Instead of being issued a 'beeper' (do they even make them?), our team was each issued a corporate cell phone, iPhone 6 with unlimited data plan. Ok but 'the powers that be' started complaining about 'over use of the unlimited data plan' and there has been at least one employee marched out the door because of the 'racy pictures' of his 'girl friend' found on his. Heck, I'd bought a protective case good to 6ft under water with my after-tax money since if it got wet and stopped working, I would have to pay for it. In effect, it became: Limited use Something whose content led to people being fired An expense to my pocket, the protective case Won't sync with older Mac iTunes at home So two days ago, I got a used, iPhone 5s with 64GB. Yesterday, I closed out my flip-phone, pre-paid, and a wireless hotspot into my iPhone 5s service contract. All of my apps have transferred along with the CD music I'd saved to a an early iPad and via iTunes, my older Mac: Unlimited use for my purposes It takes a court order to open my phone My expense is mine to use Synced perfectly with older Mac iTunes and all of my music CDs (do they make CDs anymore?) So the corporate iPhone sits in the cardboard box on my desk. I'll put it on charger when I am on call and during my week, I'll carry it around in the original box. All personal Apps and content have been deleted. In effect, it has become a business-use only phone. But I may turn it into a robo-call, honey pot. A honey pot is a computer system set up to attract the 'fruit flies' of the internet. Robo callers have replaced SPAM that is now effectively handled by 'white-list' filters. So I'll set the ring-tone default to be very, very faint (me laughing my nice person off) and put custom ring tones for the 'white list' numbers. Bob Wilson
my kids hate having to have two phones. one convinced the company to use personal with fixed monthly reimbursement. neither work in classified industries, but some info is private, especially hr.
I have a company phone that is an Iphone. I don't know what the model is, cause I'm an android user. I only use the work phone for work. I use my phone for my personal use only. In all my jobs that required company issued cell phones, I always had my own phone.
Company phone came with 24/7 emails from the boss with their ideas and questions "for discussion first thing" Monday morning. . I declined the offers.
Work phone goes on silent and sits on the charger in the armrest as soon as I get home. It comes back out when it's time to go to work. It has never been in the house.
We're a little more humbly equipped with phones, although we do also get last-years tablets and notebooks. I use my company (5c) only to receive text messages because unlike certain political figures that I won't name here, I'm actually required to keep an air gap between company and personal electronic data. SMS forwarding is frowned upon by policy. Otherwise my COU phone would remain @ my desk. Interestingly enough, forwarding my voice calls is (still) considered to be OK by the powers that be. Not wanting to repeat the mistakes of certain political figures that I won't name here......I checked. Therefore my 5c remains in its company provided OtterBox case and resides in my notebook case until a warbling tone advises me that there is a trouble ticket inbound - or some other company broadcast message like.....not to text and drive. Always a favorite when I'm on the road. The 5C has been used as a backup for a proper phone (Droid) a few times, which makes it more functional than a pager, albeit one that is still amazingly frustrating to use. There are two things I actually like about the 5. 1. It has a for-real physical, mute switch. 2. Good battery life. (probably because of how it's used)
My personal flip-top phone, Sony Ericsson, served well until the BMW i3-REx, preconditioning app came along. So my wife's home phone announced my calls because of the number. Having moved the number to a personal, 5s, she still gets the announcement and I also have remote control of our BMW i3-REx. But like you, the company phone now sits on the desk or is carried home in the box. At work, on charger but otherwise, in battery stress test mode. Bob Wilson
when my partner and i were in business, we had 40 company phones assigned, to the tune of about $3,000./mo., which we eventually were able to negotiate down to about $1,200. with at&t. employees were free to use them personally, and i don't recall ever hearing any complaints. but often, the boss is the last one to know.
This is why I got a dual sim cell phone. 2 different ring tones for 2 different lines so you know by the ring tone which line is ringing. 2 different backgrounds for each lines so you know right away which line you're dialing out of. Easy to switch between lines. I don't know why the US doesn't embrace dual sim phones.
It is likely because phones weren't sold to consumers, but to the phone companies. Having Verizon unlock your phone so you could take it to AT&T is a recent development in the US.
You would think the carriers would embrace dual sim phones because they don't make money on the phones. They money on the service. Having dual sim phones means the carriers can push 2 lines to customers while using only 1 device.
Well, part of our service fees are for covering the cost of free phones and upgrades. But few people would take the two lines. Most of the people with a business and personal phone don't own the business. The business line could be paid for by the business, but I expect most businesses wouldn't want their data and info going onto a personal phone.
From what I can tell about our IT Security policies, they don't want 'corporate' information going to the employees either. Bob Wilson
All too true. In some ways, I don't blame the corporations for this stance due to the nature of the beast that is the American civil court system (you can sue someone for literally ANYTHING in the good old US of A). However, it's a gigantic inconvenience for everyone involved that corporate IT insists that everything should always be on lock down all the time.
