Cell phone-Bluetooth surprise

[ny biker]

My car stereo system has Bluetooth to sync up with a cellphone. Today I learned just how good that connection is.

I was at the car dealer, having just had some routine maintenance done by the service department. Specifically I was standing just outside the building waiting for the porter to bring the car to me. The Bluetooth signal on my phone was turned on -- I had turned it on earlier in the day and forgotten about it. I had to call into a conference call for work, so I dialed the number while I was waiting. I heard the automated attendant for the conference call system prompt me to enter the meeting number, and then heard nothing else from the phone. While this was happening, the porter drove the car up and parked it about 20 feet away from where I was standing. I walked over to the car (wondering why I wasn't hearing anything from my phone) and as I got near it I heard a voice coming from the stereo inside. I had turned the stereo off when I had gotten out of the car earlier, so I was surprised (and not happy) that someone who worked on the car evidently had been listening to the radio.

Then as I sat down in the driver's seat I realized that I was hearing the conference call that I had dialed into on my cell phone. The Bluetooth had connected the call to the car stereo -- from 20 feet away!!

I only recently synced the phone to the car, so I'm fairly new to this technology. I used to always have the phone's Bluetooth signal turned off to save battery. But my commute has gotten longer recently, so I've started to turn the phone Bluetooth signal on when I'm in the car in case someone tries to call me. (I'm actually not a big fan of talking on the phone while driving, even with the Bluetooth/handsfree capability; I keep conversations short or pull over to the side of the road if that's not possible.)

Since I'm the only person who has keys to my car, it's not likely that this sort of thing will happen again to me. But it's useful to know that my car can take control of my phone from so far away. I have relatives who are married and have adult children, so multiple people drive their cars, and they have the same Bluetooth-sync ability. I think it's possible that they could be in their house trying to talk on the phone when a family member pulls into the driveway and the Bluetooth connects and takes over the call. I'll have to ask them about it.

[OakLeaf]

With my Toyota, you can pair multiple phones, but if you want to deactivate one and activate another, you have to do that from the car. So the scenario you're envisioning wouldn't happen unless the person in the house had activated their phone and the person driving never activated theirs.

I keep BT off when I'm not using it, too.


And FWIW, it's a rare occasion when the mechanics *don't* listen to the radio in my car. But IIRC, the BT system should turn it on automatically, otherwise you'd never be able to receive a call unless the sound system was already on.

[Crankin]

Why do you turn it off at all? I don't talk on the phone a lot, in general, but the point of Bluetooth is to be able to receive calls when you are in the car. When I answer one, it is work related and it has saved me invaluable time. I am not making social calls! Before I had Bluetooth, I would have to stop, pull over and call the person back. I know the information about being distracted and using Bluetooth, but I keep the calls short and most people respect it when I say I'm in the car, just give me the essentials.
The only problem I've ever had is after we put my phone onto DH's Bluetooth. We were driving home from our cycling trip in VT last Sept. when I had several client phone calls of an emergency nature and we couldn't turn off the Bluetooth quickly enough while we were driving. I had to tell the person to hang up and let me call her back, so her voice wasn't coming out of the Bluetooth, where DH could hear! It was a pain, so we took me off permanently.

[OakLeaf]

I turn it off for a number of reasons ...

- battery life, as NY biker said
- reducing additional emissions - yeah, I get that it's miniscule compared to the cell signal, but why take in more than I need when I'm not using it? Same with the battery life really, even though the amount of additional energy is miniscule once I plug it in, why burn more carbon than I'm using?
- risk of viruses - also miniscule, but again, why take a risk when I'm not using it?

But mostly battery life. I would not be able to get through a day without plugging my phone in if I left all that stuff on all the time. GPS is obviously the biggest battery hog - drains the battery in four hours - but any wireless service will drain it, and the more it's searching for signal that it isn't finding (like when it's paired with your car but not in your car), the more frequent and stronger search pulses it sends out, and that depletes the battery WAY quick. Just like those times when you're in an area where your phone signal keeps swapping, and your battery goes dead in half a day when you're not even using it.

Anyway, the only time I even turn the BT on is when DH is out of town. (This should go into the age and fear thread I guess ... I never worried about emergencies when I was single.) That gives me the time I need to answer the call before it goes to voicemail and tell him I'm driving and I'll need to call him back. If it isn't him I can see who it was and decline the call. This is a practical decision based on when he's out of town on his ongoing and endless family emergency, if I couldn't see who the caller was, I'd be so distracted with worry that I might not even be able to pull over safely.

[Crankin]

Wow, battery life doesn't even enter into my equation. I keep my phone on 24/7, and when I am home, it's plugged in and on. Some days, that means it gets plugged in at 7PM after being off the power supply since 8 AM, and others, it's on battery power/plugged in on and off all day. But, I've left in on all day/night, uncharged, and still wake up the next morning with at least 40% charge. On a typical day where I am out of the house most of the day and it's on, connected to Bluetooth for 2-3 hours, I rarely see less than 60% charge. Now, I don't use my phone for videos, GPS, or any of those other charge zapping things, but I do look on line, text, check email, as well as use the phone.
I really felt Bluetooth was worth it in the past couple of months when my son in CA called me and I was driving fairly long distances for work. He has no concept of when it might be good to call, and I was able to have very meaningful conversations with him; sort of like when it used to happen when he was in the car with me.

[ny biker]

I'm finding that Bluetooth does not use up a huge amount of battery on my phone. I just generally keep things turned off unless I need them in order to not run down the battery unnecessarily. You just never know when a derecho will sweep through and knock out the electricity for a week...

For a long time I just didn't see a need to connect my phone to the car's Bluetooth. My commute was 4 miles each way, so I was only in the car for long trips on weekends. I live alone, have no family within 300 miles, have no children who depend on me or significant other to make plans with. No one has an urgent need to reach me. And I really don't get very many phone calls.

I synced the car to the phone recently because my commute has gotten longer, and I've been working from home in the mornings and driving to work around lunchtime. So it's possible that someone at work might want to call me while I'm in transit. Also during long trips I sometimes want to call someone at my destination to let them know where I am and if there are any delays.

I can see how it's a useful tool for many people, but until recently I had no motivation to use it myself.