I have noticed a rather disturbing personal habit of missing company conference calls. I set alarms on my iPhone, but often get distracted by other phone calls and get a lot of notifications so I often ignore them. I have researched iPhone apps that call you at a certain time. My scheme would be for a phone call to come in 10-15 minutes before the conference call and I would be like “AHA: that conference call I forgot about!” Phone calls get my attention more than Notifications.
I found one app called “Remind Me” but it seems shady as I can’t seem to figure out how much each phone call to me costs. There are also free apps that will send “fake” calls to you but you can only set those up at most a few hour time frame and are more designed for having a laugh at your friends than any practical use.
Any non-judgey suggestions? I recognize my personal irresponsibility but am seeking tools to help me do better!
My suggestion would be, rather than an app that calls you at a specific time, get an alarm clock app, and specifically choose one that lets you choose a custom alarm tone (i.e., a sound or song that you know will specifically be an alert for an upcoming conference call). And, then, only use that alarm for that sort of alert.
As a person who suffers a lot from the same issue I have to say I consider this in the highest degree unlikely. Also possibly on the dismissive side.
Number one concrete suggestion that I would say - can you do an audit of notifications you receive and get rid of ones you don’t need to respond to? Or set them to vibrate or a tiny chime. Because at the moment it looks like you’re training yourself not to respond to phone alerts and this is undoubtedly contributing to your problem. You should ideally not get any alerts you don’t have to do SOMETHING about.
He’s ignoring those alarms. The problem isn’t having something to remind him; the problem is having too many reminders and then ignoring them. At work we often have the issue of people demanding that The Big Blue Database warn them anytime anybody sneezes: we warn them that’s going to be a huge amount of messages (most of them irrelevant) and then people just ignore them all, but no, since automated messages for sneezes are possible, automated messages upon sneezing must be sent.
Part of it is a matter of trying to clear up any notifications he can. For example, I never set my email to give me a popup or chime when mail arrives; if the computer pings I know it’s an appointment.
This is the right answer. You are already getting so many notifications that you ignore them, adding another type of notification is just adding to the problem.
If you are unable to reduce these notifications, another option, mentioned once already, is to set your alarm tone to the same tone as your ringtone. The iPhone clock app has just that functionality, you can apply custom sounds for each alarm you set. You can even setup something very different, like a song, or a recording of your own voice as the alarm tone.
It sounds like the OP isn’t setting an alarm (which would have to be physically shut off), but just setting* what,* a calendar event?
OP, you need to stop getting so many notifications. I’d become numb to them, too. Are you getting them for Facebook or whenever you get an email? Stop that!
I’m very ADD, and can forget almost anything, and have to have notifications. BUT I only get them for calendar events (which, if set to specific time, have a chime, too). The trick is, I only put important stuff on my calendar. No ongoing “Yoga every Friday at 6” - - THOSE I can remember.
I’ve trained my family/friends to not text me during work, and to never call. So if my phone chimes (or vibrates when I’m in class or a meeting), I know I’ve got something I have to do.
The iPhone alarm has its own sound (different from other notifications or phone calls). It also will, by default, play the sound even when your phone is set to “vibrate.” It also needs to be responded to manually and has a “snooze” button.
Like others have said I think the alarm (the actual alarm app) might be your best bet. Turn off your ringer so the alarm is the only thing that makes noise.
Would it be possible to mute your phone from all notifications except the reminder alarm? Say, if the conference call is at 1:00, when you set the reminder for 12:50 or whenever, at the same time set it to turn off all other notifications from 12:40 onward. That way you won’t get distracted by anything incoming, and you’re less likely to be on the phone when the reminder hits.
I agree with the other advice, start disabling all alert notifications that are not a high priority to receive. Turn off notifications from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, email, etc. etc. On my work iPhone the only audible alerts I get are for incoming phone calls, texts, and calendar reminders or invites (email has the visual badge icon to indicate new mail - no audible or push notification). I don’t need to know audibly that a friend just commented on a meme I posted, or I’ve been re-Tweeted, or whatever useless “alert” is being generated by default by any number of apps on my device.
Can an iPhone use any audio file as an alarm? (I know it can be done on Android). If so, record a voice reminder of the conference call specifics, save it as an audio file, and set that file as the alarm sound. It will literally tell you that there is a conference call coming up.
If that doesn’t work, then The Librarian seems to have the right idea.