour as well. The print on the buttons is white and they are very easy to press and use. The phone is also really easy to get used to and I could soon navigate my way around it. Once the time and date had been set as well as having to add a couple of contacts into the phone book and set volumes up for ringing and speaking I was good to go.
As I mentioned, using the phone was really easy to use so making phone calls was a doddle really! I found the phones speaker to be very clear and as this is a cordless phone there was a good range to it, I was able to take the phone down to the bottom of our garden and still have a clear conversation. There is also an answer machine built into the phone, again it is very easy to learn and add your own message onto. The answer machine stores up to 40 minutes of messages and it will flash if you have a new message.
There are a couple of features that I have never used on the phone, such as the alarm clock function and the any key answer setting, I guess I just make my calls and don't really need any other functions. We both really like this phone in our household and I have no issues in recommending it to you.
5 out of 5 from me on this product
Thank you for reading
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