Calling the speaking clock repeatedly

[Twopoodles]

On checking the phone bill from Virgin, saw the charge had gone up by £19. It turns out she has been calling the speaking clock on 123 and has already started racking up the bill for this month too. Apparently there is no way of blocking this call without losing all her incoming calls. She also constantly calls us, if I have been out of the house for more than 10 mins I will get constant calls as do my siblings and I can see that this has covered in other forums but not sure how to deal with calls to premium numbers. I am reluctant to change the phone as changing anything causes such great upheaval and her phone is her security blanket. I am staying with mum for 8 months now so hoping the problem will diminish but certainly no guarantees. How have others dealt with this? TIA

 

[Donkeyshere]

We have a dementia calendar which is clear and gives the time - others might know if there is a speaking clock one that you dont need to use the phone for? or would your PWD cope with Alexa and ask that the time from that?

 

[Twopoodles]

It’s not the time she’s after it’s just to hear a voice especially if she can’t get an answer from us. I don’t even know if she’s dialling that number deliberately or just randomly hitting 123 as she gets more anxious. We do have 2 “dementia” clocks in the house

 

[Lynmax]

We installed a Truecall call blocker on mums phone, mainly to stop incoming scam calls as only numbers that we have added to her trusted list can now call her. Anyone else ( withheld numbers are automatically blocked) hears a message telling them to call my mobile if they need to speak to mum. With this equipment you can also block certain outgoing numbers so you could block the speaking clock. The pwd does not have to press any buttons to accept calls and mum is not aware that we installed it.

That won't help with repeated calls to you though as you would not want to block your number. My mum has a bad habit of dialling 1471 to see who last called her then calling them back, this can be annoying as I might get multiple calls through the evening if I was the last person to call her! I tend to answer once, check she is fine then not answer again for a while.

 

[Grannie G]

It’s not the time she’s after it’s just to hear a voice especially

My mother used to phone the police to ask the time and the day if she couldn`t get hold of me when I was at work.

 

[brambles]

My mum has a talking clock ( quite cheap from amazon) you just press the top gently and it speaks the time and the temperature, Mum used to press it all the time when she lived at home. She still has it with her in the care home and thankfully doesn't use it quite so much, but still likes to keep it near her. It might be worth trying this.

 

[Sarasa]

British Telecom, who were mum's service provider phoned me up as she was spending a fortune getting the operator to connect her to various numbers, including the talking clock, and they were concerned about her. As well as dementia she had macular degeneration so couldn't see the numbers she wanted. We got her put on a new tariff and I took control of her bills which helped. I also got her a very simple push button talking clock that told you the time and date, but she hid it as she thought I was treating her like a child.
Shortly after all that she went into a care home

 

[nitram]

There used to be a Doro phone with a keypad that could be obscured with the facility to dial up to 4 specified numbers which could be identified by small photos.

https://www.alzproducts.co.uk/doro-319i-ph-dementia-phone

It's no longer in manufacture although it appears regularly on eBay

EDIT
Just found one
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/X2-DORO-...746946?hash=item4da2bc8a42:g:NUUAAOSw849d1V08

NOTE
Two phones are available, one is boxed with keypad cover, the other does not have a keypad cover. Both are in clean good working order.

@Twopoodles