To expect to be able to buy a mobile incoming call only phone for mother with dementia?

[Mxflamingnoravera]

My mum has dementia she has recently moved into a new care home that don't seem to be set up for being able to call my mother in between visits.
She had a doro but used it to call me twenty plus times a day and I had to remove it from her because I was getting no sleep.
The new home doesn't seem to have a system set up to be able to call residents except by mobile phone owned by the resident. So I need a phone that cannot be used to make outgoing calls and is simple to use. A smart phone is no use for her she's beyond learning how to use it.
My aunt and I both need ti call her, my aunt only has a landline and is 83 herself and will not consider a smartphone or iPad for face time (and I'd have ti drive hundreds of miles to set it up for her which I just cannot do).
Is there an incoming only phone that would work for our needs? Or ami expecting something uninventable!

I might be being dim here, but would a basic phone with no credit do the trick?

How about a cheap pay as you go, but just don't put any credit on it?

pay as you go nokia brick just make sure you register her number with tps to avoid spam

Yea I would have thought a phone with no credit would do the trick. Only problem would be if she started to use it to call 999

www.tescomobile.com/shop/pay-as-you-go/110-4g?queryID=3b7b05da9949378f84e5dc51b106c575&objectID=42871&indexName=prod_default_products

Nokia brick from tesco for £30. Make sure you use up any credit it comes with before giving it to her.

That's sound like an idea, I thought phones with no credit could take in coming calls but if it's the case that they do then that is a great start. I can get big standards pay as you go and leave it at the nurses station and they can take it to her when we call.

The only issue is that some sim cards might need a minimum top up every so often, so have a look at what their requirements are

Some companies will block in coming calls if no credit top up within a certain time frame but its usually longer than a month or 2. If you didnt put any phone numbers or contacts in phone would she remember your number

If it’s kept at the nurses’ station surely that solves the problem?

Might remember 999 I suppose? You wouldn’t want her nuisance calling emergency services.

www.alzproducts.co.uk/incoming-calls-only-dementia-telephone?gclid=Cj0KCQjw08aYBhDlARIsAA_gb0enkFmoFz3DPcL5fthPh13Ybnymne3zYs5W6ecDDi0u_jCXZsJAsGkaAkDTEALw_wcB

The incoming calls phone linked to above looks a great idea (I hadn't seen that) but it is a landline so presumably not helpful in this situation if residents do not have a telephone point in their room.

If she keeps the mobile in her room it's likely to get 'lost' fairly quickly so as you say it's probably a better idea to ask the staff to keep the phone in the office anyway, and give it to her when you ring.

My MIL's pay as you go vodafone mobile has recently been cut off because she hadn't made a call for 90 days. I took it to her nearest vodafone shop to try and get it reinstated, but they weren't interested. We thought that the phone had to either make or receive a call to keep it from being cut off, but it obviously has to make a call.
So you would need to keep credit on the phone and make sure someone uses it to make a call at least every 90 days. Unless there's a better network out there, but I can't find one.
It does seem totally unfair to the elderly, I tried to explain to the rude shop assistant that she only used it in cases of emergency, he just wanted to make her change to a monthly contract payment, but she doesn't use it enough for that.

Could you get a cheap refurbished smart phone anyway, and then use the settings to somehow block her calling out? iphones have various new 'focus' settings and things like that, and it would take a fair bit of nous for her to bypass those.

Does she remember your phone number still? Perhaps not saving any contacts would be enough for her not to use it to call out.

I also had trouble with PAYG phones, trying to keep one for a visitor, but never using it enough to stop credit running out/cancellation etc, but it was ages ago so I don't know what new contracts are like.

Thanks for all this helpful info. I could possibly use the old doro she had before but clear the numbers off so we can call her and pay the £10 month just to keep it going and call myself once a week or so when I'm up there I suspect I'm paying for it monthly anyway as I didn't stop the payments when I took the phone off her!
Brilliant you lot! How would I manage without mumsnet?

