Thursday 15 March 2012

Is the TrueCall Screening and Blocking device worth it?

The TrueCall made its first appearance on the well known TV show, Dragons Den. Pete Jones has also been quoted to say the TrueCall is the best gadget he has seen in 6 series' of Dragons Den. In a sentence what this device does is block calls from people you don't want to speak to, but i will review each of the features and how useful they are.

The first feature i will look at is 'whisper'. This asks the caller to give you there name before your phone rings. The TrueCall then reads this out to you so you can then decide if you want to speak to them or not.  This is useful if you just don't want to speak to someone right at that moment but would any other time, maybe a partner or friend. A downside to this feature is that it doesn't take into account human nature and the fact that people can lie about who they are. 
Another feature is called 'Zap and Star'. This essentially is when you create a list of accepted and unaccepted callers, and the pre-determined unaccepted ones are automatically cut off. This is a good feature if there is someone, maybe an ex partner, or company such as debt collectors that you never want to answer the phone to. 
The feature is the TrueCall 'shield'. All this means is that the person who is phoning is asked to a press a number on the keypad before their call will connect. This is a good feature as it means that automated phone calls from companies are eliminated so you can be sure it is a real person you are answering the phone to. One problem this may cause is someone that is regularly phoning you may start to get frustrated as pressing a button every time they phone you may get tedious. 
A fourth useful feature on the TrueCall is an Anonymous Caller Reject. Simply all this means that any phone calls you may receive, where the caller is using a withheld number will automatically be rejected. This is a good feature if you have a shy personality but sometimes your friends may be calling from a withheld number and so may find it difficult to get hold of you. To try and counter-act this problem though you can set the device so that any calls from a unrecognised number can be sent straight to the answer phone instead of being rejected. The TrueCall does have an in-built answer machine in which the memory can be extended by the use of an extra memory card. 

The TrueCall Screening and Blocking device also has a number of advance features. I will now explain them and state good and bad points for each. 
For the first year you get a free Internet Control Panel. This means you can look at your call details and edit your settings using the internet. This is a good addition as it literally puts it in plain English your call patterns and provides a simple way to set up your TrueCall device. The only downside is that you will eventually have to pay for this but you don't have to worry about that for your first year, which by that point you will more than likely fell that this feature is well worth the small cost of £15 per year. 
You can also have personalized greetings on your device. This means you can record your own message that people who phone you will hear. This is good because it can inform people you want to speak to that they have the right number but if your trying to avoid someone such as the debt collectors, it then lets them know that they have the right contact number but you are just ignoring them.
Another security feature on the device is the code access. This means that anyone phoning you may have to enter a pre-determined number combination to connect to your phone. This is a good idea as it means you can limit who you want to call you but people may forget this code or not know in the first place

Overall the TrueCall screening and blocking device is an excellent product. It provides great value for money as you can see by the number of intuitive features that allow you to customise completely who you allow to phone you. Please use the link below to view the TrueCall on our website for a full specification and prices for the device itself and the added memory cards. 


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