Have you ever had that sick feeling when your Android phone goes missing?
It happened to me!
After a day of work, errands and the usual rigamarole, following dinner, my husband and I settled in for an hour of TV. That’s when I process and post my Instagram photos that were shot during that day.
When I went to grab my Samsung Galaxy Note 4, it was not to be found!
Hmmm. I looked through my office, my car, and the usual places in our house, then started to quietly freak out. Where is my phone?!
Tried to call it — nothing. But I distinctly remember having it here when I got home this afternoon. Weird!
If you’ve linked your Android to Google, you’re in luck. I used the My Timeline link (https://www.google.com/maps/timeline) on Google to retrace my steps. I wanted to see where in the world my phone could be:
It’s interesting, but a ton of people must lose their Androids. If you type “I lost my Android phone” into Google, you’ll get something like this:
When you sign in, Google gently urges you to have a back up phone designated to receive 2-step verification (if you’ve set it up that way)
After you sign into Google with your password, Google will attempt to contact your phone. You can choose to have it can ring your phone at full volume for 5 minutes to help you find it. The only thing is, in order to do that, your phone’s battery needs to have some juice. Mine was dead, dead, dead.
So I selected the option to lock my phone, put a message on the lock screen, then changed the password. Pretty cool you can do all of this from your computer. You also have the option to erase your phone, or change the name of the device. Since I was PRETTY sure it was in my house, I didn’t want to erase the phone. I hadn’t backed up the contents for a week, so I would’ve lost some photos.
During the 3 days my phone was missing, I checked the location each day and saw that it hadn’t moved, and I also saw that the phone hadn’t been re-charged or turned on. Yep, Google can tell!
Google says the phone location is accurate to 33 feet, and it’s not kidding. So I had to believe the phone was someplace in my home. But where? I thought I’d looked everywhere.
As an added measure to make sure the phone couldn’t be used, I had Verizon suspend the service but continue billing. If you suspend service and maintain billing, there’s no penalty. But if you suspend service and billing, for each day service is suspended, you add 1 month to your current contract. www.verizonwireless.com/support/suspend-service-faqs/
When you suspend your phone service, Verizon will send you an email verifying you’ve requested to do so. Included in the email is a link to reactivate it — super convenient!
So, how did I find my phone?
The first half of the week, after an epic run of hot weather, it had finally cooled down. So I’d been wearing black skinny jeans and black socks with my Arcopedicos.
I don’t know what other people do, but I keep my sports socks in a separate drawer.
On the day I found my phone, Seattle was back to hot, sunny weather. It was time to break out the shorts and tennis shoes! That meant I needed some low socks!
When I opened the drawer, lo and behold…
I activated the link on the Verizon email and the phone was back online in a few minutes.
It was freaky being without my Samsung Galaxy Note 4 for so long. I take it with me everywhere, because it’s the best camera I’ve seen on a smart phone.
I hope this article will help you in case you find yourself in this predicament!
Happy ending for me. I hope it is for you, too!
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Terri Nakamura on Twitter: https://twitter.com/terrinakamura
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More from Terri Nakamura: http://seattledesigner.blogspot.com/
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