They'll keep the phone at the nurses station and say it's the home's phone not hers. So it shouldn't get lost!

With most PAYG you need to make a call (not just receive a call or send a text) every 3 months.
I got a PAYG sim on 02 which I put £10 credit on in an old phone which I only use once or twice a week for one purpose. (Need a phone for GPS and potential emergency, but don't want to take my relatively decent phone - also nice to be "off grid" ie no whatsapp, facebook etc!!!).
I make sure I call someone (usually myself) every few months so it does not get cut off. Definitely not paying £10 a MONTH!

Sipgate are a VOIP provider who will give you a free* landline number that will ring on a mobile, as long as the mobile has been configured with suitable software. (I use Zoiper.) The mobile doesn't neet to have a sim card in it, it just needs to have an internet data connection, say via wifi.

It does require some configuring of parameters to get Zoiper to work.

I migrated my old landline number to them when I cancelled my landline, so technically I have two landline numbers I can be called on, which both ring on my mobile. (Actually on multiple mobiles, I use an old mobile with no sim card as my downstairs extension.)

• There was a set-up charge when I joined sipgate, but they don't charge anything on an ongoing basis for hosting my number. They only charge for making outgoing calls. After signing up with Sipgate I never credited my account with them, so I can only receive calls.

Get an O2 Classic sim card - after your first top up of £10, the credit rolls over every month as long as you make just 1 phone call every 6 months. Call charges are: 3p a minute - 2p a text - 1p a MB. (The last of this tarrif only seems available on Ebay now where the price seems to be 99p for the sim - eg www.ebay.co.uk/itm/394189674346?epid=9031178906&hash=item5bc789176a:g:wzwAAOSwTFVi6~TL&amdata=enc%3AAQAHAAAA8J6zDAsS56t4x8%2FpARPCAgzYY%2BKuI98749CClbDcyG%2FEtp9LmY0a6u0h6LR1QSPfw4K%2BYbDKrvi0oMh2DyrtrPwODFtv4ubj0d4JVN3K84gUmMXa5UeJJWYUPEb4xoPS7K4Pqf5%2BnuN8Hbwvbb0x89Jt0EdM8UZH0vaGUY3HQtocG7s71XZpqv0mD%2BqaBsHEnMJW1wMBBHk8JklBogHicVE7MyGJSpaKvC%2BqyalQoLCe0jEHBKq%2BmjPX6dCBtjyvl52sfj37X2Xz5OsgwcA3jVOp3wHpVVW1%2BprY5SxvOc4hRJ0%2FhWfUUPP8fY30u9vpPw%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR_qi2u7fYA)

I know you were asking for something only for incoming calls but what about this - it can only call specified people so might be even more useful as she could call you too

www.doro.com/en-gb/shop/mobile-devices/easy-phones/doro-780x/

you need to think about charging the phone. After a lot of thought my Mum - mild dementia and resident in a nursing home- wears her Doro in a pouch round her neck and it’s put on the charger by her bed at night - BIG sign reminds new carers. She does not make outgoing calls and we never have trouble with Tesco Mobile.

@Autostress OP said she didn’t want that though as her mother was calling her 20+ times a day and disturbing her sleep.

You would need to delete her call list on a regular basis if there was credit on the phone.

Even if you delete all the contacts the recieved calls would show up.

She also said this one was to be left at the nurses station and taken to her mother as needed so presumably the nurses would ensure that wouldn't happen any more.

Depending on her capacity, this might not be a problem.

She may be used to a particular procedure for phoning someone, like clicking on their photo in the contacts or whatever. Going into the call log and checking recent calls might well never occur to her.

But yes, if the phone is kept with the nurses, the problem of her phoning out multiple times a day may just not be an issue any longer - depending on the level of care, of course, and whether they are likely to remember to collect the phone after and make sure she doesn't keep accessing it.