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Ok...I’m almost 70. My wife(age 68) and I have had flip phones all through the smart phone revolution. 2 years ago my daughter gave my wife her old iPhone 4S, but I kept my slide under texting flip phone.
Now we need to start traveling by Air rather than long road trips which are really exhausting with our reduced reaction time and people traveling at 75 mph 10 feet from each other in all weather. And so we need to get mobile checkin/boarding passes, easy maps through airports, joining the rental car “clubs”, the hotel “clubs” and the airline “clubs”. All of these have mobile apps to make travel easier. Soon the global card and the pre-check will probably be on my smart phone.
This is really just a stop gap until we all get chipped. China now has millions of cameras and uses face rec software to rate the population according to standards they want people to have---who to talk to what to buy etc.
At my age, I don’t have lots of friends to communicate with all the time, and I am not planning on having my nose in the phone, when I could be reading a good book, or having a conversation. My whole working life consisted of continuous conversations all day long---I was a professional talker.
And so, instead of being stampeded into buying the biggest and best, we bought the lowest model, which was the flagship model only 2 years ago!!!
We are being forced to do this to keep up with the world, not because we want to.
Hilarious? LOL
OK Man.
Yes, I travel quite a bit. I am 50. I am an IT Professional who has had smartphones since the very first smartphone. Hell, I had a Blackberry pager before most of America knew what a BB pager was.
It's still not very hard to print a boarding pass. Not even a little bit. And they still take those at the gate. Or you can print one at the kiosk in a few minutes.
I am in a rental car club and I don't need a phone to give the cashier at the counter my name to apply my points. Usually when I give them my name only they already know I am in the club.
Same with the hotel. And same with the airline. All that stuff is taken care of before I even leave for the airport.
To say a phone is MUST HAVE for that stuff is succumbing to the marketing.
Ah yes you are a regular traveler who is pretty young(50 is young to me).
Yeah... my sister in law was a international banker with the division in the far east. Everything was arranged for her, with very specific instructions. Now that she’s doing everything on her own at age 66, she’s beginning to have issues.
Wait 20 years and talk. You won’t believe the difference in how much a hassle these things become when you are only 10 years from being 80. And especially for someone who hasn’t been on a plane since 2006, and then it was a direct flight. The travel apps will make it much easier. Pretty soon they won’t take paper. Heck, the IRS is making noises about refusing to take paper any more.
Are they a MUST? No they aren’t. Did I use the word “MUST”? No I didn’t.
I'm 75 and just got a iphone 6 a few months ago, I had never had a cellphone. I did have a tablet and with the helpful guy at Cricket plus friends I am surprised at how quickly I learned it. Cricket and other companies had a special deal on it back then.
I love it, I feel like I have joined the rest of the world. It had been super handy many times compared to when I only had a house phone.
Wait 20 years and talk. You won’t believe the difference in how much a hassle these things become when you are only 10 years from being 80. And especially for someone who hasn’t been on a plane since 2006, and then it was a direct flight.
The point I am trying to make it that the 'old' ways still work 100%. Printing a boarding pass. Hell you can print one from the kiosk at the airport.
You do NOT need a rental car app on your phone. Do you not make your reservation before you even leave for the airport? If you get points in a club, that is taken care of online or, even on the phone, before you ever even get to the airport. Same with air miles.Same with the "Hotel club".
I don't understand why you think you NEED these apps. 100% do NOT.
Age has zero to do with it. Or tech savvy.
I am off the charts tech savvy. I have over 150 apps on my phone. I LOVE my phone.
I travel a lot. I don't have an app for the hotel or the rental car company.
I still prefer a paper boarding pass. It's just simpler.
Get to TSA. Unlock my phone, find the app... it won't scan? O wait let me turn up the brightness... try now.
vs. Hand over a piece of paper.
You are making it more complicated. Book your car online. Everything's squared away. Then... login to the app? For what? I don't even get how a rental car app is all that helpful. Remember... this is 150 app guy asking...
Quote:
Are they a MUST? No they aren’t. Did I use the word “MUST”? No I didn’t.
You kind of made it sound that way.
Last edited by Peregrine; 10-28-2018 at 08:40 AM..
In this day age I don’t see the point in NOT having a smartphone. I’m 250 miles from home with only my iPhone typing this. We are visiting a friend who just turned 80 and basically uses her iPhone for everything. I’m 68.
Are they a MUST? No they aren’t. Did I use the word “MUST”? No I didn’t.
You said you were forced to despite not wanting one. That pretty firmly says you consider it a must. I disagree. You got by for how many years but now all of a sudden you're force to have one? Nope.
Take it back. The world won't end. You'll either miss it because you did want it or you won't because you don't. Either way your life will go on.
I just used the American Airlines App on my iPhone 7, to directly choose our seats on 3 of the four flights that I booked back in August. I was going to try to do that with my MBP but I had trouble locating it. On the AA app for my iPhone, it was right there when the flights came up with my AA Advantage membership.
The other flight didn’t have any seats I could book together without paying an additional $60, and even if I did, there were none together. 30% of airline seats are available together at the ticket counter with the agent. So I guess we’ll try to do that at the airport by getting our boarding passes directly.
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