How not to lose a cellphone at college?

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some of my D's friends tuck their phone into their bra for safe keeping!

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<p>I am trying to imagine what you do if the phone rings while you are wearing a turtleneck.</p>

<p>My son has no trouble keeping track of his cellphone because he wears loose pants with big pockets. But it's much harder for girls.</p>

<p>Speaking of cellphones and colleges, it's important to be aware that some companies' service is not so good on specific campuses outside of major metropolitan areas. So if you have a kid applying to college, you may want to inquire on that college's specific board here about what works and what doesn't.</p>

<p>If you go on Cingular's web site and don't mind renewing you can choose from many free to inexpensive ones for upgrade. They are usually different from the ones offered in-store.
The only problem was that the service online was horrible - they cancelled our order because I went to our account to accept the upgrade and choose the phone but when they went to ship the phone they looked at the account and thought we already got the upgrade and stopped the order. It was a nightmare trying to resolve. But she did get the phone eventually shipped to her at school.</p>

<p>I have lost several cell phones because I insist on taking my phone with me when I walk the dog. But it's been almost a year since I lost the last one, because I found pants that I like that have a zipper pocket. I have three pairs. Now the first thing I do in the morning is zip my cell phone into that pocket.</p>

<p>Yea, I lost my cell phone the other day when attending a women's volleyball game at the U--it slipped out of my pants pocket while I was cheering. :( Fortunately, someone found it & turned it in so I reclaimed it the next night when we were there to cheer on the men's basketball team. It was the 1st time I had ever "lost" my phone.
I've purchased my phone from T-mobile's business folks via phone (after 1st looking on-line to find out what free or nearly free phones they had to offer). I've had no problems working with them & have been very happy with the customer service & support--both at the local store & via the toll-free #. I agree that it's important to double-check about the reception at the school your child will be attending.</p>

<p>Good idea about zip pocket pants! (but see laundering problem above...)</p>

<p>I realized no one else has mentioned this: when you lose your cell phone you also lose all the phone numbers you have stored in it. After the first time, I started creating a printed list of all my phone numbers; periodically I check it against the cell phone and update it. It's a pain to put all the numbers into a new phone, but it's LOTS more annoying to try to get all those numbers again.</p>

<p>Maybe you can all encourage your kids to not actually take the phone with them everywhere, so I can stop having to listen to them go off in class, and I can stop having oblivious girls chatting on cell phones walk straight into me because they're not bothering to pay attention to anything besides their current vapid phone conversation. If I had a dollar for every time I heard someone call someone else just to say, "Just got out of class, see you in five minutes!" I wouldn't have any student loans. Maybe I should have been born before phones were invented.</p>

<p>I usually just carry mine in my purse, if I remember to put it there and charge it, and if I think I need the stuff in my purse for something I'll put it in my schoolbag instead of moving stuff around all the time. But I don't tend to take it with me lots of places...it's usually too noisy out on the street for me to hear it if it rings, and obviously I'm not going to be talking on it in class or in a restaurant or wherever, so what's the point? Certainly never occurred to me to put it in my pocket, and I've never seen another girl take one out of her pocket, either.</p>

<p>dmd-you are so right. When my first phone died, it was terrible getting all my numbers again. Didn't learn a lesson, next phone died but I could still retrieve numbers. I started making a list, the replacement arrived. Husband was certain the sim card will transfer them-wrong. Son's died last year and then I wrote the numbers to transfer-I saved the list-too bad I don't know what I did with it.</p>

<p>Yep, those lost numbers are the worst -- when my daughter lost her phone last week, she was in tears because of those lost numbers. She definitely appreciated an email from me the next week with a dump of all family numbers that I had stored on mine, plus the phone number of some of her close personal friends. (I even included her boyfriend's phone number, though I'll bet she had that one memorized!)</p>

<p>But it is a good idea to store that info. My d did email her friends asking for their numbers again, of course... and cingular keeps bills for the past 16 months on line, so you can always retrace frequently called numbers from the bills.</p>

<p>Calmom: now I feel like an idiot! I never even thought to check the old bills. Thanks, I'll know next time.</p>

<p>Calmom, your daughter might not have her boyfriend's number memorized. If he's in her "address book" on the phone she might just scroll to his name and hit the button.</p>

<p>My husband has had the same cell phone # for 2 years and I still don't have it memorized, because I put it into my address book once, and after that I just click on his name when I need to call him!</p>

<p>Lafalum, I know what you mean -- I don't have a clue what my son's cell phone number is, because it has always been auto-dial. DMD77, looking at the bills will only work for frequently called numbers -- you can see the phone number and the city, but not the name -- so if it jogs your memory you are fine, but you probably are still left with a lot of numbers that you can't connect to a specific person. On the other hand, the phone bill is the way I got my daughter's boyfriend's number in the first place - it was easy for me to figure out based on the frequency & length of calls.</p>